A 40-year-old Surrey, BC, man was sentenced to 18 years in prison on Monday for not disclosing his HIV-positive status to sexual partners, CBC reports. He had successfully appealed the conviction but remained in prison awaiting a new trial and was found guilty again last month.
The accused was given 12 years of credit, or double time, for what he served in custody since his 2003 arrest for five counts of aggravated sexual assault. He still has six years left on his sentence. The federal government recently repealed the double credit for time served policy, but cases like this are grandfathered in.
The accused was diagnosed with HIV in 1996. Between 1997 and 2003, he had unprotected sex with five women and three of them became infected. The complainants live in the Surrey, Delta, Burnaby and Port Coquitlam areas and are protected by a publication ban.
While sentencing the accused, Justice James Williams said, “The harm inflicted on these women was by any measure atrocious.”
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