Bizarre Crime of the Week : Investigation Discovery: AIDS Murder Verdict-First in Canada

April 07, 2009

Johnson Aziga, 52, on trial recently in Hamilton, Ontario, an hour's drive northwest from Niagara Falls, New York, was found guilty of murder in the deaths of two women who died from illnesses related to AIDS.

In a precedent-setting case, Aziga became the first HIV-positive man in Canada convicted of murder for carelessly spreading the virus that causes AIDS by having unprotected sex with women who had no idea he was a carrier. Aziga was also convicted of 10 counts of aggravated sexual assault and one count of attempted aggravated sexual assault. Aziga, an immigrant from Uganda, had been employed with the Ontario Ministry of the Attorney General.

According to information from Aziga's trial, which began in October 2008, prosecutors alleged that Aziga engaged in unprotected sex with a number of women with whom he had previously worked at the Attorney General's office-two of whom have died—as well as with women that he had picked up in bars.

Prosecutors claim that Aziga had known that he was carrying HIV since 1996, and was fully aware of the Canadian laws that required him to disclose that fact to potential sexual partners but had failed to do so in many instances. Prosecutors charged that he had infected as many as 7 women, including the two who died, with HIV. Four other women who were believed to have been exposed to the virus through sexual contact with Aziga have so far tested negative for the virus.

Defense attorneys argued that Aziga was saddled with personal problems as well as a brain disorder in an apparent attempt to diminish their client's intent with regard to personally harming many of the women with whom Aziga had engaged in sex prior to his arrest in 2003.

One of the more damning moments from the trial occurred when prosecutors showed the jury a videotaped statement from one of the woman Aziga had been charged with infecting, made three weeks before she died from AIDS-related cancers. On the tape the woman said that their relationship had occurred in the summer of 2000, and that Aziga did not disclose his illness to her "at any time" during their relationship. The woman further stated that she would never have agreed to have sex with Aziga if she had known-she said that she would have refused him.

A sentencing hearing for Aziga has been scheduled for May 7, 2009.

Photo Credit: Police File Photo

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