Poz Magazine is reporting that an Iowa man was recently arrested for having unprotected sex and failing to disclose his HIV status.

Court records do not say whether his partner contracted HIV, but in Iowa a person can be charged for criminal HIV transmission—a Class B —whether or not transmission actually takes place . . . Bogardus is being held on a cash-only $50,000 bond and he faces up to 25 years in prison.

This is certainly not the first case of someone being arrested for failure to disclose their HIV status. From a purely fictional standpoint, the TV show “Law and Order: Special Victims Unit” has featured several storylines involving HIV+ individuals being charged with a crime for failure to disclose their HIV status. One episode went so far as to portray the HIV+ character as a “domestic terrorist” who was using HIV as a “weapon of mass destruction.” It’s easy to dismiss these stories as hyperbole run amuck, but a poll regarding the American public’s attitudes towards HIV reveals that these television stories don’t stray too far from reality. [Read more...]