We’re working to support Radiobubble to produce a documentary about the Greek HIV case – the women who were arrested and imprisoned after forced HIV tests. Zoe Mavroudi is directing the documentary. Here Radiobubble interviews her about the progress of the case and the making of the documentary.
US: Interview with Washington State parliamentarian on revising HIV criminal law
A well-meaning law that created stricter penalties for people who knowingly spread HIV to others should be revised to destigmatize those with the illness, says state Rep. Jim Moeller, D-Vancouver. Moeller has introduced a bill to remove references to HIV in the state’s criminal assault laws while also preserving the tough penalties for criminals who intentionally infect another person with a serious disease.
US: Interview with Senator Matt McCoy on modernising Iowa's HIV criminal law
“We have a situation in Iowa where the law did not differentiate between exposure and transmission,” says Sen. Matt McCoy. He’s introducing a bill that he says will modernize the law and recognize that people with HIV can lead healthy lives. “What we wanted to do was de-stigmatize HIV,” says McCoy. ”We have a separate statute for HIV. We don’t have a separate statute for tuberculosis or other contagious diseases.”
News from Ontario Working Group on Criminal Law and HIV Exposure
Thanks to your actions, the office of the Ministry of the Attorney General met with the Ontario Working Group on January 15, 2013, to discuss desperately needed prosecutorial guidelines. Crown counsel does not have to prosecute people who use condoms or have a low viral load, just because they can.
US: President’s AIDS council calls on feds to help states repeal HIV criminalisation laws
Advisory group says these statutes are ‘unjust’ and fuel the epidemic
BY TODD HEYWOOD, AMERICAN INDEPENDENT
The Presidential Advisory Council on HIV/AIDS (PACHA) passed a resolution last week that calls for an end to federal and state HIV-specific criminal laws and prosecutions.
While the resolution is only advisory, it recommends that the departments of Justice and Health and Human Services issue guidance and offer incentives to state attorneys general and state health departments to eliminate HIV-specific laws. The advisory group also asks these federal agencies to develop guidelines for how to approach HIV within criminal and civil justice systems that are “consistent with the treatment of similar health and safety risks.”
As the resolution notes, 32 states and two territories have laws criminalizing people living with HIV.
In explaining the reason to repeal these laws, the resolution reads:
People living with HIV have been charged under aggravated assault, attempted murder, and even bioterrorism statutes, and they face more severe penalties because law enforcement, prosecutors, courts, and legislators continue to view and characterize people living with HIV and their bodily fluids as inherently dangerous, even as ‘deadly weapons. Punishments imposed for non-disclosure of HIV status, exposure, or HIV transmission are grossly out of proportion to the actual harm inflicted and reinforce the fear and stigma associated with HIV. Public health leaders and global policy makers agree that HIV criminalization is unjust, bad public health policy and is fueling the epidemic rather than reducing it.
PACHA is also requesting that state and federal authorities review the cases of persons convicted under such laws and overturn convictions if deemed appropriate. The group is calling on the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to “issue a clear statement addressing the growing evidence that HIV criminalization and punishments are counterproductive and undermine current HIV testing and prevention priorities.”
“Today’s announcement is an important advancement in our collective effort to modernize unjust and discriminatory HIV criminalization laws,” said Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), co-chair of the Congressional HIV/AIDS Caucus in a statement last week. Lee introduced the REPEAL HIV Discrimination Act in 2011, which never passed, and served on the United Nations’ Global Commission on HIV and the Law.
“I join the President’s Advisory Council on AIDS in calling on the Department of Justice and the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention to issue clear guidance to states and public health departments on the counterproductive effects of HIV criminalization policies; we must end this clear discrimination against people living with HIV,” Lee continued. “Criminalization laws breed fear, discrimination, distrust and hatred, and we must end them.”
The White House declined to comment on the resolution, but the National HIV/AIDS Strategy adopted by the Obama administration in July 2010 does call for state legislatures to “consider reviewing HIV-specific criminal statutes to ensure that they are consistent with current knowledge of HIV transmission and support public health approaches to preventing and treating HIV.”
Policymakers at the state level also welcomed the resolution. Randy Mayer, chief of the Bureau of HIV, STD, and Hepatitis for the Iowa Department of Public Health, said the resolution was a new tool in advocates’ fight to repeal Iowa’s HIV-specific law.
“This resolution came at an excellent time for Iowa,” Mayer said in an email to The American Independent.
State activists and public health officials, including Mayer, have laid out a strategy to repeal the state’s law.
“The advocates in Iowa have also aligned their efforts with a public health perspective, so the resolution was a reinforcement of their justification,” Mayer said. “I think the more public health entities that weigh in on this discussion the better.”
But while policymakers praise the resolution, activists urge cautious optimism.
Sean Strub, executive director of the anti-HIV-criminalization organization Sero Project, said the resolution was appreciated, but the “real test will be in whether federal agencies and the administration responds with the necessary urgency.”
Catherine Hanssens, executive director of the Center for HIV Law and Policy, which runs the Positive Justice Project, echoed Strub’s sentiment, noting that while the resolution is important, PACHA “has no power to order anyone to do anything.”
“[HHS] Secretary [Kathleen] Sebelius and President Obama both have the discretion to ignore the resolution’s recommendations.”
Regardless, Hanssens said the resolution is an important milestone in the battle to repeal HIV criminal laws in the U.S.
“The work of advocates who pushed for passage of the resolution is not over,” she said. “But we have passed a major marker on the road to reform, and justice, for many people and communities affected by HIV.”
The Register's Editorial: It's time to rethink Iowa's HIV sex law
When you look at the size of the Iowa Code, it’s obvious state officials excel at creating new laws. They are champing at the bit to add more this legislative session. If their goal is really to make Iowa a better place to live, our elected officials should muster as much enthusiasm for repealing problematic statutes.
Des Moines Democratic Senator Matt McCoy wants to change Iowa's HIV disclosure law
DES MOINES, Iowa (AP) – A Des Moines lawmaker plans to introduce legislation that would reduce penalties for HIV-positive people who have sex without disclosing their health condition. Des Moines Democratic Sen. Matt McCoy says he wants to change the law to reduce penalties and focus on people who purposefully infect others with the virus.Under the current law, HIV-positive people who have sex without disclosing their condition can face up to 25 years in prison if convicted, regardless of whether someone is infected. “That is truly a Draconian punishment,” McCoy said. “Being diagnosed with HIV is no longer the death sentence it once was.”
McCoy wants to change the law so someone convicted of intentional or attempted transmission of the virus could be sentenced to a maximum of five years in prison and face a $750 to $7,500 fine. That would put HIV in the same criminal category as transmitting any other communicable disease, such as Hepatitis C. McCoy also wants to end a requirement that people convicted must be placed on a sex offender registry for life.
The Legislature unanimously approved the current law in 1998. The law was approved, in part, as a reaction to a 1996 case in New York where a man intentionally infected 13 women and girls with HIV. Among those voting for the Iowa law was McCoy, who is openly gay. McCoy said the current law made sense based on what was known about HIV and AIDS, but times have changed. “The fact that I’m gay has a real impact on my sensitivity to this issue,” McCoy said. “Clearly, I’m extremely impacted by the gay community and sensitive to people living with HIV. “I just feel it’s the right thing to do for this group of people that have been so stigmatized.”
The proposed changes to the law would take into account whether an HIV-positive person took steps to prevent transmission of the disease, such as using a condom and taking medication that makes it less likely that a sexual partner would be infected. Medications have dramatically improved over the decades, and with proper treatment HIV-positive people can greatly reduce the amount of virus in their blood and make transmission of the disease unlikely.
Randy Mayer, who heads an Iowa Department of Public Health bureau that oversees HIV, said the best way officials can reduce the spread of HIV is to encourage partners to disclose their HIV status to each other. That’s why he agrees with McCoy that the law should be changed. “The law was originally set up to encourage disclosure, but it’s doing the opposite,” he said. “The law is frequently cited by people we work with as something that creates stigma and distrust of the system. … It’s what’s creating stigma.”
McCoy has previously tried to change the law but his bills have become stuck in committees. This time, he said he has support from health care professionals, HIV/AIDS advocacy groups, law enforcement and the Iowa attorney general’s office. Since the Legislature approved the Iowa law, 25 people have been convicted, though only two of those infected partners with HIV. Of those 25, 12 people remain in prison, four are on parole, one is on probation and a trial for one person is pending.
Tami Haught, who became HIV-positive 19 years ago after being infected by her husband, said she supports McCoy’s proposal. Haught works with Community HIV/Hepatitis Advocates of Iowa, which helped draft McCoy’s bill. Haught’s husband became infected through a blood transfusion in the 1980s and died of AIDS in 1996. They married after he was infected. “It takes two people to talk about protection and disclosure. I never had the discussion with my fiance,” she said. “That’s why I hate this law because it puts the entire burden on the HIV person.”
Influential blogger, Andrew Sullivan, highlights US anti-criminalisation advocacy in his Daily Beast column
In a recent interview, Lee Thompson (aka “Uncle Poodle” from Here Comes Honey Boo Boo) claimed that he brought charges against his ex-boyfriend for infecting him with HIV, resulting in a five-year sentence. Todd Heywood casts doubt on Thompson’s story.
A Spectacle of Stigma: A First-hand Account of a Canadian Criminal HIV Exposure Trial, by Carl W. Rush
Carl W Rush’s powerful essay on the trial of Noel Bowland and Steven Boone who were found guilty on two counts each of aggravated sexual assault in December 2012 for allegedly not disclosing that they were HIV-positive before having a foursome in a hotel room is published in full below with his permission.
It begins thus:
I recently attended the criminal HIV exposure trial of two young men in Kitchener, Ontario. Each was found guilty of two counts of Aggravated Sexual Assault for exposing (but not infecting) two other men to HIV. They are now liable for a Life Sentence.
Prior to the trial, I had been following HIV exposure trials in Canada and reading the courts’ decisions. To me, many of the guilty verdicts just did not seem to fit the evidence presented in the trial or in some cases did not even seem to follow the law. How does non-violent, consensual sex between adults become a crime? I had been wondering if I was missing something; I wondered what it was that I was blind to. Was I being unreasonable? Did I not properly understand the law or the legal procedures? Was I blind to my own ignorance or bias? When I found out that another HIV exposure trial was scheduled right in my own neighbourhood, I knew that I had to go. I had to see what was happening for myself.
His conclusion, that “Canadian HIV exposure trials are both a symptom and a perpetuation of the stigmatization of Canadians with HIV,” definitely resonates with those of us working to end such unjust prosecutions.
Full Disclosure: Idaho's HIV Disclosure Laws Causing Their Own Issues
On March 10, 2009, an Idaho grand jury charged Kerry Stephen Thomas with seven felony counts of violating Idaho Code Section 39-608 by “transferring or attempting to transfer any of his bodily fluid, to-wit: semen and/or saliva by genital to genital and/or oral to genital contact, without disclosing his infection of the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV).”