On January 28, the Privy Council, which declined to...

On January 28, the Privy Council, which declined to hear the case two years ago, heard an appeal filed by Indravani Pamela Ramjattan, aged 36. In February 1991, Alexander Jordan, her common-law husband, was beaten to death by two men whom Ramjattan had called to rescue her, one of whom was her lover. Ramjattan swears she never asked them to kill Jordan, and prosecutors concede that she never raised a hand against a man they acknowledge had abused her for years. Still, Ramjattan was convicted of murder, and the Trinidadian Government said it was her turn to die. The case could set a precedent for these island nations where, women's rights advocates said, wife-killers routinely get minimal prison terms while wives who retaliate against abusers often are prosecuted to the maximum extent of the law. Ramjattan vs. the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago is the first such case to reach the highest court for the region, and it has become a cause célèbre in recent months for women's solidarity groups at home and abroad that say they are trying to balance the scales of justice.Women's rights activists said studies done so far on domestic violence in the Caribbean offer no clear picture of the extent of the problem, but they believe it is widespread. "If you take a rough rate of 1 in 10 cases being reported, I estimate there is an incident of domestic violence taking place in Trinidad every 20 minutes," said Diana Mahabir-Wyatt, a Trinidadian senator who has led the fight against domestic violence. Official statistics show that, on average, about 20 women and children are killed by such violence each year in this twin-island nation of about 1.2 million people.