LOS ANGELES : Woman Not Negligent for Hiding HIV Infection

A judge ruled Monday that a woman was not negligent for declining to tell doctors before surgery that she had been infected with the AIDS virus.

But Superior Court Judge David Horowitz refused to reduce a $102,500 jury award against the woman, upholding verdicts of fraud and intentional infliction of emotional distress. To reduce the award, the judge would have had to reject all the claims, an attorney said.

Jan Lustig, 46, a clinical psychologist from Vancouver, Wash., was sued by a medical technician who was pricked with a blood-covered scalpel while caring for Lustig after breast-reduction surgery in 1991.

She had not disclosed to the Breast Center in Van Nuys that she had tested positive for the human immunodeficiency virus, which causes AIDS.

She said she was afraid that the center would deny her care if doctors were aware of her positive test.

But a Superior Court jury found last February that Lustig committed fraud and negligent and intentional infliction of emotional distress as alleged by the technician, Diane Boulais, 40.