Following the deaths of two women he's alleged to have unwittingly infected with the virus that causes AIDS, an Ontario man has been charged with first-degree murder.

Johnson Aziga was originally charged with endangering the lives of 12 women who had been his sexual partners. All of the women said 48-year-old Aziga never told them he was HIV-positive.

Seven of the women in the case contracted HIV. One died in May of last year and the other died in December 2003.

In the eyes of the law, someone can't really consent to sex if they don't know their partner's HIV status. In such cases, they are therefore considered victims of alleged sexual assaults.

That precedent was set in 1998, when the Supreme Court of Canada ruled that a B.C. man was who failed to disclose his HIV-positive status before having consensual sex with two women was nevertheless guilty of aggravated assault.

When the two women died, that meant the assault charges were automatically bumped up to first-degree murder.

Aziga's case, believed to be the first to involve murder charges connected with the spread of HIV, is due back in court on March 11.

With files from The Canadian Press