A convicted rapist who attacked a sleeping woman cannot be deported from the UK to Jamaica because he is bisexual, judges have ruled.
The man – known only as AA – was jailed for seven years in 2018 of forcing himself on a sleeping woman after a drinking and cannabis session at a party.
The Home Office launched a bid for him to be deported back to his native Jamaica, but judges blocked the move because of fears for his own safety.
A tribunal heard AA had been in a sexual relationship with an older man in Jamaica when aged 13 and 14, and due to his sexuality he was “repeatedly violently attacked in Jamaica, leading to multiple scars on his head and body including from a metal bar, a machete, and attacks by dogs”.
Fighting deportation, the man – who moved to the UK in 2001 – argued he “would be at risk on return to Jamaica as a bisexual man”.
The Home Office suggested AA is “a danger to the community”, while Judge Melissa Canavan noted that he initially claimed to not know he had committed a crime by having sex with the woman after she had been drinking and gone to sleep.
The tribunal in 2023 found that AA’s evidence was not “entirely credible” on his understanding of rape, but it also highlighted that he has apologised in writing to the victim and attended a victim awareness course.
The tribunal also found the man had been sexually abused in his childhood relationship with the older man.
It was accepted he had been open about his sexuality, and as a result of the violence and persecution he suffered, he would be considered gay if returned to Jamaica.
Judge Canavan, sitting in the Upper Tribunal, Immigration and Asylum Chamber, said there is an “embedded nature of anti-gay and LGBTQI+ attitudes in Jamaica”.
“The evidence relating to Jamaica showed that there continues to be an entrenched culture of ‘anti-gay’ violence and discrimination”, she said, backing the original tribunal’s decision to block deportation.
The court heard the man has a “well-founded fear of persecution” if sent back to Jamaica, and Judge Canavan concluded that the tribunal was entitled to “take into account the fact that (he) had suffered past persecution on this basis, and that as a bisexual man, it was reasonably likely that he would face similar treatment if returned”.
Responding to reporting of the case, the Home Office said it made “no apology for wanting to remove foreign national offenders at the earliest opportunity. We work with law enforcement to ensure there is no barrier to deport foreign criminals, as it is in the public interest for these people to be removed swiftly.”