Equality On Trial

Costa Rican court dashes advocates hopes of marriage equality

September 23, 2013

By Jacob Combs

Marriage equality

LGBT advocates on Costa Rica who hoped that a law passed earlier this year might lead to civil unions for same-sex couples were dealt a blow last week when a court in the nation’s capitol ruled against them.  The Tico Times reports:

A family court judge in San José has rejected a gay domestic partnership application in the first legal test of Costa Rica’s controversial reform to the Young Person Law.

Alberto González and Lorenzo Serrano discovered in July that San José Family Court Judge Jorge Arturo Marchena Rosabel had rejected their petition for a legally recognized domestic partnership. The two young men have been a couple for seven years and have lived together for six-and-half years.

“We knew that the result could be positive or negative. Honestly, because of the Young Person Law we thought it would go through but there you have it, it didn’t happen,” González told The Tico Times Friday.

The couple’s lawyer, Marco Castillo, president of LGBT organization Diversity Movement, said that they had already appealed the judge’s decision and are waiting for a response. The Supreme Tribunal of the Family Courts will hear the appeal.

The July modification of the Young Person Law added an amendment that common-law marriages must be granted without “discrimination contrary to human dignity.”  González and Serrano applied for a domestic partnership–which would have provided them some, but not all of the rights of marriage–after the law was changed.  In his ruling, Judge Marchena pointed to several other provisions in Costa Rican law that mandate that marriages and domestic partnerships are open only to different-sex couples.

(h/t Towleroad)

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