By David Ovalle
Miami Herald
For threatening to kill with his illness then biting a Miami cop, HIV-positive drifter Johnson Jamerson will serve 15 years in prison, a judge ruled Wednesday.
Jamerson, 35, was convicted in June of attacking Miami Officer Matthew Hall while trying to escape a police bus bound for jail. He bit through Hall's pants, drew blood and caused a permanent bruise.
Hall was not infected -- but doctors did not clear him for eight anxious months.
``He could not have any contact with his wife or children for fear he could severely affect them,'' Miami-Dade prosecutor Ankur Sevak told Circuit Judge Daryl E. Trawick.
Jamerson, a former furniture delivery man who suffers from schizophrenia, was arrested in January 2008 for trespassing after he was found sleeping under the Interstate 395 bridge at North Miami Avenue.
On a police bus later, Jamerson slipped out of his handcuffs. Hall grappled with him. Wile struggling on the ground, Jamerson yelled out that he had HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, threatened to kill Hall and then sank his teeth into the officer's right shin.
``For three months afterward, I had to take a cocktail of medication three times a day, causing diarrhea, vomiting, nausea -- everything you can think of,'' Hall, a Coconut Grove patrolman, said after the sentencing.
Jamerson, who sports a long criminal history, was originally charged with attempted murder. Jurors found him guilty of aggravated battery on a law enforcement officer.
This message has been posted by the Coral Gables FOP, Lodge #7.
