Report: HIV Crime Law Targets Black, LGBT Tennesseans
Black women were 290 times more likely to be on a sex offender registry from crimes under a Teneessee law that criminalizes sex while HIV-positive or upgrades prostitution charges due to HIV status than white men.
Landwebs
A recent report by the Williams Institute at the University of California Los Angeles found that at least 154 people living with HIV have been placed on Tennessee’s sex offender registry and labelled as a “violent sexual offender” for charges stemming from their HIV-positive status, with alarming disparities in enforcement when it comes to race, class, and geography, AIDSmap reports. Two HIV-specific laws in the state are largely wielded against Black people and those living in Memphis.
HIV criminalisation laws criminalize otherwise legal behavior or enhance penalties for crimes based upon a person’s HIV status. Tennessee’s laws do not require actual HIV transmission, intent to transmit, or activities that pose a risk for transmission to charge someone. Black women in Tennessee were 290 times more likely to be on the registry for an HIV-related crime than white men. Many of those impacted also had to serve time in prison. Most (75 percent) of the HIV-related registrations were among Black people and the full impact on gender diverse, trans, or nonbinary people is not known.
