First Transgender State Lawmaker Arrested on Child Sex Abuse Image Charges
A former New Hampshire legislator who was reportedly the nation’s first openly transgender state elected official has been arrested on child pornography charges, according to news reports.
Stacie Marie Laughton, who was born Barry Charles Laughton, Jr., 39, was arrested Thursday on four counts of distributing sexually explicit images of children, The Daily Wire reported Friday.
WFXT-TV in Boston reported Laughton’s charges came in conjunction with the arrest of Lindsay Groves, 38, a former employee at a day care center in Tyngsborough, Massachusetts.
Groves allegedly “took nude images of children at the daycare and sent the photos to Laughton, with whom she was previously in an intimate relationship, between May 2022 and June 2023,” the news station reported.
The outlet quoted U.S. attorney Joshua S. Levy as saying Groves took pictures of the young children during bathroom breaks and diaper changes and then sent the photos to Laughton via text message.
Prosecutors and court documents indicated Grove and Laughton exchanged more than 2,500 text messages, discussing and transferring “explicit photographs that Groves had taken of children while employed at [the day care] – including at least four sexually explicit images of children who appear to be approximately three to five years old,” WFXT reported.
Laughton, a Democrat, has been active in politics, having been elected selectman in 2011, 2019 and 2021, according to Patch.com.
In 2012, he became “the first transgender-identifying person elected as a state lawmaker, thrilling LGBT activists,” The Daily Wire reported.
It linked a story at the time in the D.C. LGBT publication Metro Weekly that said his “win in New Hampshire not only made history in the state, but for the broader trans movement as Laughton became the first out trans person ever elected to a seat in a state legislature.”
After the election, however, a 2008 felony conviction came to light, prompting Laughton to resign, according to Patch.
That conviction had led to jail time on charges of conspiracy to commit credit card fraud and falsifying physical evidence, committed “while living in Laconia as a man,” according to the report.
When a special election was held to fill the post he had vacated, Laughton “signed up to run again,” Patch reported.
However, officials determined he was ineligible to hold public office because he had not completed his sentence, which included a 10-year “good behavior” clause and a restitution requirement.
“After paying restitution on the fraud charge from 2008 and serving the good behavior clause, Laughton was allowed to run for office again in 2019″ — and was elected state representative in 2020 — despite a 2015 arrest on a felony charge of making a bomb threat against a hospital, according to the report.
Laughton’s troubles with the law continued, with an arrest in July 2021 on seven counts of “penalty for false information” stemming from accusations that he misused the state’s 911 texting system, Patch reported.
He denied the charges, claiming he had been “spoofed.”
“Laughton was re-elected again in November 2022 but resigned after being arrested again, accused of stalking a woman in Hudson,” according to the report.
Former state Rep. Stacie Marie Laughton of Derry, the first openly transgender person elected to the N.H. House of Representatives, was arrested Thursday by Nashua police on charges she allegedly distributed child sexual abuse images, officials said… https://t.co/XK9RSbOP3p
— UnionLeader.com (@UnionLeader) June 23, 2023
The New Hampshire Union Leader said Laughton’s resignation from the House came that December in the form of a Facebook video.
“As of today, I’m no longer a state representative which is very disappointing, but I’m going to come back to it,” Laughton said in the video, according to the report.
“I will be attending mental health court and getting some counseling and trying to get my life back on track,” he said.
“I’m not perfect. Even in the future I still won’t be perfect but I will be a better version of myself and better able to handle situations that come my way. In two years, the next state election, I will run for state representative again.”
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