蜜芽传媒

Benedict Cumberbatch and Stephen Fry have been leading a campaign to pardon thousands of men who, like the World War Two codebreaker Alan Turing, were prosecuted for being gay.

Steve Close was convicted of gross indecency and given a dishonourable discharge from the army in 1983 after his relationship with a fellow soldier was reported to the Royal Military Police.

The conviction is still affecting Mr Close's life, despite a bill in 2003 repealing the offence of gross indecency.

He could not get "proper work" due to his conviction and in January 2013 police gave a letter to his mother which asked Mr Close to provide a DNA sample under Operation Nutmeg, a push across England and Wales to collect genetic material from people jailed for serious crimes before 1994.

This clip is originally from 5 live Breakfast on Saturday 28 February 2015.