Espoo District Court delivered its verdict on Friday in a case in which an African-born 50-year-old musician faced charges of rape and attempted manslaughter for having unprotected sex with numerous women while knowing that he carried HIV.

   

Espoo resident George Kwasi Okoke Mensah was sentenced to ten and a half years in prison.

The man faced a long list

of charges. The court found him guilty of 15 counts of aggravated attempted assault, six rapes, the sexual abuse of a child, and one aggravated assault.

   

The aggravated assault was for the case in which one of his partners actually caught the HIV virus.

   

The first act mentioned in the indictment took place in 1995 and the last was in November last year. There were a total of 23 victims during this time.

   

Mensah was ordered to pay damages totalling more than 265,000 euros.

The largest monetary compensation

, EUR 87,000, was for the woman who caught HIV.

   

The trial was held behind closed doors, and the records - with the exception of the statement on the verdict and sentence, as well as a press release - were ordered sealed until 2043.

The main legal dispute

during the deliberations of the court was whether or not the deliberate transmission of HIV to another person constituted attempted assault or attempted manslaughter.

   

The court narrowly voted in favour of the former, concluding that HIV does not meet the legal definition of a disease that is likely to cause death. Previous court decisions have seen HIV as a disease that is probably terminal.

In the court's view

the progress of HIV infections can be stopped in most cases with drugs, and a considerable number of those infected can live full lives. The court found that AIDS mortality has decreased significantly, and that the side-effects of the drugs used in its treatment can be kept under control.

   

The court nevertheless emphasised that the disease is a serious one, and described Mensah's behaviour as reckless.