Ruby Corado

In October 2021, Corado resigned from Casa Ruby following the loss of $850,000 in funding from the D.C. Department of Human Services. In July 2022, Casa Ruby closed with employees and creditors citing non-payment of wages and debts. News sources have been unable to locate Ruby Corado for comment.

While the center primarily aimed to serve the Latina-trans community, people of races and gender variants of the LGBTQ+ community have relied on Casa Ruby. As of 2020, there were multiple establishments with approximately 50 employees and an outreach that affects the lives of over 6,000 people annually. Casa Ruby provides services to marginalized groups who, due to language or immigration status, may not know what resources are available to them. Casa Ruby also provides services for violence victims, supports poor members of he LGBTQ+ community, HIV risk and testing, as well as discrimination victims, with the goal of reducing exclusion, discrimination, and discouragement for being openly LGBTQ+. Casa Ruby provides employment services, crisis intervention, support groups, English language lessons, and immigration services. Another service that they offer is a 24 hour drop-in/respite service to those who are either abandoned, homeless, or are in need of a place to stay.

Corado married David Walker in 2014, and was walked down the aisle by D.C. mayor Vincent C. Gray.

Ruby Corado (born in San Salvador, El Salvador) is an activist who founded Casa Ruby, a bilingual, multicultural LGBT organization in Washington, D.C. Established in 2012, Casa Ruby identifies its mission as "to create success life stories among Transgender, Genderqueer, and Gender Non-conforming Gay, Lesbian and Bisexual people." In July 2022, Corado was accused of mismanagement of Casa Ruby, which forced the organization to cease operations.

In June 2012, with the help of her friends and her community, Corado founded Casa Ruby, a bilingual LGBTQ+ center that helps house, treat, and support mostly LGBTQ+ youth. The first building occupied three floors of a house in Park View on Georgia Avenue NW. The organization moved to Shepherd Park in 2018.

As a result of this persecution and abuse, Corado left her day job and began heavily abusing drugs and ended up becoming homeless. Corado struggled with suicidal thoughts while continuing her career as an activist. She sought help at a psychiatric hospital around 2011.

Corado has received multiple awards and recognitions. She was included on the lists "25 Most Influential Latino LGBT activists" from Latino Voice in 2009 and "Ten LGBTQ Latin@s That Make us Proud" from XQSi Magazine in 2012. She was named a Capital Pride Hero by Metro Weekly in 2005, and was included in the 2007 Latino LGBT History Project Heroes Exhibit.

At one point, Corado worked as a sex worker to meet men without having to tell them that she was a transgender woman. She worked for an agency which would sell each encounter for $300, although this agency would take most of the profits she earned from her work as an escort. In 2008, her boyfriend at the time broke into Corado's house and sexually assaulted her, leading to emotional trauma. Despite reporting the attack, police did not investigate or prosecute the culprit. In the same year, there was another fight between Corado and her then boyfriend that led to spending a night in jail. Corado was incarcerated with men rather than with women, despite her identifying as a woman. She was forced to strip in front of the other men in the jail’s housing unit for men, and had to use the bathroom in front of the men in her cell.

Corado became widely known after the August 16, 2003 murder of Bella Evangelista, a 25 year old transgender Latina killed during the same month that included the murder of another transgender woman in Washington, DC. Corado helped organize daily vigils and a march to demand an end to the violence and recognition of human rights of transgender people. Corado was part of the Coalition to Clarify the D.C. Human Rights Act (later renamed the D.C. Trans Coalition), which changed the D.C. Human Rights Act to include protections for gender identity or expression, a change that took effect in March 2006.

Due to setbacks because of her identity as a transgender woman – including homelessness, job firings, and physical violence – Corado did not begin transitioning until the 1990s, when she felt safe enough and had been living in what she had considered a well-rounded neighborhood. In 1995, the death of Tyra Hunter, a transgender woman who died of injuries sustained in a car accident after EMS personnel refused to treat her, motivated Corado to become involved in LGBTQ+ advocacy. She started volunteering at Whitman-Walker Health, a health center focused on HIV/AIDS care for LGBTQ+ patients. A few years later, once she made the transition from male to female, she won the Miss Gay El Salvador pageant, which came with the expectation of community service.