Primary school teacher Lucy Meadows was found dead at her home in Accrington, Lancashire, England, according to The New Statesman.
The death of Meadows, 32who taught at St. Mary Magdalene's Schoolis not being treated as suspicious. An inquest will be held.
Gay Star News reported that headteacher Karen Hardman wrote on the school's website, "It is with great sadness that I have to inform you of the death of Miss Lucy Meadows.
"Our staff will be working closely with bereavement teams and are here to offer the children and yourselves any support in any way we can."
In December 2012, The Daily Mail ran a story with the headline "Shock at CofE [Church of England] school where Mr. Upton will return after Christmas as Miss Meadows."
Helen Belcher, director of Trans Media Watch, claimed Meadows had committed suicide. Gay Star News noted, however, that a coroner had not verified this claim.
Thousands Outraged After Daily Mail Reporters' Bullying Leads to Teacher's Suicide
From a SumOfUs.org Press Release
LONDON - This week, after being mocked in the press in an attack piece by the Daily Mail columnist Richard Littlejohn, transgender schoolteacher Lucy Meadows committed suicide.
Lucy was raised male, but recently underwent a transition to live as female — which for Littlejohn was reason enough to attack her in his column. Leading with the mocking headline "He's not only in the wrong body... he's in the wrong job," Littlejohn belittled and harassed Meadows, referring to her decision as her "personal problems" and playing on the outdated scare tactic that LGBT people are a threat to children.
FOR MORE INFORMATION: www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/mar/22/lucy-meadows-press-harassment .
The article led to a witch hunt targeting Meadows. Newspapers offered to pay parents for a picture of her, and she complained of having to leave home by the back door and arrive early to school to avoid the packs of journalists.
In response, thousands of people are joining SumOfUs.org, a global consumer watchdog, urging the Daily Mail to fire Richard Littlejohn, issue a public apology and institute an editorial review policy to prevent incidents like this in the future.
VIEW THE PETITION HERE: action.sumofus.org/a/daily-mail-littlejohn-lucy-meadows/ .
"Richard Littlejohn has a long history of using his perch at the the Daily Mail to mock and harass others, from laughing at cerebral palsy to snide insinuation that ethnic minorities got their jobs through discrimination to incessant attacks on the LGBT community, Littlejohn has been a national disgrace," said Kaytee Riek, Campaign Manager for SumOfUs.org . "The Daily Mail may thrive on controversy to sell its tabloid papers, but even it knows it went too far this time. In the wake of backlash, the Daily Mail removed the article from its website, but the damage has already been done."
"Everyone has the right to say what they think, but mainstream publications like the Daily Mail shouldn't support and promote this sort of hate," continued Riek. "The Daily Mail needs to ensure that this never happens again — by not only yanking Littlejohn's column and apologizing for the paper's decision to run the hateful opinion piece, but also instituting an editorial review policy that prevents discriminatory writing from ending up in its paper again."