At a look: Laws within the Caribbean area that criminalize homosexual intercourse

ST JOHN’S, Antigua — In latest years, a number of Caribbean nations have struck down legal guidelines criminalizing same-sex relations – a few of them relationship again to the European colonial period.

Courts in Belize in 2016 and Trinidad and Tobago in 2018 discovered such legal guidelines unconstitutional. Last 12 months, the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court additionally dominated Antigua and Barbuda’s “Sexual Offences Act” unconstitutional. The case was filed by a homosexual man who was persecuted for his sexual identification. Just months after the ruling, St. Kitts & Nevis and Barbados, struck down comparable legal guidelines that usually sought lengthy jail sentences. Other instances within the area are pending.

Still, discrimination in opposition to LGBTQ individuals persists throughout the conservative and principally Christian Caribbean. Some lawmakers and non secular leaders oppose the abolition of anti-gay legal guidelines, invoking God of their arguments and calling homosexual relationships a sin.

Same-sex consensual intimacy remains to be criminalized in six Caribbean nations, in accordance with Human Rights Watch and the London-based group Human Dignity Trust. The most penalties in these nations vary from 10 years to life in jail.

The legal guidelines “are seldom enforced against consenting persons. And the specific legal provisions vary from country to country,” Human Rights Watch wrote. “But they share one common trait: they all give social and legal sanction for discrimination, violence, stigma, and prejudice against lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) individuals.”

Here’s a fast have a look at the legal guidelines:

Jamaica

Some LGBTQ-rights teams contemplate Jamaica the Caribbean nation most hostile to homosexual individuals. Jamaica’s authorities has argued that it doesn’t implement its 1864 anti-sodomy legal guidelines. But activists say protecting these legal guidelines on the books stokes homophobia and violence in opposition to the LGBTQ neighborhood. The area’s main human rights physique agrees. Jamaica’s “Offences Against the Person Act” makes “the abominable crime of buggery” punishable by imprisonment and onerous labor for as much as 10 years.

Dominica

The “Sexual Offences Act ” criminalizes same-sex sexual exercise between males in addition to girls with sentences of as much as 12 years imprisonment.

Grenada

The Criminal Code criminalizes “unnatural connexion” – broadly understood as sexual activity between males – with sentences of as much as 10 years in jail. It additionally criminalizes “grossly indecent acts”, with as much as two years in jail and/or a fantastic. “While the language is gender-neutral, only sexual acts between men are criminalized under this provision,” in accordance with Human Dignity Trust.

Guyana

Life imprisonment for anybody “who commits buggery, either with a human being, or with any other living creature.” Under the “Criminal Law (Offences) Act,” anybody who “attempts to commit buggery; or assaults any person to commit buggery; or being a male, indecently assaults any other male person,” may very well be imprisoned for as much as 10 years.

St. Lucia

Under the 2004 “Criminal Code of St. Lucia,” any act of “gross indecency” dedicated by individuals of the identical intercourse is punishable by as much as 10 years in jail. “Buggery” can also be punishable with a 10-year sentence.

St. Vincent and the Grenadines

Criminalizes same-sex sexual exercise between males in addition to girls with sentences of as much as 10 years in jail. The 1990 “Criminal Code ” additionally punishes an “act of gross indecency with another person of the same sex” with as much as 5 years in jail.

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Associated Press journalist Danica Coto in San Juan, Puerto Rico, contributed to this report.

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