THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT 
              Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: Tuesday, February 11, 1997            TAG: 9702110282
SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B3   EDITION: FINAL 
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS 
DATELINE: WOODBRIDGE                        LENGTH:   31 lines

INMATE WROTE TO VICTIM'S FAMILY BEFORE EXECUTION

A man who was put to death last week for the sexual torture slaying of a teen-ager asked the victim's parents in a letter written just before his execution for forgiveness.

But Michael Carl George, in the one-page letter that was hand-delivered Saturday to Gail and Attila Sztanko, recognized they might not be able to grant his request, Gail Sztanko said.

``If this is something that made it easier for him to accept his fate and allowed him to die with some sense of hope, for that reason alone it has some merit,'' she said Sunday.

The boy's father, however, said the letter didn't erase his anger at the June 1990 killing of his 15-year-old son, Alex.

``I felt just like I did before,'' he said. ``It doesn't help Alex.''

The letter was delivered by a minister. George, 39, was executed Thursday night at the Greensville Correctional Center.

Gail Sztanko said it appeared that George thought about what he wanted to say for a long time and was trying to express remorse.

``It's going to take some time to get everything in perspective,'' she said.

Alex Sztanko was accosted while riding a motorcycle along a dirt power line trail in Woodbridge. George handcuffed the boy to a tree, sodomized him, used a stun gun to shock his genitals and shot him with a 9mm handgun.