Jamaica’s Sodomy Law Gets First Legal Challenge

Dan82 · Oct 29, 2011

http://www.care2.com/causes/jamaicas-sodomy-law-gets-first-legal-challenge.html

At a press conference in Kingston today, October 26, Jamaican attorney Maurice Tomlinson announced that the organization AIDS-Free World has presented a first-ever legal challenge to the country’s anti-gay laws.

The group has submitted a petition at the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) on behalf of two Jamaican gay men whose names are being withheld to protect their safety.

Representing the petitioners will be a very high-powered legal team including Lord Anthony Gifford, who practices in both Jamaica and the UK and was counsel on a similar and successful case before the European Court of Human Rights, and pro bono attorneys from the US firm Thompson Hine and the Law Center at Nova Southeastern University.

Their argument will be that by criminalizing homosexuality, Jamaica is in violation of international human rights laws which it is a signatory to, such as the American Convention on Human Rights.

A similar legal challenge is underway against Belize and Caribbean LGBT groups have been raising the issue of sodomy laws with inter-American bodies for some time...

Read more: http://www.care2.com/causes/jamaicas-sodomy-law-gets-first-legal-challenge.html#ixzz1cBJCAhrY
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Jamaica’s Sodomy Law Gets First Legal Challenge

Dan82 Full Member

Dan82
Full Member