Oct 6, 2007 11:18 am US/Eastern
Club Promoter Jailed For Exposing Woman To HIV
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MIAMI (CBS4) ―
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Suspect Elidor Kersaint
CBS
The South Beach club promoter arrested for allegedly having unprotected sex with a woman and not telling her he was HIV positive had bond set at $100,000, because prosecutors believe he is a threat to public safety.
Prosecutors believe Elidor Kersaint was planning to have sex with more unknowing women, despite his arrest. Documents obtained by CBS4 News shows how they asked the judge to increase his bond. However, Kersaint had already posted a lower bond and bailed out of jail when the increase went into effect. Weeks later officers tracked him down and rearrested him.
Miami Beach police are asking that women who had unprotected sex with him to come forward; 22-year old Kersaint is HIV positive and is accused of knowingly spreading the disease to his sex partners.
Wednesday night
CBS4 News spoke to some of his colleagues, who didn't want to talk on camera. They say Kersaint has been living with HIV all his life; his mother passed it on to him. However, they say they didn't find out about his status until the days leading up to his arrest.
One 20-year-old woman has already told Miami Beach police she had contact with Kersaint.
According to his MySpace page, Elidor Kersaint paints himself as a pretty popular guy on the South Beach scene who might have promoted himself in clubs including Opium, Prive, and Mansion. Representatives from the Opium Group say Kersaint was not an employee, but he may have worked with any number of third party vendors.
"I can unequivocally confirm that this individual is not an employee of the Opium Group," said Opium Group representative Vanessa Menkes in a written statement to
CBS4.
On his MySpace page, there are dozens of pictures of him posing with club going celebs, and countless pictures of him with half naked women.
But police say Kersaint had a dark secret.
"He carries a 'pretty big stick' here in Miami Beach which is attractive for some people," said Bobby Hernandez with the Miami Beach Police Department. "Unfortunately he could have used that big stick, or attractiveness, to lure these women in to have sex with them and unbeknownst to them he has HIV."
The one woman who came forward told investigators she had sex with Kersaint on two occasions and he never told her he had HIV. Police fear there may be other women who had sex with Kersaint and are not aware that he was HIV positive. Miami Beach police are urging anyone who had a relationship with Kersaint to see a doctor and then contact police.
Kersaint, who has been locked up since last June, faces a minimum of five years in prison if convicted
At Jackson Memorial Hospital, Dr. Nancy Gutierrez , who specializes in HIV research, said "unprotected sex is a risk" in these times.
(© MMVII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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