2025-03 Legal Name and Gender Change Requests

                                                                                                                          Bulletin# 2025-03

LEGAL NAME AND GENDER CHANGE REQUESTS

INTRODUCTION                                                                            

The purpose of this informational bulletin is to provide all personnel assigned to Custody Operations with additional information concerning an inmate’s right to petition the court for a legal name and/or gender change, and the Department’s role in these requests.

PROCEDURES

As stipulated in California Code of Civil Procedure § 1279.5, “A person… sentenced to a county jail has the right to petition the court to obtain a name or gender change…” Further, the law states, “A person sentenced to the county jail shall provide a copy of the petition for name change to the sheriff’s department, in a manner prescribed by the department…” In accordance with State law, Custody Division Manual section 8-02/010.00, “General Requests,” delineates that such requests shall be directed to the facility legal units.

When an inmate submits a general request for a legal name and/or gender change, facility legal unit personnel should provide the requestor with the appropriate court provided forms (Los Angeles County civil court address list; NC-100, “Petition for Change of Name”; NC-125, “Order to Show Cause – Change of Name to Conform to Gender Identity”; and/or NC-300, “Petition for Recognition of Change of Gender and Sex Identifier”) located in the Department’s e-forms library. The requesting inmate will need to complete the required documentation and mail them on their own accord to the appropriate court. The Department does not require a copy of the petition.

Once the inmate receives a court order approving the name and/or gender change, the inmate should submit a second general request to the facility legal unit to process a copy of the court order. Facility legal unit personnel should submit the copy of the court order to the Records Administrative Deputy at the Inmate Reception Center (IRC), who will then update the inmate’s records.

For inmates whose names and/or gender were changed pre-incarceration, they must arrange for an advocate outside of custody to mail them the court order so it can be forwarded to the IRC Records Administrative Deputy in the manner prescribed above.

In addition to the e-forms library, personnel and inmate advocates may retrieve the appropriate court documents from the following publicly accessible link: Court Forms | Judicial Branch of California

Any question concerning the contents of this bulletin can be directed to the IRC records clerk [REDACTED TEXT].