Moroccan authorities took an elderly British tourist into custody and sentenced him to a four-month prison term on the charge of being a homosexual.

The arrest took place on Sept. 18, but it was only until a week later that Ray Cole, 69, was able to reach his family in Kent, south of London to alert them.

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"It's really rough, he's in with paedophiles and murderers and people who have committed shocking crimes," Cole's son, Adrian, told the LGBTQ publication Pink News. "The Consulate tried to visit him but were initially turned way, and told he had refused to see them. But when we spoke to him, he didn't know anything about it."

The younger Cole, 41, confirmed his father is gay, having coming out of the closet several years ago after 45 years of marriage. He had gone to Morocco to visit another man, Jamal Jam Wald Nass, whom he had met on social media and with whom he had had vacationed in the country before. The incident occurred in the city of Marrakesh, a popular tourist destination for Europeans. 

Article 489 of the Penal Code of Morocco criminalizes "lewd or unnatural acts with an individual of the same sex." Men and women convicted of same-sex relations are fined and can be imprisoned for up to three years.

Morocco's legal code is heavily influenced by Islam, which is the majority religion in the north African country on the Mediterranean coast south of Spain.

The law is rarely enforced, but is often used as a means of extortion or petty revenge. Adrian suspects the police were looking for a bribe from Nass, a common bullying tactic in a country whose police force is well-known to be corrupt, or that conservative neighbors called authorities to rid themselves of somebody they disapproved.

The younger Cole tells Pink News his father and Nass were approached by police at a bus stop. When authorities made for Nass, Cole stepped and both men were arrested as a result. During court proceedings, officers used a photo of the two men together found on Cole's as proof of a homosexual act taking place. Adrian calls the trial "farcical." 

"Why they haven't just deported him no one seems to be able to be able to explain," Adrian said. "He knows he committed a gay act on their soil, he gets that. But he should be deported back, putting a 69 year-old tourist in prison for that isn't sensible, you can't lock them up.

Adrian, who is gay himself, also worries for his father's ill health. The younger Cole, who was able to visit Ray in prison, reports his father is forced to sleep on a concrete floor in a prison dormitory designed to hold 44 men but currently holds 60.

"He's had a couple of minor strokes before and has a minor heart condition. He has also been suffering with depression, which the court didn't take into account."

The Cole family took to the Internet to highlight the case, starting the #freeraycole hashtag on Twitter, as well as working with British authorities in the United Kingdom and Morocco to free their patriarch, who is still imprisoned as of this writing. The whereabouts of Nass were not made public.

Adrian is also campaigning on Facebook, posting: "Please share this with as many people as you can and let's make sure that the Moroccans think twice about the way they treat those who chose to contribute to their economy."

TagsRay Cole, homosexuality, Gay, Morocco, Arrested