LGBTQ Coalition Sweeps to Victory in Caribbean Court

The drive for legal equality for LGBTQ people has faced strong headwinds in the Caribbean in recent years. In February 2024, a court in St. Vincent and the Grenadines dismissed a challenge to the nation’s archaic antigay criminal codes, saying the laws were justified on the grounds of public health and morality. And an appeals court in Trinidad and Tabago reinstated that nation’s anti-sodomy laws in March 2025, ruling that the colonial-era statutes were constitutionally untouchable.

But the winds of progress are blowing strong in St. Lucia, where a coalition of community groups just won a stunning court victory, overturning laws that imposed long prison sentences for same-sex intimacy. This was the coalition’s fourth court victory since 2022, when it successfully challenged anti-queer criminal statutes in Antigua and Barbuda, St. Kitts and Nevis, and Barbados. A similar case in Grenada is pending.

David Hunt talked with Kenita Placide, executive director of the Caribbean Alliance for Diversity and Equality (ECADE), the organization behind the legal tempest sweeping across the islands. 

An edited version of this featured aired on This Way Out: The International LGBTQ Radio Magazine.

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David Hunt is an Emmy-winning journalist and documentary producer who has reported on America's culture wars since the 1970s. Explore his blog, Tell Me, David.