Public health authorities in Ohio are reportedly trying to trace more than 200 clients of a sex worker who allegedly continued offering her services for more than two years after discovering she was HIV-positive.
“They won’t be in trouble, it’s a matter of public health awareness. This is not a scam,” Mark Warden, chief deputy of the Washington County Sheriff’s Office, insisted Thursday during a press conference last week, according to Parkersburg News and Sentinel.
It was in an attempt to limit the damage that public health in Marietta/Belpre, Ohio, reportedly called on clients of Linda Leccesse, 30, to be “brutally honest” with authorities, after discovering that the sex worker reportedly continued his activities despite a positive HIV diagnosis in January 2022.
But it was only during her arrest last week for sexual solicitation that the police discovered the diagnosis she had been carrying around for two years.
In total, the woman would have had sexual contact with at least 211 people since then, the authorities told the local media, stressing that this made them, but also those with whom they had sexual relations subsequently, “at risk” of catching the potentially fatal disease.
Its customers could come from several states, they added.
“The Marietta/Belpre Health Department is a judgment-free zone with complete confidentiality,” said Barbara Bradley, health department administrator, according to the Parkersburg News and Sentinel.
The sex worker was thus accused of soliciting sex after a positive HIV test, which would be considered a third-degree crime in the United States.
