Blog post: After an Eight-Year Wait, Our Case Challenging a Vile Jamaican Law is Finally Heard
By Sarah L. Bosha
AIDS-Free World Legal and Research Advisor, HIV and Human Rights
November 15, 2019
In early October, AIDS-Free World received a piece of news that caused us to let out a collective cheer. The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR) had granted a hearing on a petition that we filed on behalf of two extraordinary individuals who suffered terrible harm because of Jamaica's anti-sodomy law. The petition was filed eight long years ago, in 2011. Given audience with the IACHR, we would finally have the opportunity to make our arguments and tell the stories of the victims.
It was a unique privilege to appear on November 11 before the IACHR, which had convened in session at Quito, Ecuador. I made the case for repeal of the anti-sodomy law and provided analysis on its attendant human rights violations alongside Maurice Tomlinson of the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network and Samir Varma of Thompson Hine law firm. We argued that Jamaica's anti-sodomy was a gross violation of the right to health and the right to family, among other rights enshrined in the American Convention on Human Rights, which Jamaica signed in 1978.
The two individuals on whose behalf we presented the petition— we have identified them as A.B. and S.H.—suffered much hardship and heartache before they fled Jamaica in search of safety and security. They were victims of Jamaica’s colonial-era law that criminalized sexual relations between men and fostered a culture of homophobia in Jamaica. Gay men and other sexual minorities were hated to death—quite literally. Many were murdered by mobs. The police often did nothing to arrest the perpetrators.
For A.B. and S.H., Jamaica provided no relief, no peace, and no respect for their humanity. Each had been beaten, verbally abused, and rejected by their families. A.B. recalled how his mother’s house was surrounded by an angry mob that wanted to stone A.B. for being gay.
Health care workers are often lauded for their willingness to serve those in need of assistance, caring for their patients in an impartial and nondiscriminatory manner. But A.B. and S.H.—and other gay Jamaicans—found no refuge in hospitals and public health centers. Instead, they suffered the same discrimination they experienced elsewhere in Jamaican society. A.B. was subject to jeers and taunts when he sought an HIV test at a free government clinic: "I saw patients in the waiting area and nurses pointing and laughing at me while I sat for about an hour to be called for the test. I was intimated by the atmosphere and just wanted to leave. I regretted going to the clinic very soon after I arrived.”
A.B.'s right to health was violated. He could not walk into a public health center to receive a simple HIV test in a welcoming and inclusive environment. The consequences are significant—not only to his own health and quality of life but also to Jamaica's efforts to control and prevent HIV. The health care workers in the clinic had failed an important test. They had lost sight of the patient, blinded by hate.
A.B.'s story offers strong proof that the criminalization of same sex relationships drives sexual minorities underground and away from the most basic HIV services and public health centers in general. In this way, homophobic laws fuel the spread of HIV.
We urgently hope that the IACHR in its response to our petition recommends that the Jamaican government repeals the anti-sodomy law.
As a global health practitioner and human rights lawyer, I was honored to be a part of a case that highlighted the human impact of an unjust law. I—and AIDS-Free World and my co-counsels —will continue fighting until this institutionalized act of homophobia is consigned to the ash heap of history.