Important note: Information in this article was accurate in 2004. The state of the art may have changed since the publication date.
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San Francisco Examiner - November 1, 2004
Ethan Fletcher, Staff Writer
San Francisco resident Marty Tagle, 37, was sentenced in San Mateo County Superior Court on Friday after pleading guilty in September to one count of oral copulation with a minor. He also admitted to a special enhancement penalty for not telling his partner he was HIV-positive.
The court decided to stay the three-year prison sentence the charge normally brings. Tagle, however, will still serve two years because of the oral copulation charge and must register as a sex offender after his release.
A former insurance writer for Norcal Mutual Insurance Company, Tagle was busted by Daly City cops last November while engaged in sexual acts with a 15-year-old boy inside a car.
Tagle met the youth through a phone chat line and had seen him several times before that night, according to Deputy District Attorney Elizabeth Raffaelli. However, it became clear after police interviews that the boy did not know of Tagle's HIV-positive status.
Raffaelli said the defense's argument that Tagle was using a condom during the sexual acts was not strong enough, as the sentence was based not on the intention to transmit the disease, but because using condoms does not always guarantee safe sex. Raffaelli pointed to numerous cases she has prosecuted in which girls had become impregnated because of broken condoms.
"When you don't give your partner that information [of being HIV-positive] then that isn't practicing safe sex," Rafaelli said.
Raffaelli would not say whether the boy has the HIV virus.
The DA's office originally charged Tagle with lewd and lascivious acts with a 14- or 15-year-old, with a special enhancement penalty because the age difference between the two partners was more than 10 years. However, Raffaelli said, that charge was dropped in order to pursue the special HIV enhancement.
Despite the fact that Tagle had no prior criminal record and received extensive support from his family, he received the two-year sentence because of the large age difference and the life threatening nature of the HIV charges, Raffaelli said.
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