INMATE WILDER FREED DIES OF AIDS AT HOME

                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, April 16, 1993                   TAG: 9304160037
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: B2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: RICHMOND                                LENGTH: Short
INMATE WILDER FREED DIES OF AIDS AT HOME
An inmate given conditional clemency by Gov. Douglas Wilder has died of complications from AIDS.
New York prison officials told Virginia authorities that Alex Manuel Velazquez, 29, died early Wednesday in New York City, where he was living with his parents.
Wilder allowed Velazquez to go home Nov. 25, the day before Thanksgiving, because doctors could no longer say with any certainty that the inmate would live more than three months.
"Overall, his condition has deteriorated to the extent that I felt, inasmuch as we have the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays coming, he should be allowed to spend time with his family," Wilder said at the time.
Sandra Semevolos of Hartford, Conn., Velazquez's sister, had been trying for more than a year to convince Wilder to release her brother.
Velazquez was sentenced in 1989 to 23 years in prison for a cocaine distribution conviction in Virginia Beach. Wilder said Velazquez had been a model inmate at the Powhatan Correctional Center.
As a condition of his early release, Velazquez was required to remain in his parents' home unless he got permission from a parole officer to leave.

by Bhavesh Jinadra by CNB