Car­los Alberto Tor­res, who served 30 years in a fed­eral prison will be released this month. He will return to Puerto Rico where he will be received with an artis­tic cel­e­bra­tion in Ponce.
On May 20^th the Pro­ba­tion Board deter­mined his release which will be effec­tive at the end of the month.
In 1999, then Pres. Clin­ton, did not include Tor­res in a group of 12 Puerto Rican polit­i­cal pris­on­ers who received a pres­i­den­tial par­don. Had he not been par­doned, his orig­i­nal sen­tence would have kept him in jail until 2024.
No other Puerto Rican polit­i­cal pris­oner has served as many years in prison as Tor­res. The other Puerto Rican polit­i­cal pris­oner with a long sen­tence was Oscar López Rivera, who has spent 29 years behind bars.
Tor­res will be expected to arrive on 29 July. An activ­ity has been orga­nized at Par­que Mon­u­mento Don Pedro Albizu Cam­pos in Ten­ería, Ponce, where he was born Sep­tem­ber 1,1952. The group “Asi Somos” will head­line other artists per­form­ing at the activ­ity. It will be trans­mit­ted on sta­tion WPAB 550AM and on the inter­net http//pipponce.org.
Tor­res, 57 years old, chose to go under­ground in 1976 with his then preg­nant wife. Four years later on April 4, 1980, he was appre­hended for con­spir­acy to over­throw the gov­ern­ment and being a mem­ber the Armed Forces for National Lib­er­a­tion, a clan­des­tine orga­ni­za­tion that fought for Puerto Rico’s inde­pen­dence in the 70’s and 80’s.
Accord­ing to the Com­mit­tee Pro Human Rights of Puerto Rico, while in jail, Tor­res obtained a uni­ver­sity degree, worked in the Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion, and became a painter and arte­san.
Lopez Rivera who also went under­ground in 1976 was arrested in 1981, accused of trea­son and belong­ing to FALN. He served a 12 of a 70 year sen­tence in iso­la­tion. Nev­er­the­less, he rejected Clinton’s offer of an early release. He con­tin­ues in prison.
The other Puerto Rican still jailed is Avelino González Clau­dio. He was the leader of the Fed­er­a­tion of Uni­ver­sity Stu­dents
pro Inde­pen­dence (FUPI) and the Pro Inde­pen­dence Move­ment (MPI) dur­ing the years he spent in New York.
In 1985 he was accused in abs­ten­cia of hav­ing planned a $6 mil­lion rob­bery to Wells Fargo in Hart­ford, Con­neti­cutt as a mem­ber of the Macheteros.