UK Court Declares Caribbean Nation’s Anti‑Gay Law Unconstitutional

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — A final court of appeals in England struck down a centuries‑old law criminalizing gay sex in Trinidad and Tobago in a ruling that was hailed by activists worldwide.

The decision concluded a decade‑long legal battle for LGBTQ+ rights in the twin‑island nation and is final, with no further appeal possible.

“Those laws cannot be regarded as reasonably justifiable in a society that has a proper respect for the rights and freedom of the individual,” said Judge Philip James Sales of the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council.

He added that “the current understanding of the fundamental individual right to respect for private and family life is that it protects such a core part of human identity, as one’s sexual orientation and the sexual activities carried on in private between consenting adults to give expression to that identity. Laws which seek to criminalize such activities cannot be justified.”

The case was initiated in February 2017 by Jason Jones, who argued that the colonial‑era “buggery” statutes were unconstitutional. Those statutes, which carried penalties of up to five years’ imprisonment, had not been enforced in recent years but were seen as perpetuating stigma.

Jones, who has been openly gay since age 16, left Trinidad and Tobago in 1996 because of what he described as homophobic violence and discrimination.

Opposition to the challenge came from the government of Trinidad and Tobago, the nation’s Council of Evangelical Churches, and its largest Hindu organization, the Sanatan Dharma Maha Sabha.

The legal journey began when Trinidad’s High Court declared the statutes unconstitutional in April 2018. However, a local appeals court partially reversed that ruling in March 2025, leading to an appeal to the Privy Council. Trinidad and Tobago, a sovereign republic within the Commonwealth, still uses the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council as its highest court, though it has been pushing to replace it with the Caribbean Court of Justice based in Trinidad.

Trinidad and Tobago’s government had urged the Privy Council to uphold the 2025 decision. In that ruling, a majority of justices found that the High Court had erred by allowing judges to alter the law, citing constitutional provisions that shield colonial legislation from challenge.

Other Caribbean nations that retain similar buggery laws include Grenada, Jamaica, and Saint Vincent and the Grenadines. Meanwhile, several Caribbean jurisdictions have moved toward decriminalization: the Bahamas in 1991, the United Kingdom in 2001 for its Overseas Territories, and more recently judges in Barbados, Dominica, Saint Lucia, and Antigua and Barbuda have struck down comparable statutes.

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