A 41 year old Kenyan man, identified as Kennedy Okwako A. was sentenced
to 8 years imprisonment for having s3xual intercourse with various women
without using a condom despite knowing he was infected with HIV.
Kennedy, a Kenyan DJ and musician from Würzburg, was also a victim of
the same. In 1998, Kennedy was infected by his German wife without his
knowledge. Although he insists he wasn’t trying to revenge, he slept
with eight women without informing any of them of his status. Three of
his victims who appeared in court, a housewife, a hairdresser and the 13
year old, were all not infected.
Kennedy had been accussed of attempted severe bodily harm, attempted
murder (manslaughter) and sexual assault of a minor. Fortunately, there
was no evidence that he had forced himself on the minor and those
charges were dropped. Kennedy had told the court that he had slept with
the young lady, but he didn’t know she was a minor. He also accepted
that he had slept with her only once without protection but even then,
the young girl didn’t protest. Of the nine women he slept with, two had
tested positive.
The prosecutor had tried to accuse him of vengence saying that Kennedy
was infecting German women as payback to his German wife. The court
ruled out this hypothesis as unfounded.
According to a psychiatrist from the Gesundheitsamt, Kennedy had basic
knowledge on what HIV was and he always took his ARVs with no issues.
Kennedy had been a regular patient at the Gesundheitsamt, where he
received counselingand also signed adocument that agreed that he had
understood that he shouldn’t have unprotected s3x. In his defence
Kennedy told the court that the doctors had told him the probability of
any of his partners being infected was very low and he thought that
meant it would never happen.
He was eventually charged with nine accounts of knowingly trying to infect his partners with H!V.
“I didn’t want to hurt anybody. I promise never to have unprotected sex
ever again”, Kennedy told the court before the ruling. Well, he won’t
worry about having any kind of s3x behind bars though.
During the court processes, it was also discovered that he might have
slept with more than the nine women who had appeared in court. This
means that if the other women come out and press charges, Kennedy could
spend very many years in prison.
In 2002, a lady had taken him to court pressing the same charges but the
case didn’t go anywhere and Kennedy walked away without any punishment,
not even a slap on the wrist. But not even the scare of a new process
made him change his behavior. “He might have assumed he’s behaviour
wasn’t that bad because he wasn’t punished for it”, the prosecutor told
the court. In 2007, he was arrested yet again and this time, the court
process continued to completion. In that year, six women testified
against him in court and he was sentenced to 8 years imprisonment. In
2010, three other women took him to court and this time he got10 years.
If women continue taking him to court, Kennedy might see his sentence
increase every couple of years.
Kennedy was married to two German women and had three daughters with his many other ex-girlfriends.
- mkenyaujerumani.de