Lovers queue up to sue ‘lying’ actor after HIV confession
CHARLIE Sheen faces a barrage of lawsuits from former lovers after the Hollywood star admitted he had spent nearly £7 million (R151.5m) in bribes to keep secret he is HIV positive.
The bad boy star of Platoon and Wall Street said: “It’s a hard three letters to absorb. It’s a turning point in one’s life,” as he told NBC’s Today Show of the disease he says was diagnosed four years ago.
Although the womanising 50-year-old actor claimed he had warned all of his sexual partners that he had HIV, at least two of them insisted publicly last night that it had come as a complete shock.
As a string of celebrities, including Lady Gaga and actress Heather Locklear, came out in support of Sheen’s “bravery” on social media, evidence grew that he had lied about telling his sexual partners about his HIV.
A prominent Los Angeles lawyer told website TMZ he had been contacted by at least 10 women who claim they had both protected and unprotected sex with Sheen, a month ago. In each case, they alleged he didn’t disclose his HIV status.
They could sue the actor for “intentional infliction of emotional distress, fraud and sexual battery”.
Bree Olson, a former porn star and one of Sheen’s two live-in girlfriends during his public meltdown in 2011 – the period in which he says he was diagnosed – was described by radio host Howard Stern as “shaking and upset” when she appeared on his show.
Asked when she learned Sheen had HIV, she said: “Right along with everyone else. Three days ago I started getting calls – it was right when everything happened in Paris. He never said anything to me. ‘I’m clean,’ he told me. I was his girlfriend. I lived with him… He doesn’t even value my life.”
Natalie Kenly, the other girlfriend who shared Sheen’s home at the time, also said Sheen had never told her about his HIV status, but insisted she believes he genuinely loved them. She said yesterday that she was not HIV positive.
It is alleged Sheen has had some 200 sexual partners in the past two years.
Indicating she might be among those to sue Sheen, Olson – who also revealed she had tested negative for HIV – said his non-disclosure of his illness was “illegal”.
In California, Sheen’s home state, it is a felony offence punishable by up to eight years in prison for a person with HIV to have unprotected sex with intent to infect. It is also an offence, carrying a six-month sentence, to wilfully expose others to HIV.
Olson, whose real name is Rachel Oberlin, said Sheen insisted on using lambskin condoms which health experts stress do not protect against HIV transmission.
She also revealed that Sheen received regular visits from a doctor but “they’d go into a room by themselves”, and the actor told her he was receiving treatment for a steroid problem.
Sheen insisted on Tuesday that it was “impossible” he could have passed on the disease, although his own doctor – who joined him for the Today interview – contradicted him.
Dr Robert Huizenga, who said he met Sheen six years ago, said the actor was “healthy” and didn’t have Aids.
He said it was “incredibly rare” for someone – like Sheen – who was receiving medical treatment to transmit the virus.
But Huizenga admitted he was “petrified” that, due to his depression or substance abuse, Sheen could stop taking his pills.
The National Enquirer, whose claims appear to have pre-empted Sheen’s TV confession, cited text messages that actress Brooke Mueller, Sheen’s wife from 2008 to 2011, sent to her assistant saying she was scared for her life after belatedly discovering he had HIV. – Daily Mail