On January 19, 2010, Carlos Alberto Torres attended a video hearing presided over by a U.S. Parole Commission hearing examiner whose task was to consider the disciplinary charges stemming from last January, and to make a recommendation for what should happen with respect to his request to be released on parole. Carlos Alberto answered the questions posed, and his attorney Jan Susler asked that the Parole Commission release him on parole as previously recommended, regardless of the wrongful charges. She pointed out the vast, ongoing support for his release, and argued that there is absolutely no risk in releasing him, as evidenced by the impressive example of his compatriots who were released by presidential commutation in 1999. The hearing examiner then made a favorable recommendation. Download letter hereBio on Carlos Alberto Torres:
Carlos Alberto Torres was born in Ponce, Puerto Rico on September 19, 1952. His parents moved to New York, finally settling in Chicago. He studied in the University of Illinois in Carbondale and Chicago. Carlos was one of the founders of the Rafael Cancel Miranda Puerto Rican High School now known as the Dr. Pedro Albizu Campos Puerto Rican High School and participated in the Committee to Free the 5 Nationalists (including Lolita Lebron, whose portrait he is holding in the photo at right). In 1976, Carlos was forced to go underground and was on the FBI's 10 most wanted list. He was captured along with other comrades and sentenced to 88 years on charges of seditious conspiracy, among other charges. Carlos Alberto is a regular writer for Libertad and his short stories have been published in Cuentos Sara la Libertad.
Although the Clinton Administration offered clemency to 12 Puerto Rican political prisoners in the fall of 1999, no leniency was granted to Carlos Torres, whom prosecutors described as a leader of the Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional (FALN), an underground organization which fought for Puerto Rico's independence in the 1970s and '80s. (See the PARC/National Committee page on Amnesty for the Puerto Rican Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War).
Although the Clinton Administration offered clemency to 12 Puerto Rican political prisoners in the fall of 1999, no leniency was granted to Carlos Torres, whom prosecutors described as a leader of the Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional (FALN), an underground organization which fought for Puerto Rico's independence in the 1970s and '80s. (See the PARC/National Committee page on Amnesty for the Puerto Rican Political Prisoners and Prisoners of War).
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