The colonial-era law banning same-sex relations in Saint Kitts and Nevis has been overturned in a “landmark” ruling for the Caribbean country, the Gay Times has reported. On 29 August, the Eastern Caribbean Supreme Court upheld a motion by Jamal Jeffers, a gay man who challenged sections 56 and 57 of the Offences Against the Persons Act, which criminalised acts of “buggery” and “unnatural offences.
In essence, the judgement by Judge Trevor Ward said “sections 56 and 57 are “not reasonably justified in a democratic society in circumstances where they proscribe sexual acts between consenting adults in private, which involve no element of public conduct or harm to, or sexual acts, with minors.”
“To the extent that it criminalises the private lives of gay persons in this year, the law is excessive and arbitrary,” Ward said.
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