In Association pour le Progrès et la Défense des Droits des Femmes Maliennes (APDF) and Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa (IHRDA) v. Republic of Mali, the African Court examined whether Mali’s 2011 Persons and Family Code was compatible with the state’s binding obligations under African and international human rights law relating to the protection of women and children.

In the Ogiek case, the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights held that Kenya had violated multiple provisions of the African Charter by forcibly evicting the Ogiek, an indigenous forest-dwelling community, from their ancestral lands in the Mau Forest Complex without consultation, justification, or adequate compensation.

This case followed the death of Cristina Britez Arce in June of 1992. Britez Arce was more than 40 weeks pregnant and had experienced several risk factors during her pregnancy that went unaddressed by the health system. When Britez Arce went to the hospital, doctors took an ultrasound and told her that her fetus had died.

This case arose from a January 2011 incident in Fizi, Democratic Republic of the Congo. Congolese soldiers had carried out a retaliatory military operation against civilians following the killing of a fellow soldier. This resulted in mass arrests, the collective rape of women, torture, destruction of property, and other abuses against fifty-three women and one man.

Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 272 § 30 authorizes the superior court to issue injunctions preventing the dissemination of any visual material that is deemed to be obscene.

Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 272 § 21B allows privately controlled hospitals and health facilities to refuse to admit patients for abortions, sterilization procedures, or the receipt of contraceptive devices or counseling when such services conflict with the facility's stated religious or moral principles. The statute further provides that such conflict with the facility’s stated religious or moral principles.

Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 272 § 3 criminalizes administering or causing a person to ingest any drug or intoxicating substance with the intent to facilitate sexual intercourse while they are intoxicated. The statute’s purpose is to prohibit sexual violence enabled through drug-induced incapacity, as well as to protect individuals from being overpowered or deprived of the ability to consent. A person who violates this section faces a mandatory minimum sentence of ten years in state prison and may be sentenced to life imprisonment.

Massachusetts General Laws Chapter 272 § 2 criminalizes fraudulently or deceitfully enticing or taking a person from any location for the purposes of prostitution or unlawful sexual intercourse. The law also punishes anyone who assists in such an abduction. A violation is punishable by up to three years in state prison, up to one year in jail, a fine of up to one thousand dollars, or a combination of a fine and incarceration.

The African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights is a continental judicial body created by Member States of the African Union that provides binding adjudication and authoritative interpretation of human rights obligations under the African Charter and other related instruments.

A man was convicted of raping his estranged wife and breaking and entering with intent to commit a felony. On appeal, he argued that under the common law, a husband could not be convicted of raping his wife. The Supreme Judicial Court rejected this “marital rape exemption,” holding that the revised rape statute, G.L. c.