Sweden: 20 year-old man gets another eight months for second HIV exposure conviction

The 20 year-old Linköping man previously sentenced to two years in prison in 2008 for having unprotected sex without disclosure with seven women aged 17-25 and arrested last month for having unprotected sex without disclosing his HIV-positive status to a 15 year-old girl has been sentenced to a further eight months in prison and must pay 40,000 SEK (about 4,000 Euro) damages.

According to the brief report on SvD.com (English translation here) since he was on conditional release after serving 16 months of his original sentence, he will serve the eight months months he had left in addition to this eight month sentence, meaning he will spend 16 months in prison in total. Since the sex only took place last month, the girl's HIV status is unclear.

Sweden: 20 year-old man previously convicted of HIV exposure arrested again

A 20 year-old Swedish man who was released from prison in January 2009 after serving 16 months of a two-year sentence for HIV exposure has been arrested again following allegations that he had unprotected sex without disclosure with a 15 year-old girl.

Although the case is briefly summarised in English in a report in The Local, much more detail is provided in the Swedish tabloid, Aftonbladet.

According to this report, the young man from Linköping was originally diagnosed in April 2007, at the age of 17, after having had unprotected sex with his HIV-positive girlfriend at the time, despite knowing her HIV status.

Following his diagnosis, he appeared to go on something of a bender, sleeping with seven young women without disclosing his status or wearing a condom. None became HIV-positive. He was arrested in September 2007 (previously reported on my blog here) and the case went to court in January 2008.

His defence was that he was in denial.

I rätten försvarade han sig med att han var chockad och inte kunde ta till sig informationen. (In court he defended himself that he was shocked and could not absorb the information.)

He was found guilty of attempted aggravated assault and sentenced to two years in prison. He was also ordered to pay 40,000 Swedish Krona (around €4000) in damages to each of the seven young women.

Released after 16 months' prison, in January 2009 he moved back to Linköping.

Last Friday, he was picked up for questioning by police following a complaint from a 15 year-old girl that he had had unprotected sex without disclosing his HIV status.

Prosecutor, Britt-Louise Viklund told Linköping District Court:

Han erkänner och skyller på att han var alkoholpåverkad. Han hade tillgång till kondom men använde den inte, säger Britt-Louise Viklund. ("He recognises and blames it on the fact that he was under the influence of alcohol. He had access to condoms but did not use them.")

His defence lawyer argued, unsuccessfully, that her client had changed.

Han är djupt ångerfull över det här, han har förändrat sitt beteende mycket den senaste tiden och han menade att det inte finns någon risk för fortsatt brottslighet, säger hans advokat Morgan Gerdin. (He is deeply remorseful over this: he has recently changed his behaviour and says that there is no risk of further crime," said his lawyer, Morgan Gerdin.)

However, the court decided that the risk was so great that he would expose more women to the risk of infection that he has been remanded in custody until his trial.

The case reveals much about the difficulties of a punitive approach to HIV non-disclosure and the Swedish system's inability to deal with a young man unable to come to terms with his diagnosis.

Surely prison is not working as a deterrent, nor has it rehabilitated him. Some of the comments from readers of The Local suggest far more draconian measures, including a tattoo on his forehead, castration and a slow a painful death. I have reported the latter suggestions (such as "Cover him in gasoline and BURN him!") as hate speech under The Local's 'report abuse' policy. Let's see if they remove such comments.

Issues such as inflammatory media coverage of HIV exposure/transmission cases, and how public health laws are also being used (and abused) in such cases were discussed in Stockholm in June 2009 at an excellent one-day symposium, HIV and Criminal Law, organised by HIV-Sweden.

You can download a pdf report of the meeting here or email HIV-Sweden to request a hard copy.

US: Idaho man's third criminal HIV exposure conviction nets him 20-30 years (updated)

Update: Sept 17 2009. Thomas has been sentenced to 20-30 years in prison for his third HIV exposure conviction

Here's part of Idaho TV station, Fox12.com's, report:

Thomas' defense involved a number of people he worked with at Sel Equity -- all character witnesses, who told the judge how good Thomas was at his job. Thomas also spoke to the court and apologized to his victim. "First and foremost, I do take responsibility for the harm that I've done to Diana, to her family," said Thomas. But this is far from his first offense. He was convicted of similar crimes in 1988 and 1996 and did a number of years behind bars. So it seemed strange that this time his attorney would ask the judge for a 30-year sentence -- most of which being spent doing community service instead of prison time. "He is in a unique position with his intelligence, his ability to be articulate, to actually make a difference in people's lives," said his attorney. The judge disagreed. "As I said today, even your victim feels sorry for you, but that doesn't mean that you shouldn't be punished, and punished severely," said the Hon. Michael Wetherell. "The 20-year consecutive sentence that he imposed was meant to send this defendant a message that we're not going to tolerate this any more," said Jean Fisher, Ada County deputy prosecutor.

Original post: March 13 2009. Kerry Thomas, 45, who was the first person to be convicted under Idaho's HIV exposure law in 1996 (see the 1999 appeal documents here), has been charged again following a complaint from a woman last December.

According to KIVI-TV.com,

Boise Police say they found out Thomas had a sexual relationship with a woman and transferred the virus to her.

The story has made the national news. According to a CNN online report, this is actually the third time Mr Thomas has been accused of criminal HIV exposure or transmission.

In 1990, Thomas was charged with four counts of HIV transmission and two counts of statutory rape, Fisher said. As part of a plea agreement, he pleaded guilty only to the rape charges...[He] received a 12-year sentence and had to serve three years before being eligible for parole. He was later granted early release. In 1996, however, Thomas was again charged with one count of HIV transmission, and a jury convicted him, Fisher said. He received a 15-year sentence with a seven-year minimum. Now out on parole, Thomas faces possible life in prison on the new charges because prosecutors are seeking his designation as a "persistent violator."

UK: Man previousy convicted of reckless HIV transmission jailed again

The sixth person to be convicted of reckless HIV transmission in England & Wales, Derek Hornett, has been jailed again for breaching an order banning him from contacting people over the age of 60, after pleading guilty last month to four separate breaches of the order, concerning four separate women.

Mr Hornett pleaded guilty to reckless HIV transmission to an 82-year old woman in December 2005. It was claimed that he began a relationship with the woman to take advantage of her secure financial position. Along with his three years, three months prison sentence he was given a Sexual Offences Prevention Order, which prohibited him from having sex with anyone without telling them he was HIV-positive, and from associating with, or working for, anyone over the age of 60.

The Western Morning News reports that Recorder Ian Pringle who passed sentence at Exeter Crown Court yesterday found the pre-sentence report "very disturbing". It seems he had again tried to establish sexual relationships with at least one of the four women.

Martin Salloway, mitigating, told Exeter Crown Court yesterday Hornett was seeing a psychiatrist and "recognised that he has got difficulties".

Hornett's HIV was "on the brink of becoming full-blown Aids" and his illness would make his time in jail more "onerous".

He added Hornett's wife, who was in court, was also terminally ill and the defendant was her full-time carer.

Passing sentence, Mr Pringle said he was certain Hornett had been trying to develop a sexual relationship with one of the women to whom the charges related and added: "It's difficult to imagine a more flagrant breach than that."

He sentenced Hornett to two years for the first breach and 12 months for each of the other three. He said the 12-month sentences would be served concurrently with one another but consecutively with the two-year sentence.

Canada: Ontario man imprisoned for a second time for HIV exposure

An Ontario man who had already been convicted of aggravated sexual assault (HIV exposure) because he failed to disclose his HIV status to his female sexual partners, and who served almost three years in prison, has been imprisoned again for five years for the same 'offence' with a different woman.

Apart from raising the obvious point that rehabilitation was obviously not achieved in this man's case, the case also shows how informed members of the criminal justice system are about the risks of sexual HIV transmission.

Justice Johanne Morissette, who has already presided over the trials of Tendai Mazambini, Owen Antoine, and Mark Hinton said it was “miraculous” that Edward Kelly had not transmitted HIV to his female sexual partner. Since he was found guilty of having unprotected sex once with the latest partner, it is hardly a miracle that HIV transmission did not occur.

Even more worrying was that Mr Kelly's lawyer, Robert Farrington, had no idea about HIV transmission risks, either.

Farrington told Morissette he consulted the AIDS Committee of London to understand how Kelly had never infected his sexual partners.

He learned Kelly hasn’t transmitted his illness, largely because his CDA blood-cell count — cells that help protect the body from infection — remain high while his viral count remains low.

Although it is possible that reporter Jane Sims, who has covered on every single criminal HIV exposure/transmission case in London, Ontario, – or subeditor – got the details wrong (CD4 counts have nothing to do with HIV exposure or transmission risk, it is related primarily to viral load) she probably reported what the lawyer said (but then again, why didn't she correct him?)

Report from The London Free Press below.

Man with HIV gets five years
By JANE SIMS
SUN MEDIA
Mon, September 8, 2008

The judge said it was “miraculous” Edward Kelly never transmitted HIV to unsuspecting sex partners.

Already punished with a three-year prison term in 2003 for not disclosing his health status to four women, the London man was ordered today to serve five more years for the same crime.

“I realize the severity of the crime I have done and I realize what I did was wrong,” Kelly told Justice Johanne Morissette.

“Hopefully it will never happen again,” he said, then corrected himself. “No, it will never happen again.”

Morissette noted Kelly’s abrupt correction. “You have to understand your status,” she said.

“You have five years to think about your future and think about having this status for the rest of your life.”

Kelly, 34, pleaded guilty to one count of aggravated sexual assault in July.

His victim was a 37-year-old woman who hooked up with him through an Internet chat line on June 3, 2005.

They met a day after communicating online and had protected sex two days later.

Kelly never told her he was HIV positive — which was diagnosed in 1997.

On June 11, 2005, they had unprotected sex. Again, he didn’t disclose his HIV.

They broke up at the end of July and, in August 2005, Kelly was arrested and his parole was revoked.

When Kelly was released from custody, he called the woman. They saw each other as friends, but she didn’t know about his HIV until one of his roommates disclosed it to her.

She called police on May 2, 2006.

The woman, who remains HIV negative, sobbed softly in the courtroom during sentencing.

Kelly’s lawyer, Robert Farrington, said his client is the father of four children — two who are teenagers and have no contact with him.

The other children are twins born to Kelly and a woman who met and started a relationship with him after the latest charge was wending its way through the courts.

He told that woman of his status. Neither the woman nor the twins have tested positive for HIV.

Farrington said Kelly’s actions were “a tremendously serious offence,” but his guilty plea shows he has accepted responsibility.

Farrington told Morissette he consulted the AIDS Committee of London to understand how Kelly had never infected his sexual partners.

He learned Kelly hasn’t transmitted his illness, largely because his CDA blood-cell count — cells that help protect the body from infection — remain high while his viral count remains low.

Kelly was also ordered to provide a DNA sample and his name will be added to the sex-offender registry for life.