Bid to overturn loitering laws critics say target poor

A case against the government seeks to overturn the country’s loitering laws, which activists and lawyers claim are discriminatory, and used by police to extract bribes and sexually abuse women.

Critics say the laws are used to target poor and vulnerable people and subject them to criminal sanctions. Women arrested for loitering, and lacking money to pay bribes, claim they have been violently raped by police officers. Others say they have been coerced into having sex to avoid spending the night in a police cell. Loitering has been on the statute books since the days of British rule.