A man who fought the dismissal of a lawsuit against his estranged exotic dancer wife, the federal and provincial government, Toronto health officials and a local strip club, has lost his appeal.

Percy Whiteman, who contracted HIV from Suwalee Iamkhong, his wife, launched the appeal after his $33-million lawsuit was thrown out by Ontario’s Superior Court in 2013.

In the lawsuit Whiteman alleged that the Zanzibar Tavern, where his wife had worked as a stripper, as well as the provincial and federal government, failed to protect him from his wife who was infected with the AIDS-causing virus.

“I have concluded none of the defendants are responsible for Whiteman’s contraction of HIV. Mr. Whiteman was the author of his own misfortune,” Justice Carole Brown wrote in her judgment at the time.

Iamkhong moved to Canada in 1995 after leaving Hong Kong where she had worked as an exotic dancer and, according to court documents, a prostitute. She tested positive for HIV shortly before leaving Hong Kong.

Whiteman met, and later married, Iamkhong while she was working as a stripper at Zanzibar.

They were married for seven years before she told him she had HIV and Whiteman discovered he too was infected.

Iamkhong was convicted of aggravated assault and criminal negligence causing bodily harm in 2007. She was sentenced to two years in prison and deported to Thailand in 2010.

Whiteman’s lawsuit alleged that Zanzibar was liable for Iamkhong’s actions, which exposed the public to her disease, and that government immigration and medical officials failed to protect him by not providing adequate testing when she came to Canada.

Whiteman said he would never have contracted HIV if Canada had started testing immigrants for the infection earlier than 2001.

He contracted the virus in 1997.

The Ontario Court of Appeal upheld the dismissal of Whiteman’s case on the basis that it came after the limitation period and there was “no evidence” that proved if the actions of the federal government had been different he would not have become HIV positive.

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Sal Grillo, legal counsel for Whiteman, was unavailable for comment about any future plans for the case.

With Star files