A man from Trinidad and Tobago has won a legal appeal lasting almost a decade in the last court of appeal available to him — the judicial committee of the Privy Council in former colonial power Britain.
Jason Jones, a gay man born in Trinidad and Tobago, had challenged the Caribbean nation's Sexual Offences Act outlawing consensusal sex between adult males, saying that it breached his fundamental rights under the country's constitution.
He initially won his case at Trinidad and Tobago's High Court, but the government and religious organizations managed to partially overturn the ruling once more, prompting Jones to the take the case to the island nation's highest appellate authority — the Privy Council in the UK.
"To discriminate against somebody simply because of who they choose to love is simply ridiculous," Jones told the Associated Press after Tuesday's judgment was rendered.
The Privy Council in London is the final court of appeal for some Commonwealth countries including Trinidad and Tobago, although that issue was already contentious in some circles prior to Tuesday's ruling.
A panel of five judges unanimously allowed Jones' appeal, dismissing a counter-appeal from the Caribbean country's Attorney General.
It found that two sections of the country's Sexual Offenses Act 1986, criminalizing "buggery" and "serious indecency" respectively among same-sex couples, violated Jones'
