'Nightline' Weighs In on Industry Halt

CHATSWORTH, Calif.—Tuesday night's episode of ABC news magazine program Nightline opened with an approximately six and a half-minute segment addressing the current self-imposed moratorium on production in the adult industry due to reports of a performer possibly having tested positive for HIV. The segment recapped the industry's last major HIV scare in 2004, and included archived interview footage with the central figure of that outbreak, Darren James, as well as with Vivid Entertainment founder/co-chairman Steven Hirsch and former Vivid Girl Nikki Jayne.  In addition, Nightline freshly interviewed a retired performer named Gina Rodriguez and AIDS Healthcare Foundation's Michael Weinstein, who spoke of his ballot initiative to make condom usage in adult productions a mandatory stipulation of being granted filming permits in Los Angeles. Among Weinstein's arguments for why industry opposition to said requirement should be discounted was the assertion that adult producers "would also like to use 16-year-old girls, and they're not permitted to do that." See the full segment here. Screen shot courtesy of abcnews.go.com.