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Drag Race Alum Tyra Sanchez In Jail For Protesting Previous Arrest
The RuPaul's Drag Race season 2 winner was arrested again, this time for an unusual protest.
Drag Race season two winner Tyra Sanchez is having a rough year.
Sanchez, whose legal name is James Ross, was arrested again in Florida and is being held in Bradford County Jail, according to a report from Entertainment Weekly.
Ross was a controversial figure on RuPaul's Drag Race, but earlier this year the drag performer was finding success by rebranding and performing under the new drag persona King Tyra. There was even a North American tour in the works.
But it seems like these plans were upended when Ross was picked up by police on Thursday for protesting an earlier arrest. On May 17, Ross was arrested for allegedly resisting a police officer after a car accident in Starke, Fla. and then filed a citizens complaint against the officer for excessive force and unlawful arrest.
Today (July 6), Ross was arrested a second time because the 35-year-old drag queen’s protest began to cause a “traffic problem,” chief of police Jeff Johnson told the outlet.
"He came out and was in his little outfit, and he had the police sign, hanging it up and showing and dancing," the chief of police said. "He was in a little G-string with a black bra on. It still was within the 'freedom of speech' category. The problem we had was it was in an intersection within a construction zone, but it wasn't really causing a traffic problem."
The situation then escalated and Ross was eventually arrested for breach of peace after he left and came back wearing a “big old dildo” under his tights, Johnson said.
"He comes back out on the road and starts shaking it, and that's when people started stopping and cussing at him, and causing a traffic problem,” he said. “It was bad from there on.”
Ross is currently being detained in a holding cell while waiting to be booked, according to EW.
Ariel Messman-Rucker is an Oakland-born journalist who now calls the Pacific Northwest her home. When she’s not writing about politics and queer pop culture, she can be found reading, hiking, or talking about horror movies with the Zombie Grrlz Horror Podcast Network.
Ariel Messman-Rucker is an Oakland-born journalist who now calls the Pacific Northwest her home. When she’s not writing about politics and queer pop culture, she can be found reading, hiking, or talking about horror movies with the Zombie Grrlz Horror Podcast Network.
