A government-appointed commissioner has defended the choice to house a transgender father, who abused his daughter, in a women’s prison.

Sex Discrimination Commissioner Dr. Anna Cody stated during a parliamentary hearing that she considers convicted offender Autumn Tulip Harper as a ‘trans woman’.

Dr. Cody’s surprising admission came during questioning by Liberal Senator Claire Chandler at a Constitutional Affairs Legislation Committee session.

Senator Chandler inquired, ‘Are you aware of the Victorian case involving a male paedophile being placed in a women’s prison, which has been in the news recently?’ prompting Dr. Cody’s response.

‘For the purposes of the Sex Discrimination Act, do you consider that this man, who is a child sex offender, is a woman?’

Dr Cody responded: ‘The Sex Discrimination Act includes trans women within it, so, the person who I believe you’re referring to is a trans woman.’ 

Ms Chandler, a Liberal senator from Tasmania, ended her line of questioning with the comment: ‘That was very revealing.’

This parliamentary questioning followed reports by the Daily Mail that the Victorian Government provided over $100,000 to a transgender prison initiative shortly before Harper’s incarceration at the Dame Phyllis Frost Centre, a women’s maximum-security prison.

Jacinta Allan’s government announced an additional $30,000 funding to supplement the $75,000 already given to the organization Flat Out and its ‘Beyond Bricks and Bars’ program as of August 7 last year.

Harper, not their birth name was jailed on August 26.  

At his pre-sentence hearing, Witt Gorrie, the coordinator of Beyond Bricks and Bars, wrote a report for Harper which was highlighted by Judge Nola Karapanagiotidis as Harper was sentenced to a minimum 30-month jail term.

‘I accept that Mr Gorrie has the expertise and experience to give evidence on these issues and his evidence was not challenged,’ Judge Karapanagiotidis said.

‘The report indicates that all trans women who enter the women’s system are placed in solitary confinement upon reception and remain there for anywhere from five weeks to their entire prison sentence.

‘Placement in long-term solitary confinement is restrictive and has significant impacts on a person’s mental health.

‘In Mr Gorrie’s experience in working with trans women in the prison system, all have also ‘reported transphobic bullying and harassment’, along with sexual harassment and abuse, within the custodial environment.

‘He also referred to some of the common difficulties and delays around receiving, and appropriately monitoring, hormone replacement therapy in custody.

‘Mr Gorrie considers that as a young trans woman you would be particularly at risk in prison.’

Harper’s lenient sentence and allocation to a women’s prison after he was convicted of abusing his five-year-old daughter sparked outrage amid claims it has set a ‘dangerous precedent’.

The Australian Federal Police, acting on a tip from US law enforcement, raided Harper’s home in Clayton South, in Melbourne’s south-east, on September 15, 2023.

Investigators discovered Harper subjected his five-year-old daughter to ‘persistent sexual abuse’ between May and June of that year.

Harper sent 77 child abuse files via Discord to his United States-based paedophile master known in court documents as ‘Samuel Booth’.

The details of Harper’s offending, who pleaded guilty in the Melbourne County Court in July 2024 to charges including persistent sexual abuse of a child under 16, are too harrowing to publish.

Detectives discovered Harper had been in a ‘master/slave’ relationship with Booth where he would order them to perform daily tasks and film them.

‘These directions included brushing your teeth or showering, but also included instructions for the sexual abuse of your daughter,’ Judge Karapanagiotidis said.

Harper initially expressed ‘hesitance and concern’, once telling Booth that ‘she is my daughter and I shouldn’t be doing it’.

‘Booth encourages and instructs you to engage in a variety of sexual and perverse acts with your daughter,’ the judge noted.

‘He occasionally offers you affirmations that you made him ‘so hard and proud’ and that he is ‘impressed by you’ and that ‘you did so good’ and are ‘such a good girl’.’

Harper told police they ‘felt terrible and horrible’ about the offending.

‘You felt tied to Booth because you were not in a good mental state,’ Judge Karapanagiotidis said.

‘Booth seemed to care, which is not something you had much of. You feel your life had gone terribly and everything got worse.’

Forensic psychiatrist Dr Rajan Darjee said Harper ‘identified as a female, living as a female and hormonally female’ and exhibited a common ‘pattern of sexual abuse seen in females’.

‘This pattern of sexual abuse is one which a more dominant male pressurises, manipulates and/or coerces a female who has access to a child… to sexually abuse that child and/or to make that child available to him to sexually abuse,’ Dr Darjee wrote in his report.

‘The person who drives this offending is the dominant male who is able to use a vulnerable female to do what he is sexually motivated to achieve.’

Shortly after Harper pleaded guilty, an unnamed individual hijacked his Facebook page and changed the cover picture to the words: ‘I’m a pedo’.

The Department of Justice and Community Safety refused to comment on Harper’s location.

‘When considering placements, Corrections Victoria considers the safety of the individual prisoner and the safety of other prisoners and staff, as well as the security of the prison and relevant legal requirements,’ a spokesman said.

However, the Harper case has drawn anger from women’s rights campaigners.

Women’s Forum Australia chief executive Rachael Wong demanded that the Victorian government review the sentence, claiming the ‘extraordinary leniency sets a dangerous precedent’.

Women’s Voices Australia founder Jasmine Sussex said this was the grim consequence of the state allowing gender self-identification.

‘This is an obscene human rights violation by the Victorian government against the most vulnerable group of women in the state – those incarcerated,’ she said.

‘All decent-minded Victorians are sickened by this craven government policy.

‘It forces the County Court to lie to a five-year-old girl surviving her father’s evil sexual assault and aggravate his offence with state-sanctioned abuse – claiming the paedophile rapist is a woman.’

Harper was jailed for a maximum of four years and nine months.

The County Court heard Harper would most likely be housed in solitary confinement at Dame Phyllis Frost Centre.