NO TRIAL AFTER ALL!

I am not going to jail:-)

Today the case against me for oral sex was scheduled in court, but the prosecutor has instead withdrawn and dismissed the case due to lack of evidence. I feel both anger and relief. This case shows how completely wrong it turns out when one mixes law with HIV prevention. The prosecutor was a hair's breadth from making most gays into potential criminals.









The prosecutor brought charges against me in March 2012 after Penal Code Section 155 ("the HIV-penal code") for putting another man to risk of infection by oral sex. Studies showed that I was not the source of infection. We had different viruses and my ex-boyfriend gradually withdrew the case.


Followed safer sex advice

I was prosecuted despite that I followed the advice given from health care organizations to HIV positive and HIV negative people in connection with oral sex.

The new Norwegian HIV organization “Nye Pluss” (www.nyepluss.no) has gone through the health professional advices, Norwegian health authorities and professional through hearings has approved all these years. For nearly thirty years now oral sex was considered safer sex between men despite use of condom and whether one has HIV or not, under certain precautions not to use toothpicks before sex, etc. All brochures and all international and national experts in HIV infection has always said the same thing: All the research shows that HIV transmission through oral sex is extremely rare and no common source of infection, so the investigation in this case shows.


Enormous stress

The trial was originally scheduled for October 2012, but was postponed and re-scheduled for February 2013. It's terrible that I for almost a year had to live with this indictment hanging over me. It has been a terrible burden, an load I would not wish my worst enemy. To me it has been a totally unjustified attack on me as a person, on my morals and my values. A threat to imprison me for something almost every gay does; oral sex without a condom.


Destroys all prevention with one stroke

The case demonstrates very clearly how completely wrong it goes when the law interferes in HIV prevention. And the law will do when there is the potential for it, such is its nature. The law is there to be tested, not at least new laws. The prosecutor will of course also in the future try any case he gets on his table, if he believes it is possible to get a conviction. And there is nothing in the current Criminal Code provisions or in what the Syse Committee proposes that would prevent the prosecutor to try a new case of oral sex. This will happen when the prosecutor feel the "right" case pops up, like they thought of my case.


Stops infection tracing work

We were a hair's breadth away from that a conviction in a court of law could have broken all contact tracing among men who have sex with men with a single blow. "Everyone" has oral sex, so who newly infected with HIV would have given up their sexual partners to the doctor for tracing if one can be convicted for sucking? It's something all gays do. Who would dare to expose themselves to prosecution and punishment? And again it is just as obvious that the testing of HIV will suffer when you can be punished even for oral sex. Any gay is then a potential criminal, because "everyone" has oral sex and "everyone should have reason to believe" that one can be infected with HIV, while almost no one uses condoms for oral sex, as studies show. Who will dare to HIV test?

This unfortunately show how naive even the law can be. It is a narrow and blindly legal consideration. However, there is nothing what so ever in the Syse Committee's proposal that would prevented a diligent prosecutor who will plow new legal grounds in court. On the contrary: If the subtypes of the virus in two HIV-infected persons are sufficiently similar, which theoretically can happen, the prosecutor can argue that infection probably occurred. He will of course have the matter tested in court, since he has a possible case of contamination, despite the fact that you've followed the advice on safer sex.


Guaranteed new cases with new penal code

If the Syse Committee's proposed new penal code § 237 is approved by the Parliament, we will have new HIV cases in Norwegian courts, regardless of the source of infection. It is the intention of a new penal code. Also new cases against gays will come, and contact tracing and testing among men who have sex with men are sure to further damage, such research also has shown.