Pastor’s Son Ordered To Pay Woman $2.4M For Giving Her Herpes

Pastor’s Son Ordered To Pay Woman $2.4M For Giving Her Herpes

Pastor’s Son Ordered To Pay Woman $2.4M For Giving Her Herpes: A Harris County jury recently found Rev. Ralph West II, the senior pastor and son of the founder of The Church Without Walls in Houston, Texas, liable for intentionally spreading herpes to a woman. He was most recently the campus pastor in Eldridge.

According to KPRC, the jury unanimously decided West II was guilty after a three-day trial for battery, willful infliction of emotional distress, and fraudulent concealment of his herpes infection from his unnamed victim, whom he met on Facebook and then had unprotected sex with in 2018.

The $2.45 million verdict included $1.45 million in compensatory damages and $1 million in exemplary or punitive damages, according to Fox 26. The amount is said to be the largest award ever made for a case like this in Texas.

“We truly hope this verdict sends a strong message to people throughout Texas and the United States who are infected with sexually transmitted diseases that they must disclose having the disease before engaging in sexual intercourse with anyone else,” Shaun Murphy, the plaintiff’s attorney and a partner at the law firm Slovak Baron Empey Murphy & Pinkney, LLP, said in a statement. “It is also important for those who have suffered harm after being infected due to another’s negligent or intentional conduct to know they have a legal remedy.”