A trans-identified male who raped an infant has filed for a request to be granted temporary leave from prison in order to attend an Indigenous ceremony. Adam Laboucan, also known as Tara Desousa, is currently serving a rare indefinite sentence at a women’s prison in British Columbia, Canada.
Laboucan is the youngest offender in Canadian history to be designated a dangerous offender by the court. The label is scarcely applied, and handed only to those offenders who are considered an extreme danger to the public with no foreseeable rehabilitative potential.
The designation came after Laboucan sexually assaulted a 3 month old baby boy in Quesnel, British Columbia in 1997. As previously reported by Reduxx, Laboucan was 15-years-old at the time and had been hired to babysit the child. The infant was so brutally injured by the attack that he had to be flown to Vancouver, 410 miles away, to undergo reconstructive surgery.
During the trial, an expert witness stated that Laboucan displayed “everything from transsexual to pedophilic tendencies.” A forensic psychiatrist who examined Laboucan testified that even he believed himself to be a danger to the public. “He said he was not planning a life of crime, but he felt he had no way to control the flood of violent, murderous fantasies,” Dr. Ian Postnikoff told the B.C. Supreme Court.
Postnikoff also revealed that Laboucan routinely mutilated himself while in custody, including chewing on and eating his own flesh to the point of deep tissue damage.
Disturbingly, Laboucan also admitted to murdering a toddler by drowning when he was just 11 years old, but charges were never filed because he was too young to be held criminally responsible under Canadian law.
Due to the horrific nature of the infant rape, as well as the testimony of multiple experts who asserted that he was a danger to the public, Laboucan was handed a rare indeterminate prison sentence in 1999 at the age of 17, and was declared the nation’s youngest criminally violent sex offender.
But despite the violent and sexual nature of his crimes, Laboucan was transferred to the Fraser Valley Institution for Women in Abbotsford after beginning to identify as a “woman.” In a dating site profile from 2018, he boasted of being given “720ccs DD gel implants” and a vaginoplasty. The surgeries are believed to have been covered using public funds from the province of British Columbia.
Fraser Valley Institution for Women features a minimum-security annex that hosts a program for incarcerated mothers and their babies. The Mother-Child Program takes place in a house comprised of facilities such as a shared kitchen, lounge and bathroom, as well as multiple bedrooms.
According to a source within the facility, Laboucan was housed directly next to the Mother-Child facility, and assaulted a female inmate during an altercation over his presence.
In October, Laboucan filed a request for temporary leave from Fraser Valley in order to attend a cultural ceremony in Vancouver hosed by the Circle of Eagles Lodge Society. According to the Circle of Eagles website, their purpose is to “support Indigenous Brothers and Sisters leaving federal institutions and those dislocated from society, to reintegrate into Community by providing respectful wholistic services and culturally safe spaces.”
Circle of Eagles CEO Merv Thomas was questioned by CTV on Laboucan’s application to attend their ceremonies, but declined to comment on his specific case.
“We leave the final judgments to the creator,” Thomas said. “We don’t judge anybody that comes to us.”
CTV used “she/her” pronouns for Laboucan throughout the report on his application.
Laboucan has unsuccessfully applied for temporary leave from prison several times, with the Parole Board deferring to his dangerous offender status. However, federal case managers have reportedly argued that Laboucan should be granted escorted temporary releases in order to help him move towards reintegration.
A report released by the Correctional Service in 2022 revealed that 82% of “gender diverse” prisoners in Canada who had a history of sexual offending were men who identified as transgender. Almost all had committed their crimes prior to claiming a transgender status. The overwhelming majority committed offenses that caused death or serious harm to their victims, over half of whom were women or children.
In June of 2017, the category of “gender identity” was made a protected characteristic after it was added to the Canadian Human Rights Act via a controversial piece of legislation known as Bill C-16. The Canadian government claimed the bill had been assessed for its impact on women prior to approval, but has refused to release any details of the assessment’s findings.