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Stephen Hucker vs. transgender people

Stephen Hucker is a British-Canadian psychiatrist and anti-transgender activist. Hucker was director of the forensic division of Toronto’s notoriously anti-trans Clarke Institute of Psychiatry from 1982 to 1993. While there, Hucker collaborated on anti-trans work with Ray Blanchard, Robert Dickey, Ron Langevin, and Betty Steiner.

Hucker has assessed prisoners seeking transgender healthcare for Correctional Services of Canada (CSC) and has testified as an expert witness in several legal cases involving trans people.

Background

Stephen John Charman “Steve” Hucker earned a medical degree from the Faculty of Medical Sciences at University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne (now Newcastle University) in 1970. In 1975, Hucker was certified by the Royal College of Psychiatrists in the UK. Hucker then moved to Canada to train in forensic psychiatry at the Clarke Institute and was certified in psychiatry by the Royal College of Physicians & Surgeons of Canada in 1977. Hucker was elected a Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists in 1985.

According to the 2007 book Violence Risk:

“Stephen Hucker obtained his medical and psychiatric qualifications in the United Kingdom before completing his forensic psychiatric training at the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry in Toronto. He was Head of the Forensic Programme there from 1982 until 1993 and then spent five yearrs as Professor of Psychiatry, Psychology Professor of Psychiatry at McMaster University and Head of Forensic Services at St. Joseph’s Healthcare in Hamilton, Ontario.

Over the years Dr. Hucker has conducted research on a number of forensic psychiatric topics, has lectured widely to scientific and professional audiences across North America as well as in Great Britain and Australia and has conducted many administrative reviews of forensic and correctional facilities. He also maintains a busy forensic psychiatric practice and is frequently called upon to provide an opinion to defense lawyers and prosecutors, community agencies and parole boards, and often testifies as an expert witness. In all these circumstances he has gained extensive practical experience in risk assessment and management.

Dr. Hucker has been Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto since 1998 and he resumed his affiliation with the Centre of Addiction and Mental Health in the Law and Mental Health Programme in 2005.”

Hucker is the principal of Stephen Hucker Medicine Professional Corporation, which has billed millions of dollars over the course of operation, according to public records.

Hucker married Mary Ann McCoy in 1978. They separated in 1993. Hucker filed an assignment in bankruptcy in 1994. A divorce was granted in 1997.

Professional affiliations

Newcastle University (1970s)

Publications from the 1970s indicate that Hucker was affiliated with Newcastle University, then known as University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

METFORS (1970s/1980s)

Hucker served as medical director and as Psychiatrist-in-Charge of Forensic Services for the Metropolitan Toronto Forensic Service (METFORS). The 1987 annual report noted that Hucker was named to the board of directors on June 2, 1987 and stated:

“The educational programs over the past year are outlined in the attached appendices. During the past few years we have published three books through Dr. C.D. Webster, formerly Research Scientist, in collaboration with the Forensic Service of the Clarke Institute of Psychiatry.

  • (1) Clinical Assessment Before Trial, 1982, by Webster, Menzies, and Jackson;
  • (2) Mental Disorder and Criminal Responsibility, 1981, edited by Hucker, Webster, and Ben-Aron; and
  • (3) Dangerousness: Probability and Prediction, Psychiatry and Public Policy, 1985, also edited by Webster, Ben-Aron, and Hucker.
  • A fourth book was published by Dr. R. Rogers: Conducting Insanity Evaluations, 1986.”

Dr. S. Hucker was appointed overall Chief of Forensic Services of both the Forensic Service at the Clarke and at METFORS, with Dr. R.J. Mahabir as Chief of Service of METFORS, reporting to Dr. Hucker. Dr. R.E. Turner continues on staff at METFORS and as Professor of Forensic Psychiatry. Dr. M. Phillips will be overall Administrator of Forensic Services.

University of Toronto

Starting in the late 1970s, Hucker co-authored papers with Ron Langevin that indicated affiliation with University of Toronto.

Clarke Institute (1982–1993)

A 2008 historical background of the University of Toronto Department of Psychiatry noted:

The Clarke Institute years, which lasted until the 1998 merger of the Institute with Queen Street Mental Health Centre (QSMHC), the Donwoods Institute and the Addiction Research Foundation, were characterized by slow, steady expansion. Ken McKnight died prematurely. He was succeeded by Dr. Bob Coulthard and later by Dr. Stephen Hucker. Certainly this was a period in which the study of sex offenders advanced remarkably. At one time there were two separate, but loosely interconnected research clinics. One was led by Dr. Kurt Freund who pioneered phallometry and who made important theoretical contributions around “courtship” and other disorders. The other was led by Dr. Ron Langevin and was notable for its wide influence (e.g., Sexual Strands). As already mentioned, this line of inquiry continues to the present day through the efforts of Drs. Betty Steiner, Ray Blanchard, Rob Dickie [sic], Paul Fedoroff, Howard Barbaree, Michael Seto, Martin Lalumière, Maxine Peterson [sic], James Cantor and Calvin Langton.

In the mid–1980s, the then Assistant Deputy Minister, David Corder, invited Stephen Hucker to lead a committee which would offer government advice about how best to reorganize and redevelop the Oak Ridge Division of the Penetanguishene Mental Health Centre. This was a protracted and painstaking review. Some members visited similar services in the United States. One key recommendation was that the population of Oak Ridge be cut by at least half. The other half, it was argued, could be better and more fairly housed under conditions of medium security. This meant that specially-designed units would, of necessity, have to be created or retrofitted in some of the other hospitals located throughout the province. Such a unit was, in fact, established in Toronto within CAMH and another has been recently added. Various other medium-secure units have come into being, most recently at St. Joseph’s Healthcare, Hamilton.”

Queen’s University

Hucker served at Queen’s University in Kingston as Professor & Chair of the Division of Forensic and Correctional Psychiatry, with senior teaching appointments in the Departments of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Law.

McMaster University (1993–1998)

For five years, Hucker was Professor of Psychiatry, Psychology Professor of Psychiatry at McMaster University and Head of Forensic Services at St. Joseph’s Healthcare in Hamilton, Ontario. Hucker was also affiliated with the Centre for Mountain Health Services.

Hucker has been involved in gatekeeping trans healthcare within the Correctional Services of Canada (CSC). Hucker has also served as an expert witness in a number of cases brought by trans and gender diverse prisoners.

University of Toronto (1998–)

Hucker was appointed Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Toronto in 1998 and was later appointed emeritus status.

in 1998, Hucker received the Bruno Cormier Award from the Canadian Academy of Psychiatry and the Law for “Outstanding Contributions to Canadian Forensic Psychiatry and Distinctive Achievements in the Field.”

CAMH (2005–)

Hucker resumed an affiliation with the Centre of Addiction and Mental Health (formerly the Clarke Institute) in the Law and Mental Health Programme in 2005.

In 2011, Hucker authored an advisor’s report on hypoxyphilia at the request of the DSM-5 Paraphilias Subworkgroup of the Sexual and Gender Identity Disorders Workgroup, chaired by Ray Blanchard. Hucker recommended renaming it asphyiophilia.

In 2017, Hucker was elected a Fellow of the Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers.

Anti-trans activism

Publications

Hucker contributed a chapter on medical-legal issues to the 1985 book Gender Dysphoria. Perspectives in Sexuality, edited by Betty Steiner and featuring several Clarke Institute employees. Hucker also co-authored papers with Ray Blanchard on autoerotic asphyxiation, which discussed that in some fatal cases, the victims were found cross-dressed.

Legal cases: expert testimony and assessment

Kavanagh v. Canada (Attorney General): 2001

Hucker was a central figure in the landmark ruling in the 2001 Canadian Human Rights Tribunal case Kavanagh v. Canada. In 1989, transgender Canadian Synthia Kavanagh was convicted of the 1987 second-degree murder of transgender roommate Lisa Janna Black. Kavanagh had begun a social and medical transition at age 13 but was held in a variety of maximum and medium security male institutions in Ontario and British Columbia by the Correctional Service Canada (CSC). Upon entering prison, Kavanagh’s hormone therapy was halted, and Kavanagh was denied sex reassignment surgery under a blanket prohibition developed in 1980 by psychiatrist FC Rhodes Chalke and managed within CSC by Jane Laishes at the time of the tribunal. A further report was prepared for CSC in 1982 by Hucker, Betty Steiner, and others. CSC’s policy was again revised in 1987. In 1992, Yvon Lapierre recommended that transsexual inmates not receive any treatment while incarcerated. CSC also consulted with psychiatrist Diane Watson Hucker, and others, In 1993, CSC’s policy was revised to permit hormone therapy throughout the period of incarceration.

Hucker had examined Kavanagh at Mission Institution in 1997 and concluded that Kavanagh was not an appropriate candidate for surgery. The case proceeded before the Canadian Human Rights Tribunal, where Clarke Institute employees Hucker, Robert Dickey, and Maxine Petersen testified for the CSC:

  • A “real life test” requirement used to be a condition for approval for medical transition. Gatekeepers would require trans people to socially transition for one to three years before being approved for medical transition options like hormones or surgery. Hucker, Dickey, and Petersen claimed that the artificiality of the prison environment does not allow for a true real life experience, and would provide a distorted picture of the inmate’s suitability for sex reassignment surgery. Hucker would still insist that the patient spend at least one year living in the community as a member of the target gender, so as to determine whether the patient can deal with the negative reactions that they are bound to encounter along the way.
  • Hucker claimed that a psychopath’s propensity to manipulate and tell lies makes such individuals very difficult to properly assess as candidates for surgery, making Kavanagh’s “very severe” psychopathy a criterion for exclusion. Hucker assessed Kavanagh’s score on the Hare psychopathy scale as in the top 5% of the prison population.
  • Hucker stated that inmates who were not “truly transsexual” would seek to be placed in women’s prisons, for sexual purposes. 

Hucker attempted to justify CSC’s cautious and restrictive approach, including the argument that surgery was not necessarily essential in the correctional context and that placement in women’s prisons raised safety and management concerns. However, the Tribunal carefully weighed his testimony against other medical and human-rights evidence and ultimately rejected the idea that blanket policies could override individualized medical necessity. The Tribunal concluded that CSC’s broad denial of hormone therapy and its categorical refusal to fund surgery were discriminatory on the basis of sex and disability.

Barker v. Barker: 2020

Barker v. Barker is a landmark Ontario Superior Court of Justice ruling released on June 25, 2020, by Justice Edward M. Morgan. It found psychiatrists and the Crown liable for assault, battery, and breach of fiduciary duty against 28 former mental health patients of the Oak Ridge Division of the Penetanguishene Mental Health Centre against psychiatrists Elliott T. Barker and Gary J. Maier, and the Government of Ontario. The court found the treatments, which included forced solitary confinement, hallucinogenic drugs, and forced nudity, were unethical and caused long-term harm and condemned their treatment as unethical “human experimentation.” The decision was later upheld in 2022 by the Ontario Court of Appeal.

The case cited several reports by Hucker commissioned by the CSC, including a 1985 published report, a 2002 draft report, and a 2003 published report.

E.F. v. Correctional Service of Canada: 2023–

This Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (CHRT) case involves a federally incarcerated person (anonymized as “E.F.”) who made a hormonal and surgical gender transition while incarcerated and unsuccessfully sought a transfer to a women’s prison. The CHRT case centers on whether the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) discriminated against a federally incarcerated person with disabilities by failing to accommodate their needs as outlined in the Canadian Human Rights Act.

In 2023, “E.F.” filed an order seeking to name Hucker as a Respondent in the case. That request was denied.

“In the complaint, she alleges that the CSC contracted Dr. Hucker to make a gender-dysphoria assessment of her. He interviewed her on July 6, 2018, and issued a report on August 3, 2018. She claims that after interviewing her, Dr. Hucker disclosed personal information about her gender identity and expression to third parties in her home community, effectively outing her, all without her consent. This included seeking input from her estranged wife. […] She contends that he relied on her estranged wife’s views and on the fact that she had not come out earlier to conclude that she was not a transgendered woman. She adds that Dr. Hucker deliberately misgendered her numerous times in his report. He ultimately recommended that she not be offered feminizing hormones and that she abandon her “strategy” regarding sex transformation.”

References

Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (August 14, 2023). E.F. v. Correctional Service of Canada, 2023 CHRT 31 (CanLII). https://www.canlii.org/en/ca/chrt/doc/2023/2023chrt31/2023chrt31.html?resultId=2fe4068403fe428a80fac7f6908f1a6c&searchId=2026-04-29T20:05:39:277/5c16be1c93a7454cb888f46ce66765e6

Ontario Ministry of Health (December 15, 2022). Order in Council 1810/2022. https://www.ontario.ca/orders-in-council/oc-18102022

Ontario Ministry of Health (February 08, 2018). Order in Council 230/2018. https://www.ontario.ca/orders-in-council/oc-2302018

Bourget, D., & Chaimowitz, G. (2010). Forensic psychiatry in Canada: A journey on the road to specialty [Editorial]. Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law, 38(2), 158–162. PMID: 20542934 full text https://jaapl.org/content/38/2/158

Webster, Christopher; Court. John (April 16, 2008). The Evolution of the Law and Mental Health Program at the University of Toronto. https://utoronto.scholaris.ca/server/api/core/bitstreams/71c98943-ea4d-4a8a-a513-ba225b1a00f0/content

Canadian Human Rights Tribunal (August 31, 2001). Kavanagh v. Canada (Attorney General), 2001 CanLII 8496 (CHRT). https://www.canlii.org/en/ca/chrt/doc/2001/2001canlii8496/2001canlii8496.html

Ontario Court of Justice, General Division (January 7, 1999). McCoy v. Hucker (1999), 84 O.T.C. 397 (GD) https://ca.vlex.com/vid/mccoy-v-hucker-680636793

METFORS (July 1, 1987). Tenth Annual Report, 1986 – 1987. https://www.ojp.gov/pdffiles1/Digitization/107055NCJRS.pdf

Selected writing by Hucker

Hucker, Stephen (June 15, 2023). Breathless Ecstasy: The Pleasures and Perils of Erotic Asphyxiation. Forensic Psychiatry Institute https://www.forensicpsychiatryinstitute.com/ifpls/past-lectures/

Hucker, S.J. (2011). Hypoxyphilia. Archives of Sexual Behavior 40, 1323–1326. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-011-9824-3

Hucker, Stephen J. (2008). Sexual Masochism: Psychopathology and Theory. In Laws, D. Richard; O’Donohue, William T. [editors] Sexual Deviance: Theory, Assessment, and Treatment. Guilford Press, ISBN 978-1593856052

Hucker, S. J., & Blanchard, R. (1992). Death scene characteristics in 118 fatal cases of autoerotic asphyxia compared with suicidal asphyxia. Behavioral Sciences & the Law, 10(4), 509–523. https://doi.org/10.1002/bsl.2370100407

Blanchard, R., & Hucker, S. J. (1991). Age, Transvestism, Bondage, and Concurrent Paraphilic Activities in 117 Fatal Cases of Autoerotic Asphyxia. British Journal of Psychiatry, 159(3), 371–377. https://doi.org/10.1192/bjp.159.3.371

Hucker, S.J. (1985). Medical-Legal Issues. In: Steiner, B.W. (eds). Gender Dysphoria. Perspectives in Sexuality. Springer https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4684-4784-2_13

Freund, K., Scher, H., & Hucker, S. (1983). The courtship disorders. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 12(5), 369–379. https://doi.org/10.1007/bf01542881

Langevin, R., Paitich, D., Hucker, S., Newman, S., Ramsay, G., Pope, S., Geller, G., & Anderson, C. (1979). The effect of assertiveness training, provera and sex of therapist in the treatment of genital exhibitionism. Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry, 10(4), 275–282. https://doi.org/10.1016/0005-7916(79)90002-8

Hucker, S.J. (1975). Pubertal manic-depressive psychosis and mental subnormality–a case report. The British Journal of Mental Subnormality, 21(40), 34–37. https://doi.org/10.1179/bjms.1975.007

Books

Webster, Chris; Haque, Quazi; Hucker, Steve (2013). Violence Risk – Assessment and Management: Advances Through Structured Professional Judgement and Sequential Redirections (2nd edition). Wiley-Blackwell, ISBN 978-1119961130

Webster, Christopher D.; Hucker, Stephen J. (2007). Violence Risk: Assessment and Management. John Wiley & Sons, ISBN 978-0470027509

Webster, Christopher D.; Hucker, Stephen J. (2003). Release Decision Making: Assessing Violence Risk in Mental Health, Forensic, and Correctional Settings. Forensic Service, ISBN 978-0973271201

Webster, Christopher D.; Ben-Aron, Mark H.; Hucker, Stephen J. [editors] (1985). Dangerousness: Probability and Prediction, Psychiatry and Public Policy. Cambridge University Press, ISBN 978-0521300292

Langevin, Ron [editor] (1984). Erotic Preference, Gender Identity, and Aggression in Men. Routledge, ISBN 978-0898594454

Hucker, Stephen J,; Turner, Robert Edward [editors] (1984). Basic Forensic Psychiatry: A Manual for those Working in the Juvenile and Adult Criminal Justice Systems of Canada. [textbook] Ottawa: Department of Justice

Hucker, Stephen J.; Webster, Christopher D.; Ben-Aron, Mark H.; [editors] (1981). Mental Disorder and Criminal Responsibility. Butterworths, ISBN 978-0409837346

Resources

Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org)

College of Physicians and Surgeons of Ontario (https://register.cpso.on.ca/physician-info/?cpsonum=42306)

University of Toronto Psychiatry (psychiatry.utoronto.ca)

Forensic Psychiatry (forensicpsychiatry.ca) [2006–2015 – archive]

  • Paraphilia overview
  • forensicpsychiatry.ca/paraphilia/overview.htm [archive]
  • Transvestic fetishism
  • forensicpsychiatry.ca/paraphilia/transfetish.htm [archive]

LinkedIn (linkedin.com)

IMDb (imdb.com)

Government of Ontario (gov.on.ca)

ResearchGate (researchgate.net)

International Association for the Treatment of Sexual Offender (iatso.org)

St. Joseph’s Healthcare Hamilton (stjosham.on.ca) [archive]