LAPD Officer Seeks Job Pension After Testing HIV Positive

In the first case of its kind, a Los Angeles police officer is seeking a city-paid stress disability pension because he tested HIV positive after arresting a drug suspect who was infected with AIDS and later died of complications from the disease.

Officer Alvin LaBostrie, a nine-year member of the Police Department, appeared Thursday before the Board of Pension Commissioners asking for a tax-free disability pension because of the psychological stress and physical injuries he has undergone since he said the man bled on him during the arrest two years ago in West Los Angeles.

The question before the board is not whether LaBostrie has been infected. The board must decide whether his problem is directly related to the July, 1988, arrest, or if it is linked to his lifestyle outside the job.

The board members, unsure how to proceed with its first AIDS-related case, twice were unable to reach a quorum vote on whether LaBostrie’s problems were job-related. Pointing to his past sexual activity and pending criminal charges for writing bad checks, the board invited him to return in two weeks for further evaluation.

LaBostrie, appearing with his Bible in one hand and tissues in the other, tearfully begged that he not be forced to undergo more medical examinations.

“I don’t want to see any more doctors,” he said. “Each doctor I go to, no one provides any help. Some treat me like I’ve got leprosy and put their rubber gloves on. But no one knows what I’m going through.”

LaBostrie is believed to be the first Los Angeles-area law enforcement officer infected with the AIDS virus while on the job. If the board determines that he was infected in the line of duty, he would be the first Los Angeles-area officer to receive a disability pension because of the AIDS virus.

With AIDS cases increasing dramatically here, law enforcement administrators say they worry that new incidents are bound to spring up. Just recently, for instance, the union that represents county sheriff’s deputies began offering AIDS insurance for its membership.

LaBostrie, 40, who is divorced with four children, said after the hearing that he became infected during a July, 1988, narcotics arrest. He said the suspect was bleeding from puncture wounds on his arm left by 15 to 20 needles found near the scene.

“He told me he got AIDS shooting drugs in New York,” said the officer, a short, soft-spoken man with a slight goatee. “He said he owned a clothing store in New York and that when the store became successful, he celebrated by shooting drugs. Then he came up with AIDS.”

Some of the man’s blood ran onto LaBostrie’s right hand, the officer said, where he had an open wound from chapped and extremely dry skin. “He was bleeding all over the place,” the officer said.

In May of 1989, after the man died of AIDS complications, LaBostrie tested positive for the HIV (Human Immunodeficiency Virus).

“It was like receiving a death sentence,” he said. “I could immediately imagine what the guys on Death Row feel like.”

His pension application file included a statement from one doctor who was “confident” the officer tested HIV positive through his contact with the drug suspect. But another medical expert said there was only a “0.4%” chance of a person becoming infected that way.

LaBostrie’s complete medical files were not made public by the board.

In general, medical experts have agreed that it is relatively rare for a person to become infected with AIDS through contaminated blood mingling with a cut in the hand. Health care workers, for instance, are given only a 1% chance of becoming infected that way.

If it is determined his psychological problems and physical disabilities--fatigue, diarrhea and sore throat--are not related to his job, he may be eligible for a taxable pension worth 30% to 50% of his salary. But if it is shown his disability is job connected, he could receive a tax-free pension of from 30% to 90% of his salary.

LaBostrie said after the hearing that he had three past episodes of gonorrhea, but that those incidents were in the 1970s, long before he became a police officer. “It may imply I had sex with many women, but that’s not the case in my life,” LaBostrie said.

LaBostrie declined to discuss the bad check charges, except to say that he has been in poor financial shape since September because he cannot work.

Pension board members indicated that they would not be influenced by the check charges because LaBostrie applied for the stress pension in February, long before the charges were filed.

Meanwhile, he fears his health will worsen and that he will be unable to provide for his children if the pension board does not act soon.

“Despite the ups and downs, I liked my work,” he said. “Being a police officer was in my blood, just like this thing (HIV) that’s in me now. Like my job, that’s the other part of me that’s dying.”