Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – A prominent LGBTQ+ activist has been charged with allegedly raping two boys ages 14 and 9, court documents reveal. Police arrested 37-year-old Kendall Stephens on a slew of charges, including rape, involuntary deviant sexual intercourse, unlawful contact with minors, corruption of minors, unlawful contact with minors, indecent assault against people less than 13 years of age, obscenity to minors and endangering the welfare of children.

The investigation began in September 2023 when the Philadelphia Police Special Victims Unit received disturbing reports from the grandmother of one of the victims who reported that family friend Kendall Stephens—who is Black—allegedly abused her grandchild. Officials say Stephens abused one boy on at least three occasions since 2022, beginning when he was just eight years old.

Stephens also allegedly gave the 14-year-old victim gifts “out of nowhere,” the victim claims in a possible attempt to “keep him quiet,” court documents detail. Moreover, Stephens purportedly told the younger victim that he would be locked up if the boy disclosed to anyone the abuse taking place.

The victims’ aunt—who asked to remain anonymous—spoke exclusively to Fox 29 News about details in the disturbing accusations, revealing that Stephens has been a family friend to the victims “since they were born,” as well as what transpired after her nephews informed their grandmother about the ongoing abuse.

“We were able to sit them down individually, which is when they broke down and cried and said everything that happened,” the aunt recalled.

The aunt claimed that Stephens did not deny the allegations when confronted by her and her mother, stating that “she didn’t deny it to us, she tried to flip the story and say my nephew tried to kiss her first…he’s nine years old. No, he didn’t.”

The 37-year-old activist has already posted bail on Tuesday, which was set at $250,000 by the judge and is scheduled for a preliminary hearing on Dec. 29, according to court reports.

Stephens previously made headlines in August 2020 after he was attacked in his Point Breeze neighborhood in South Philadelphia after confronting a rowdy crowd of six outside his home, threatening to call 911 if they didn’t quiet down and disperse. Stephens claimed three members of the violent group then targeted him for being a trans woman while his two goddaughters were present in the residence.

“They called me a tranny, they said, ‘You’re a man, we’re gonna get you.’ And they were repeating this all throughout the beating, (they) said that I deserved it,” said Stephens.

One of the attackers, Tymesha Wearing, pleaded guilty earlier this year to aggravated assault, conspiracy, as well as hate crime charges.  

“Nearly three years ago, Kendall Stephens endured a frightening crime that was intended to demean and silence her,” Philadelphia District Attorney Larry Krasner stated on the case. “Instead, Ms. Stephens continues to speak out loudly on behalf of other queer victims of violent crime — all while pursuing graduate studies. This criminal case is now closed, but Ms. Stephens will never stop fighting for the respect, support, and protections that queer people deserve in order to live safely, freely, and joyfully.”

Following the attack, Stephens became involved in local activism within the LGBTQ+ community, collaborating with city prosecutors on investigations involving LGBTQ+ victims and using political ties with top Pennsylvania Democrats to press for updates to Pennsylvania’s hate crime statutes that extended anti-discrimination protections to LGBTQ+ Pennsylvanians in 2021.

The legislative change was supported by Krasner, who lamented how he could not bring tougher charges against Wearing the prior year for the assault against Stephens. Stephens and other activists later joined Krasner for a 2021 press conference to help launch the LGBTQ+ Advisory Board as a “source of information and resources for victims and survivors of crime within the community.”

A spokesperson for the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office’s LGBTQ Advisory Committee confirmed with NBC10 that Stephens is no longer a member of the board:

“She was removed from the committee after the DA’s Office was informed about her arrest and referred the case to the AG’s Office,”

In an October 2022 post to Stephens’ Instagram account, Senator Bob Casey (D-PA) invited Stephens to speak “about the horrors facing the LGBTQIA+ community,” referring to Casey as a “true ally to the community.”

During his 2022 gubernatorial run against Republican Doug Mastriano, Governor Josh Shapiro also appeared with Stephens at a campaign event to promote his endorsements from “a diverse group of LGBTQ+ leaders” at the William Way LGBT Community Center in Philadelphia.

Manuel Bonder, a spokesperson for the governor, called the recent allegations “abhorrent,” telling Fox that Stephens “should be prosecuted to the fullest extent and process of the law.”

The Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office is prosecuting the case against Stephens after it was referred to them by the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office due to a potential conflict of interest given Stephens’ political ties and declined to provide further comment.

The extent of Stephens’ activism is well documented via archived links to his now-deleted Twitter account. The alleged 2020 hate crime incident that propelled Stephens into the city’s local celebrity status was featured in the Fall 2020 issue of Equality Magazine, “the nation’s largest LGBTQ magazine,” as well as the cover for the Community College of Philadelphia’s student newspaper, The Vanguard. Stephens also attended Temple University, which platformed the transgender activist in April 2021 “to elevate the voices of the marginalized and the forgotten,” according to his Twitter.

That same month, as the nation was reeling from the aftermath of the summer 2020 racial riots, another high-profile officer-involved shooting took place in Minneapolis when 20-year-old Daunte Wright was shot dead by White police officer Kimberly Potter after discharging what she thought was her taser as Wright resisted arrest and attempted to flee by vehicle.

According to Grid Magazine, Stephens helped lead a Philadelphia march in “solidarity with the people of Minneapolis,” in response to Wright’s shooting. A clip uploaded to YouTube that same day shows Stephens shouting into a microphone at the city’s luxury apartment residents to “use your privilege and your power to elevate and enhance the voice of the voiceless,” prompting several nervous White onlookers from the complex to join the protests.

“I rebuke the continued assassination of Black & Brown people in this country by racist law enforcement murderers who harass, brutalize, and target marginalized communities in their efforts to control, terrorize & neglect when they should be serving and protecting. #DaunteWright” Stephens took to Twitter again a few days after the protest.

The disturbing case of Kendall Stephens is the latest in a pattern of recent arrests of transgender activists on similar charges. In May 2022, Carlos Arturo Aparicio Hernandez, 36, another prominent trans activist, faced 16 felony charges following accusations of sexual abuse and exploitation of a 15-year-old boy. Described by The New York Times as a “transgender human rights activist” in a 2018 article about LGBT migrants, Hernandez was granted asylum in the United States in 2017, citing severe police brutality in his native El Salvador before settling in Los Angeles, California.

Later that year, Lailani Muniz, a 39-year-old trans and HIV activist in the Bronx LGBT community was arrested for allegedly soliciting sex from an underage boy online and arranging to meet with him. Muniz was honored in June last year during a pride flag-raising ceremony at Bronx Borough Hall in honor of Pride Month.

The first openly transgender state legislator, former New Hampshire Representative Stacie Laughton, was arrested on charges of distributing child sexual abuse images in June of this year. Following Laughton’s federal indictment and unrelenting pressure from the concerned public, Hillsborough County jail confirmed that the former Democratic state representative is being housed in a male unit, which State Rep. Kathrine Prudhomme O’Brien (R-Derry) called “a victory for public safety.”

“The safety of female inmates is important, and there shouldn’t be loopholes that could be taken advantage of that make them more vulnerable. I’m pleased to learn Laughton is housed appropriately,” Prudhomme O’Brien explained.

Perhaps the most notorious act of trans-related criminal violence was the notorious case of transgender mass shooter Audrey Hale. Hale, a biological female-turned-male, trained the end of a high-powered assault rifle onto innocent people inside a Nashville Christian school, killing six, including three 9-year-old children. Despite a systemic cover-up of Hale’s political writings and manifesto, portions of it were leaked to conservative media, revealing a racially motivated desire to specifically kill White children.

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