A disease notorious for its fatality rate is surely an illness, which brings with it trepidation and angst.
However, a man in Kansas City, Missouri took his situation too far when he thought it OK to lie about his sickness, causing a 30-year-old woman to sleep with him under the impression that he was HIV negative.
Jon W. Velasco was charged with recklessly infecting another with HIV on Wednesday, which is a class A felony, as reported by Fox 4 News. Velasco had been able to go about his life, following the unforgivable lie until the woman’s mandatory HIV screening for her employer was retrieved in February. It came back positive.
The woman reached out to authorities on March 15 and explained that she had partaken in unprotected sex with Velasco and had done so on several occasions; all between August of 2012 and when she tested positive earlier this year. According to court documents, Velasco is the only person the woman claims to have had any sex contact with since the last time she tested negative for the disease.
She continued on about Velasco’s obvious knowledge of his infection. She said that because he was incarcerated, he would have had to have been tested for HIV, as the tests are mandatory for prisoners.
The woman met with Velasco upon his release from prison in August of 2012. He told her that he was not infected.
And that was a boldfaced lie.
The Missouri Department of Health and Senior Services have records, which reveal that Velasco tested positive on April 30, 2012. Further, additional records from the Western Reception Diagnostic Correctional Center showed that the troubled man actually received HIV counseling along with information from correctional center staff following a separate positive test on June 27, 2012, as reported by the news station.
When Velasco was initially approached by the woman with regard to her positive HIV test, he stuck with his story and said that he was not infected. She successfully convinced him to go through with a test at a ‘free clinic,’ in which they both could get tested for HIV. The results came back positive for them both. Velasco reportedly broke things off with the woman following the results.
Although Velasco’s next court date is not readily available, he did decline to speak with detectives about the case without a lawyer present. He’s currently being held in detention on a cash-only 100,000 bond
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