Ami Avanti
Ami Avanti, a male who identifies as a transgender woman, was charged in 2024 with non-fatal strangulation and assault occasioning actual bodily harm (ABH) following an incident at Avanti’s mother’s home on August 11, 2024.
A neighbour had called the police after they observed Avanti’s elderly and vulnerable mother in the street in her underwear and heard shouting. Police bodycam images showed Avanti’s mother (who has a chronic lung condition for which she was hospitalised six times over the year) in a nightdress, struggling for breath and with heavy bruising on her arms.
In the footage, she alleges to officers “He’s been drinking and had me by the throat in the hallway,” then adds: “I managed to get away from him but it’s like a light switch, one minute everything is OK and the next it’s really bad.”
The officer then interjects: “He’s asked me to call him she,” to which the mother responds: “Yes.”
“I do love him. He’s my child, but I just can’t go on like this. Something is not right with him.“ She then continues “I had laid down because I didn’t feel well. He had gone to put salt on his food and the lid came off the container, I’m guessing that’s what started it.
“Anyway, he came up the stairs ranting and raving, I couldn’t tell you what was said.
“It’s just every day there is arguments. He says I locked him up for years and didn’t allow him to do anything. Have you ever heard anything so ridiculous?
“He then slipped down the stairs and was blaming me, he was kicking and punching me, he grabbed me by the throat trying to choke me.”
It appears that Avanti’s mother did not support bringing the case but the police/CPS proceeded with prosecution based on the bodycam footage. The judge therefore acquitted Avanti, aged 46, at Laganside Magistrates Court in Belfast in January 2025 after citing issues with the “contemporaneousness” of the evidence, saying “There was no statement made in the case, she is not here to give evidence, and she sent a letter to the court in support of the defendant. “Given the issues with evidence in the case I cannot be safe in admitting it.”
Media, alongside the police and courts, acceded to Avanti’s demand for female pronouns thereby obscuring an alleged case of male violence against women. Headlines included “Belfast woman cleared of battering mum in row over table salt”.
See here for examples of trans-identified males convicted of strangulation offences and here for examples of trans individuals convicted of violent offences against their mothers.
Image credit: Belfast Telegraph
Media reports
Belfast Telegraph https://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/sunday-life/news/belfast-woman-cleared-of-battering-mum-in-row-over-table-salt/a787693626.html archive
Sunday World https://www.sundayworld.com/crime/courts/belfast-woman-cleared-of-battering-elderly-mum-in-row-over-table-salt/a931036709.html archive