Trans woman beaten by teen football players in hate crime, Washington cops say

Two teens are accused of beating a transgender woman at a Renton transit station in a hate crime, Washington police reported.

Nikki Armstrong, 39, of Renton told police the teens, brothers ages 15 and 17, shouted homophobic slurs during the attack, KIRO reported.

The teens are charged with assault and a hate crime in the attack at about 8:20 p.m. Monday, Sept. 15, Renton police said in a news release.

At a court hearing Tuesday, a judge ordered the teens held on electronic home detention, police said in an update.

Armstrong told police she argued with the teens earlier in the evening, police said. When she returned to the center a few hours later, the teens chased her, knocked her down and beat her, police said.

She suffered serious injuries and was taken to a hospital, police said.

“They were on top of me, and it was all fists and feet,” Armstrong told KING. “They held me by my neck and choked me while they were stomping on me and taking turns punching me in the face. When the kid took me down and put an arm around my neck I was 100 percent certain they were going to kill me.”

She told the station she suffered a broken nose and fractured eye socket in the attack.

Officers arrested two of the teens suspected in the beating, police said.

The two are brothers and play football for a local high school, KIRO reported. Police are looking for two other teens suspected in the attack.

Renton is about a 10-mile drive south from downtown Seattle.

A February Gallup poll found 1.3% of adult Americans identify as transgender, making up 13.9% of all LGBTQ adults.

There were at least 932 anti-LGBTQ “incidents” across the U.S., averaging about 2.5 per day, from May 2024 to May of this year, according to a report from the pro-LGBTQ media advocacy group GLAAD.

A record-high 52% of these involved transgender people, according to GLAAD.

This story was originally published September 17, 2025 at 9:39 AM.