Disclaimer: This profile includes graphic themes that may be considered disturbing to some readers. Reader discretion is advised.

Danielle Laurenti never imagined her job would cost her this much. 

In 2018, Massachusetts passed a criminal justice reform bill that included a provision mandating that prisoners be treated according to their “gender identity.” As a result, female correctional officers are legally obligated to strip-search trans-identified male inmates. 

For Laurenti, a survivor of sexual assault, receiving that order didn’t just feel like a violation of standard protocol. It brought her back to personal trauma she refused to relive.

“I felt physically incapable of performing this task,” she told IW Features. “And I was immediately punished for it.”

Laurenti had spent nearly a decade proving herself in one of the most grueling jobs a woman can take on. The single mother from Norton, Massachusetts, joined her state’s Department of Corrections (DOC) in 2010 to build a better life for her son, she said. She worked her way into an elite investigations unit, tracking down drugs and weapons inside the prison walls.

“I was really good at it,” Laurenti said. “I loved my job.”

Then, the state changed the rules. The 2018 Massachusetts Crime Bill stipulates that trans-identified inmates be given access to commissary items and clothing consistent with their “gender identity,” searched by an officer of the same “gender identity,” and housed with inmates of the same “gender identity.” 

This didn’t sit well with Laurenti, who filed a complaint and told her superiors she couldn’t comply with the directive to strip-search males, as she had been sexually assaulted in 2012 and feared having to “go through that again.” 

Before 2018, Laurenti said correctional officers could be fired for performing cross-sex searches. But the Massachusetts Crime Bill state stripped away this privacy protection—and with it female officers’ rights to consent—overnight with no warning, no training, “nothing,” Laurenti said. 

Notably, Massachusetts’ policy requiring female officers to strip-search trans-identified male inmates stands in conflict with the Federal Bureau of Prisons’ policy (5200.08 –– Transgender Offender Manual), which dictates that staff consent is required before conducting a strip search of an inmate who identifies as transgender. Laurenti pointed to the federal policy as the more reasonable one, as female officers should not be forced to perform these searches against their will, she said.

In her request for accommodation, which was reviewed by IW Features, Laurenti argued this “psychological distress” would interfere with her ability to conduct strip searches of “pre-op males” identifying as transgender.

The DOC’s response was swift, cruel, and unsympathetic toward a woman’s trauma.

She was yanked from the post she said she thrived in, reassigned to standard housing duty, and later dragged into a disciplinary hearing. Laurenti alleged department officials even told her she could be found in contempt of court.

“They didn’t care that I was a survivor,” she said. “They cared that I wouldn’t bend the knee.”

According to Laurenti, the standard search procedure is already graphic and dehumanizing. Officers must inspect “every inch” of an inmate’s body. This includes under armpits, behind ears, inside mouths –– and when the inmate is male, under the foreskin, behind the testicles, and into the anal cavity.

Laurenti described the process as “a sexual assault that you feel.” 

Laurenti argued the state is enabling predatory men to indulge in their sickest fantasies to adhere to radical gender policies. “These men… they enjoy it,” Laurenti alleged. “A lot of them have crimes against women. They get off on being naked in front of us. They know what they’re doing.”

But, when she spoke up to voice her discomfort, she said prison officials made an example out of her.

“They used me as a scare tactic,” she said. “They made sure every other woman in that prison knew what would happen if you said no.”

For years, Laurenti stood alone. She wrote to the commissioner but said she was ignored. She asked the union for help but was told her case was a “hot potato.” She applied for a medical accommodation for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), but according to documents reviewed by IW Features, she was unfortunately denied.

“I felt worthless. Completely betrayed,” Laurenti recalled. “It was like I didn’t matter anymore.”

Then, she found others who shared her concerns. A handful of women –– eight in total –– who also had been forced to participate in strip searches of male inmates. Together, they filed a class-action grievance in November 2023, led by the Massachusetts Correction Officers Federated Union.

The women’s allegations are damning. Their filing accused the DOC of violating its own sexual harassment policy and creating a hostile work environment for female staff.

“To force women to conduct cross-gender strip searches is to knowingly create workplace trauma,” the filing read.

But in April 2025, an arbitrator ultimately ruled against the women. Laurenti, who had been fighting this battle for several years, said she wasn’t shocked by their dismissal. But she was still furious.

“I was enraged, but I was empowered,” she said. “Everyone has that gut feeling when something’s wrong. This was wrong from day one.”

And Laurenti has let that empowerment fuel her decision not to back down.

Since her vertical demotion, Laurenti said she has been blacklisted from promotions. Though she has applied for positions she said she was overqualified for, she’s been denied time and time again, she alleged. There’s a general sentiment within the DOC not to promote her since she’s the one who said no, Laurenti argued.

And yet, she’s decided to stay and fight.

“I still love my job,” she said. “That’s the hard part. I love what I do. And that’s why I’m still here, that’s why I’m still fighting.”

In one particularly gut-wrenching moment, Laurenti recalled being called to perform another strip search after having earned a promotion to sergeant. She said she locked herself in the bathroom, as she couldn’t stop hyperventilating.

“They called me on the radio two or three times,” she said. “I didn’t want to lose my promotion. That’s money, that’s food for my kid.”

She ended up assisting another female officer in the search, breaking down in the process.

“Every time I do one [a strip search on a male inmate], I pinch the inside of my arm just to stop myself from crying,” she admitted. “It’s the only way I can get through it.”

Laurenti added that some of these trans-identified men even claim they are “lesbians.”

“They still want women, and now they’re getting off on having women inspect their genitals.”

Laurenti isn’t trying to make any major political statement—she’s just asking for mere human dignity. She added that she’s not trying to take rights away from trans-identified individuals — she’s simply asking to be afforded the same rights and respect by having the right to consent to these searches.

“We’re not robots,” she said. “We’re mothers. Daughters. Sisters. Every time a woman walks into that room and is forced to do that [strip search], it’s a government-sanctioned sexual assault.”

IW Features reached out to the Massachusetts DOC for comment, but they did not respond.

“It’s not just about me,” she continued. “I don’t want any woman to ever go through what I did. We deserve better. And we deserve the right to say no.”