A gay couple from Massachusetts was detained by police after kissing on the dance floor of a popular club on Grand Cayman. Aaron Chandler, 23, and his boyfriend, both from on Amherst, Massachusetts, were holidaying with the boyfriend's sister and brother–in–law on the Caribbean island. The four had gone to the Royal Palms and joined about a dozen other couples who were dancing.
At one point Chandler kissed his boyfriend. A patron approached the men and berated them. "He asked us not to do that," Chandler told the Cay Compass newspaper. "He said, 'you shouldn’t be doing this here'.
The couple ignored the protest and kept dancing. Chandler, who is a member of the National Youth Advocacy Coalition, then planted another kiss on his boyfriend. "I do display affection when I’m with my boyfriend, publicly," Chandler told the paper. "It’s never anything most people would consider obscene however; usually it’s in the form of holding hands or a quick kiss."
But a police spokesperson told the Compass that two Cayman laws - the Penal Code and the Towns and Communities Law - could have been used to lay changes on the grounds that same-sex kissing in public caused distress or a disturbance to another member of the public.
An off-duty police officer intervened after the second kiss. "He told me he did not want me to show public displays of affection," Chandler said. "He said it was against the law for two people of the same sex." As the four Americans were preparing to leave the club Chandler kissed his boyfriend again.
At that point "The officer grabbed my wrist and told me he was placing me under arrest," Chandler told the Compass. A second police officer arrived at the scene and the two men were taken to the George Town police station. After several hours in a holding room they were released without any charges laid. Chandler said that police attempted to get them to promise not to kiss again in public while on the island. Whether they could have been charged is questionable. Following complaints in several British territories in the Caribbean the UK Parliament passed a law in 2000 requiring the islands to abide by British law that decriminalized homosexuality.
The lesson, try not to spend money to support anti gay vacations.
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