One court hearing in Trinidad and Tobago could be the first step towards legalizing gay sex in eight countries. Currently, in Trinidad & Tobago, you can be jailed for life just for having consensual gay sex. But Jason Jones’s landmark legal challenge with the High Court in the country on January 30 will challenge this law.

Jones tells Gay Star News the case calls for ‘the discriminatory “buggery” laws from British colonial past, to be struck down from the constitution.’ It’s currently one of only four such cases worldwide. The case is challenging Sections 13 and 16 of the Sexual Offenses Act. They mean that gay sex can be punishable by up to 25 years in prison.

Currently, both male and female homosexuality is illegal. But Jones says his case has implications beyond Trinidad and Tobago: ‘It will have a legal precedent that has legal standing in seven other English speaking nations in the Caribbean.’

This means Jones’s case could liberate LGBTI people in Grenada, St Kitts and Graves, Barbados, Antiga, St Vincent, St Lucia and even Jamaica. Read more via Gay Star News