When Dejanay Stanton had friends who were no longer welcome in their own homes, she brought them to her mother’s house.
Stanton began transitioning around 11, supported by her family who knew she was becoming the person she was always meant to be, her mother, Valerie Griffin said. But others weren’t as lucky, so Stanton often offered fellow transgender women a safe haven in her home.
“She was a beautiful soul,” Griffin said. “She always tried to help people.”
On Aug. 30, 2018, Griffin lost her daughter in an act of violence that spurred calls from activists and community members for better protections for the transgender community. That same year, another transgender woman, Ciara Carter Minaj Frazier, was fatally stabbed during an argument in the West Garfield Park neighborhood.
More than eight years later, Griffin’s alleged killer is standing trial, accused of luring her into an alley and shooting her in the head because he didn’t want anyone to know he had been involved with her. Tremon Hill, 25, is charged with murder in the slaying of Stanton, who was found around 11 a.m. in an alley in the 4000 block of South King Drive in the city’s Bronzeville neighborhood.
“She was living her life on her own terms,” Assistant State’s Attorney Jennifer Cooper said during opening statements Wednesday. “She was living her life as the person she wanted to be.”
The case is going before a jury at a time when the political climate has only grown more hostile, according to advocates who say they are still fighting for safer communities. Shortly after taking office in 2025, President Donald Trump issued an executive order rolling back trans rights.
The Human Rights Campaign has recorded almost 400 fatal attacks of transgender and gender nonconforming people since 2013, according to the organization, nearly 60% of whom were Black trans women.
“It continues to be a serious issue within the community, and our larger community needs to be paying attention to it,” said Elizabeth Payne, legal director of the Chicago Alliance Against Sexual Exploitation.
People experiencing intimate partner violence can call or text the Illinois Domestic Violence Hotline at 877-863-6338.
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“Any type of marginalization can increase the likelihood that someone can use power and control against a survivor,” said Amanda Pyron, president and CEO of The Network Advocating Against Domestic Violence.
Stanton’s family lined into a courtroom at the Leighton Criminal Court Building as the trial got underway before Cook County Judge Pamela Stratigakis.
Prosecutors are pinning their case on cellphone evidence they say documents texts between Hill and Stanton, as well as cellphone pings marking their locations, even though they say Hill attempted to delete them.
“(The pings) showed the victim’s phone and the defendant’s phone coming together in the secluded alley,” Cooper said.
But Hill’s public defenders told jurors that no witnesses, DNA or fingerprints link Hill to the crime scene.
“The death of 24-year-old Dejanay Stanton is an absolute tragedy, and her family and her friends deserve answers,” Assistant Public Defender Sarah Anderson said. “But the answer isn’t Tremon Hill.”
According to prosecutors, Hill, then 17, arranged a meeting with Stanton at a motel in July 2018. Afterward, he became afraid someone would find out about the relationship and asked her to delete photos and messages he sent her.
“The evidence … will show the defendant’s increasing desperation to hide his secret, until finally he realized that the only way he could hide it was to kill the only person who knew about it,” Cooper said.
He lured her into a “secluded alley” and shot her in the head, Cooper alleged. First responders found her lying outside a sedan was parked in the alley.
Her phone was on the driver’s seat, ringing constantly, a police officer testified.
Detectives then pieced together what happened after they recovered some phone conversations, even though Hill tried to delete them, Cooper said.
But Hill’s attorneys say police failed to look at other people who were a risk to Stanton. Anderson said she did sex work, putting her in a vulnerable position, though Griffin told the Tribune her daughter was not a sex worker.
“We’re not saying that to villainize or shame her, but sex work is dangerous work,” Anderson said.
The last time Griffin saw her daughter, she watched her get into her car and leave the house. She told her, “I love you, mom,” Griffin said.
Later, Griffin learned what happened through a Facebook post that showed the crime scene and asked people to check on their loved ones. Griffin knew it was her daughter, she said.
“It’s been a long eight years,” she said, “a painful eight years.”