Man Guilty of Spreading AIDS Virus : Courts: Judge convicts David Scott Crother of assault with a deadly weapon for infecting a Ventura County woman.

In what attorneys say is the first case of its kind in California, a Santa Barbara man was found guilty of assault with a deadly weapon Friday for infecting a Ventura County woman with the AIDS virus.

In a non-jury trial that took less than five minutes, Ventura County Superior Court Judge Lawrence Storch convicted David Scott Crother, 46, of two counts of assault.

Each charge involved a sexual liaison that Crother had with the unidentified victim without wearing a condom or telling her that he carried the AIDS virus. The woman and a 2-year-old child whom Crother allegedly fathered now carry that virus, while Crother has developed acquired immune deficiency syndrome itself.

Crother, excused from his own trial because of his failing health, had forfeited his right to a jury trial and agreed not to fight the charges. The 46-year-old unemployed carpenter did so knowing that Storch would hear no testimony, that he would only read the transcript of the grand jury investigation, and that he almost certainly would return a guilty verdict.

The unusual legal move is aimed at forcing a speedy appellate court ruling on whether Crother can be legally prosecuted under the assault statute, said Robert M. Sanger, his attorney.

Sanger said he intends to file an appeal immediately after the sentencing hearing, scheduled for Aug. 14, so appeal courts can rule on the precedent-setting case before his client dies.

Chief Deputy Dist. Atty. Vincent J. O’Neill Jr. agreed to push for probation and community service, rather than a jail sentence, in deference to Crother’s failing health and his willingness to agree to the speeded-up process.

If Crother dies before his appeals are resolved, the case would become moot and no precedent would be established, the attorneys said.

“We hope the appeal will be decided in a manner that sets a precedent, that the assault charges were appropriately filed and that the conviction should stand in this case,” O’Neill said after the judge’s ruling. “The virus is a deadly weapon when another is exposed to it in that way.”

Defense attorney Sanger continued to argue that the assault charges do not fit the kind of behavior Crother engaged in, and that no one should be prosecuted for spreading a disease.

Society instead should be working on education for the healthy, a cure for the sick and empathy for anyone stricken with AIDS, Sanger said.

“You can’t take the common law, the law that has developed in this country for several hundred years, and say, ‘We’re going to include in it a new crime,’ ” Sanger said. “I think it’s dangerous, even if it seems to be a good cause in this case . . . to expand the criminal law in that way.”

The Ventura County Grand Jury indicted Crother in January, 1991, on 15 counts of assault, one for each sexual liaison he allegedly had with the woman between September, 1988, and August, 1989, without telling her of his AIDS infection.

Crother agreed to be tried by Storch on only two of the counts--involving a liaison at the woman’s home in April, 1989, and one at a Santa Paula motel on Aug. 1, 1989. Prosecutors have agreed to drop the remaining 13 charges, stemming from liaisons the two allegedly had in Santa Barbara County, after Crother is sentenced.

As part of his trial waiver, Crother also agreed to serve probation and perform any community service that Storch might impose. O’Neill said that could include helping other AIDS patients or counseling people on AIDS prevention.

Storch also could require that Crother refrain from behavior such as the acts outlined in the indictment--engaging in unprotected sex without informing his partner that he carries the AIDS virus.

Crother was diagnosed with the AIDS virus in 1988 through a confidential test conducted by the Santa Barbara County Health Department, Sanger has said.

Sanger said Crother believed wrongly at the time that the virus that causes AIDS was more likely to be transmitted during homosexual sex than during heterosexual sex. And Crother is extremely remorseful, Sanger said.

Meanwhile, Sen. Ed Davis (R-Santa Clarita) has decided not to pursue passage of his bill that would make it a crime to knowingly expose another person to the AIDS virus through sex, said Margaret Pena, legislative director of the American Civil Liberties Union.

If made law, it could have imposed a maximum sentence of life in prison on anyone convicted of knowingly exposing someone else to the virus through unprotected sex or sharing hypodermic needles.

Davis could not be reached for comment.