DR1 Daily News - Dominican Republic

In a landmark ruling, the Dominican Constitutional Court (TC) has invalidated articles from the Police and Armed Forces justice codes that criminalized homosexual relations among service members. The ruling, issued on 18 November 2025, removes long-standing penalties that defined “sodomy” as same-sex intercourse, ensuring that members of the military and national police can engage in such relationships without fear of sanction, the media reports.

The 2010 Constitution explicitly bans same-sex marriage, a change that was carried into the 2015 version.

The Constitutional Court’s new ruling, designated TC/1225/25, specifically targets Article 210 of Law 285 (1966), which created the National Police Justice Code, and Article 260 of Law 3483 (1953), which established the Armed Forces Justice Code.

The repealed articles previously stipulated varied terms of “correctional prison” for offenders depending on their rank. For officers, the punishments ranged from six months to two...