A man from Worcestershire has been sentenced to four-and-a-half years in prison after infecting a woman with HIV, having deliberately stopped his treatment and concealed his diagnosis from her.
A Deliberate Concealment
Luke Davis, 31, of Kidderminster, was found guilty of inflicting grievous bodily harm at Hereford Crown Court. The court heard that Davis was diagnosed with HIV in 2017 and initially took medication. However, he completely disengaged from his medical care in 2019.
Judge Martin Jackson told Davis he had chosen not to inform his sexual partner about his condition for "entirely selfish reasons". The judge stated that Davis had been explicitly advised by healthcare professionals to use protection and to be open with future partners, advice he "chose to ignore".
"I'm satisfied that somebody … who chooses not to tell that other person they are carrying a condition such as HIV, who chooses to ignore advice about informing partners … does so, in my view, with a significant degree of premeditation," Judge Jackson said.
The Victim's 'Life Sentence'
The woman discovered she was HIV positive in 2021 during a routine screening. In a victim impact statement read to the court, she described the diagnosis as "the darkest time in my life" and said it left her feeling "physically sick as though my skin was crawling".
She told the court: "I struggle to love myself as I see this as a part of me I can never get rid of. To me, it’s a life sentence as I will never be, or see myself as, the same."
Judge Jackson echoed her sentiment, noting that she "lives with the constant threat that that virus could prove really quite serious indeed … to the point of being fatal."
Mitigation and Wider Investigation
The court was told of mitigating circumstances in Davis's life, including the loss of his 13-month-old baby in 2017 and his belief that he brought Covid into his grandfather's home, leading to the grandfather's death in 2020.
Following the report to police, an investigation revealed Davis had been regularly sexually promiscuous and had several other partners. Officers, working with public health officials, appealed for other potential victims to come forward. To date, no further victims have been identified.
After the sentencing, Giovanni D’Alessandro, a senior crown prosecutor, said: "We hope the sentence imposed provides some measure of justice to the victim and dissuades others from this type of dangerous and reckless behaviour."
