A woman was defamed by the state’s use of her picture with words falsly identifying her as having HIV in a 2013 advertisement opposing discrimination against those infected with the virus, a Court of Claims judge has determined.
Avril Nolan, a model, does not have the human immunodeficiency virus. But Judge Thomas Scuccimarra ruled in Nolan v. State of New York, 123283, that the context in which the photo was used by the New York State Division of Human Rights (DHR) clearly identified her as having HIV and failed to include a disclaimer saying she was a non-infected model.
