The UK government will extend its Disregard and Pardons policy currently covering a narrow set of laws to any conviction that was imposed on someone purely due to consensual homosexual activity under now-abolished laws, The Guardian newspaper reported on Tuesday
LONDON (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 04th January, 2022) The UK government will extend its Disregard and Pardons policy currently covering a narrow set of laws to any conviction that was imposed on someone purely due to consensual homosexual activity under now-abolished laws, The Guardian newspaper reported on Tuesday.
According to the media outlet, the move, set to be announced by Home Ministry Priti Patel, is intended to "righting the wrongs of the past."
At present, only nine former offenses are currently included on a list which the Home Office said largely focused on repealed offenses of sodomy and gross indecency between men.
However, an amendment to the Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill will broaden the criteria to include any repealed or abolished civilian or military offense that was imposed on someone purely due to consensual same-sex sexual activity, the newspaper said.
Anyone who died before the changes were made, or up to 12 months afterwards, will also be posthumously pardoned.
Until 1967, being homosexual was considered a crime in the UK and gay and bisexual men faced a maximum sentence of life in prison if they broke the law.
One of the most notorious cases was that of mathematician and World War II code-breaker Alan Turing, who was convicted in 1952 for gross indecency and was chemically castrated.
Turing, who died in an apparent suicide two years later, was given a posthumous royal pardon in 2013.
