Transgender teenager kills himself after school bans him from using his name

A transgender teenager killed himself after a grammar school said he could not officially change his name at school, an inquest heard.

Leo Etherington, who was born Louise, was found in his bedroom in May by his father who became anxious after he did not respond to his calls to come down for dinner.

The 15-year-old was told he could not officially stop being called Louise at school until he reached the age of 16, a coroner at an inquest into the death was told.

The teen was said to have been “angry with [the] school” which is an all-girls grammar school in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, about the decision.

The inquest heard Leo came out as gay in 2013 when he started going to the school but it was not until after school one day in 2016 that he told his father he was transgender who responded by telling him he would love and support him.

“The school told him he had to be 16 to change his name. He said he was angry with the school,” Martin Etherington, his father, told the inquest according to Bucks Free Press.

“I asked him if I should speak to them and he said no. I said we could wait until he was 16 and then change his name.”

Friends at the school were said to refer to him as Leo and sometimes as Alex – a name he previously chose before deciding it was too “gender neutral”.

While he had been told by their family doctor he was not qualified for gender reassignment surgery via the NHS, his father told the inquest he had been willing to fund any surgery when the time came.

Leo is said to have struggled with losing his mother, Lucy, a software developer who died of cancer in 2013 when was just 11 years old. He previously told his father that he felt like he was born in the wrong body.

Mr Etherington said in a statement to the coroner that he was not initially anxious when Leo did not listen to calls to come downstairs for dinner, assuming he was revising for his GCSE exams.

Alison McCormick, the assistant coroner, recorded a verdict of suicide at Beaconsfield coroner’s court on Thursday, telling Mr Etherington: “You and Leo had a very loving, supportive relationship, and you provided all the support he could have hoped for. I know this must be very hard but I hope you can take some comfort from that.”