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Legal Top Stories
HIV scandal singer receives suspended sentence
By CMU Editorial | Published on Friday 27 August 2010
Nadja Benaissa, a member of German pop group No Angels, has been found guilty of grievous bodily harm after admitting to knowingly exposing three sexual partners to the HIV, one of whom subsequently contracted the virus. She was given a two year suspended sentence, 300 hours of community service and been order to attend regular counselling sessions.
As previously reported, Nadja Benaissa was charged with one count of causing grievous bodily harm and two of attempting to cause bodily harm in February this year, after originally being arrested in April last year. She allegedly had sex with all the men in question between 2000 and 2004, and was diagnosed with HIV in 1999.
At the start of her trial earlier this month, Benaissa told the court: “I’m sorry from the bottom of my heart. The last thing I wanted was for my partner to get infected. [I feared that revealing my diagnosis] would probably have meant the end for No Angels”.
She also claimed that doctors had told her that the chances of her passing on the infection were “practically zero”.
Judge Dennis Wacker told the court in the city of Darmstadt yesterday that Benaissa had been found guilty of grievous bodily harm because she had acted carelessly, but was given a lenient sentence because she had confessed, shown remorse and “learned to be responsible and deal with her illness”.
Benaissa did not speak to reporters upon leaving the court, but her lawyer Oliver Wallasch said outside: “I can’t say whether she’s going back on stage because I’m not her manager but I’m sure she’ll crack open a champagne bottle tonight. We had a very fair and speedy trial. The aim of the defence and my client was to have a verdict which led to probation and this was the result. Today will be a turning point in her life, as she now knows that she will not be imprisoned. Her reaction was emotional because it was the end”.
