Chicago Tribune - April 30, 2002
James Janega, Tribune staff reporter

The latest case was discovered the same day Nikko Briteramos, a freshman center on the Huron University basketball team, was denied a reduction of his $10,000 bail on the felony charge.

Briteramos is accused of having five sexual trysts with a girlfriend of three weeks after he was told in late March that he had tested positive for the disease. He is the first person to be tried under a two-year-old South Dakota law making it a felony to knowingly expose a person to HIV.

"He's just devastated right now," his father, Disraeli Briteramos, 47, a salesman from Chicago, said after the hearing. "He's not a serial viral killer. He did not come here to this pristine community to spread this virus. He's just as much of a victim as everyone else. He's very frightened."

Briteramos, 18, faces up to 15 years in prison and a $15,000 fine for each count if he is convicted. He is scheduled to be arraigned Thursday at the Beadle County Courthouse in this conservative prairie town of 11,000 mostly elderly residents.

Briteramos is on a basketball scholarship at Huron University, a private 400-student liberal arts school. He was arrested in his dorm room last Tuesday.

More than two dozen of his friends crowded into the courtroom Monday in a show of support. They described him as quiet and sensitive and a good listener.

Disraeli Briteramos, who took a bus from Chicago to attend the hearing, said his son had a clean bill of health when he enrolled last fall. He was awaiting further HIV test results when police and health officials took him into custody, his father said.

His girlfriend fled the scene. Both of them later told prosecutors they had just had sex.

"He was a regular user of condoms, and we can't even really say for sure he didn't use condoms [with the girlfriend]," Disraeli Briteramos said.

Asked if the girlfriend was aware his son had HIV, he said: "Did she know? No, she did not know."

Beadle County State's Atty. Michael Moore said county health officials personally informed Briteramos March 27 that he had the disease.

The infection was uncovered when Briteramos gave blood at a Red Cross blood drive in February.

Two other people in Beadle County tested positive for HIV late last week. The fourth case was outside Beadle County but "there is a clear connection to the Huron incident," said state Department of Health Secretary Doneen Hollingsworth.

Still unclear was whether Briteramos had infected one or more of the others, or if he had been infected by one of them, Hollingsworth said.

All four cases involve young people and are connected to Beadle County, she said. None of the four was Briteramos' girlfriend, she added. The four who tested positive for HIV had more than 50 sexual partners among them. No one else has been charged, Moore said.

Before the current group of cases, there had been six known HIV patients in Beadle County since the state began keeping records of the disease in 1985, Hollingsworth said.

"Certainly the most unusual thing is the alleged criminal conduct," Hollingsworth said. "The nature of the case is troubling. These are very serious allegations."

South Dakota is one of more than 30 states that have made intentionally exposing others to HIV illegal.

Though some elements of the laws vary, several have been upheld by state appeals courts, including a 1989 Illinois statute. Prosecutors in Illinois seldom use the law, however, preferring to charge defendants with aggravated battery or attempted murder.

Since word of Briteramos' arrest was made public Thursday, more than 180 Beadle County residents have requested HIV tests in local, state and private clinics. Frequent retesting will be required, health officials said.

Although antibodies indicating the presence of HIV often appear within six weeks of infection, it can take as long as six months for them to appear in some people. The only way to contract the virus is through sexual contact or shared needles.

"We're all worried about his outcome, how he's doing physically and mentally," said Stephanie Harkless, 19, a Huron sophomore from Minneapolis who attended the hearing. "He's having a hard time with this. He never meant to do anything like this."

As sheriff's deputies led Briteramos out of the courtroom in handcuffs, his friends quietly followed him down the courthouse stairs, many of them choking back tears. One faculty member called after him in encouragement.

"This is a campus where if somebody has a problem, there's probably a person standing right next to them saying, 'Come on, we can get through this,'" said interim university Chancellor Brad Smith, who attended the hearing. "I think you saw that today."
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