A 35-year-old HIV-positive man in New Zealand injected his blood into his wife while she was sleeping, thereby infecting her with the virus, court documents have revealed.

According to a report in New Zealand’s Sunday Star-Times, the man did it so that his wife would start having sex with him again, as she had refused to do so out of fear of contracting the disease. He gave her the virus by pricking her with a sewing needle tainted with his blood.

More details from Sky News:

In the documents, the wife described how, in May, 2008, she found a sting-like mark on her left thigh and two days later awoke to a stinging feeling in her leg.
She said: “I got up… and I flicked the blankets… I looked at (the husband) and he was wide awake.”

The wife asked him if he had pricked her and he said, ‘No’. But she later found evidence of “blood sprinkles” on their duvet, which she said her husband tried to hide from her.

The husband is currently in prison awaiting sentencing, and faces up to 14 years in jail.”