Reviled serial killer Dana Sue Gray bares all about her 'terrifying and disgusting' sex attack at the hands of her trans prison cellmate

The caged serial killer Dana Sue Gray has revealed how she was sexually assaulted by a male-to-female trans cellmate in the California prison where she's serving life without parole.

Gray gained notoriety in the 1990s for stabbing and strangling three elderly neighbors to death, so she could steal their credit cards and buy fancy clothes and massages.

Now a lifer at Central California Women's Facility (CCWF), she says she's been sexually assaulted by one of the trans inmates who now serve their sentences in women's lockups.

Gray, 66, describes a 'terrifying and disgusting' attack by the cellmate, who has not undergone sex-change surgery, in which he pulled down his pants and 'shoved his d**k in my face.'

Many people who recall Gray's gruesome killing spree will struggle to sympathize with her.

Yet the alleged attack sheds light on life at California women's prisons, which have seen ever more sexual assaults since 2021, when a new law let trans women apply to transfer into them.

In phone interviews with the Independent Women's Forum (IWF), a campaign group, Gray reveals details about the attack and her fears about caging women with biological males.

When Gray learned early last year she'd share her dormitory with a trans inmate, she said she 'wasn't bothered' and saw a chance to 'educate' herself about the trans experience.

She and the cellmate were initially 'real friendly,' she says.

That soon felt 'a bit off' as their interactions became stressful and part of an 'abusive relationship,' she says.

He criticized her, said she'd die in prison, and urged her to quit taking college classes, she says.

Gray says her 6ft 2in roommate, who we are not naming, became aggressive.

He approached her bunk late one night and subjected her to a full-on sexual assault, she says.

'He came into my bed area and pulled his pants down, and shoved his d**k in my face,' she says.

It was 'terrifying and disgusting,' she says. But she had the wherewithal to order him to back off, which he did.

He did not touch her, she says, calling the attack a 'show of male dominance.'

The roommate tried again the next night, she says.

He 'put that big man hand on my back, on my shoulder blade' and awoke her with a fright.

She kept her composure, she says, telling him: 'Stay the F out of my area. Don't ever come to my area. Don't ever touch me.'

Gray told a guard about the incident and the roommate was moved to another yard, she says.

She did not formally report an assault, she says, as there was no way to prove her allegations, and it would have kick-started a process that would have put her in isolation, which worried her.

Her experience — and other sex assaults at the sprawling lockup outside Chowchilla, in central California — expose flaws in Senate Bill 132, which enshrined the rights of trans inmates, she says.

To request a transfer, trans detainees must only profess their identity — taking cross-sex hormones or having surgery is not needed.

Requests are reviewed by a warden, guards, medical and mental health staff, and an expert on prison rapes.

Advocates of the law, which was signed into law by Democratic Gov Gavin Newsom in September 2020, say trans detainees are most often victims of abuse and deserve the safety of lockups matching their gender identity.

But Gray, who has been behind bars since 1998, says SB132 changed women's prisons beyond recognition.

'It's disgusting, and I have to be polite and deal with it for my own safety, and so that I have a less stressful day, but I don't like it,' Gray said.

'I don't want any of them here. I want them to go away.'

Women inmates are often vulnerable and poorly educated, says Gray. Some have consensual sex with trans cellmates.

The law shows how politicians sacrificed female-only cellblocks for 'troubled' trans-identified men, she says.

'They don't care,' she says, as they 'throw some condoms in there, and let them have sex.'

'It degrades women so bad,' she adds.

Gray killed three elderly women in the Canyon Lake area southeast of Los Angeles in 1994, and was caught after a fourth victim survived and identified her.

She took her victims' credits card and went on spending sprees for swimsuits, cowboy boots, a ski mask, vodka, and a massage at a ritzy spa.

Andrea Mew, who is investigating SB132 for IWF, says even women murderers should be able to serve their sentences in all-female prisons.

'No one deserves to be subjected to sexual harassment,' Mew told DailyMail.com.

'If someone with her reputation is now boldly sounding the alarm, then there's evidently reason for serious concern about the safety of all female inmates.'

A spokeswoman said the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) doesn't comment on specific cases.

The department 'investigates all allegations of sexual abuse, sexual misconduct, and sexual harassment pursuant to our zero-tolerance policy,' she added.

The state system has some 1,997 trans and non-binary detainees.

Some 345 inmates in male prisons have requested transfers to women's lockups. Of them, 46 were approved, 64 were denied, and 87 inmates changed their minds. The rest are under review.

Just 16 inmates of women's prisons have requested transfers; three have been approved.

The CDCR says it vets requests carefully and only approves them when it's 'safe to do so.'

The Transgender Law Center, the ACLU, and others say trans detainees are most often victims of abuse and deserve protection.

Letting them serve their sentences in lockups matching their gender identity makes them safer, advocates say.

But women's rights groups warn of rising incidents of rape and other horrors in what were once women-only cellblocks.

They point to Tremaine Carroll, 51, a 6ft 2 in male-to-female trans detainee who's been charged with raping two women inmates in January after being transferred to the Chowchilla lockup.

One of them, a small woman in her thirties, says Carroll forcibly penetrated her in the shower of the eight-bedroom dormitory they shared.

She was left traumatized by the attack, and relives the ordeal each time she takes a shower, when her heart pounds in her chest, she says.

Carroll is due back at Madera Superior Court for a preliminary hearing on July 8.

Sharon Byrne, director of the Women's Liberation Front, says SB 132 makes it too easy for any male convict seeking access to women or a way out of violence-plagued men's prisons.

'Any male serving out any sentence for violent assaults, rapes, crimes in a men's prison, sees an open door to easily get into a woman's prison,' says Byrne.

'Who's not going to take advantage of that?'