Judge Releases Inmate on Bond in AIDS Case

A federal prison inmate suffering from AIDS was on his way to a private hospital Monday after a judge ruled that the U.S. Bureau of Prisons lacks adequate facilities to treat the disease.

Lawyers in the case of Leonardo Botero Gomez, 43, said Monday that this is the first time a sentenced federal prisoner has been freed on bond for medical treatment and they are preparing a class-action lawsuit on behalf of all federal prisoners with AIDS.

In Washington, Bureau of Prisons spokesman Greg Bogdan said the agency was conferring with its counsel and seeking more information before responding publicly to the ruling. He initially said there is not a large number of federal inmates with AIDS, but later said the agency would not comment on that subject.

Gomez, sentenced May 5 to a minimum of 10 years for cocaine trafficking, is in the most advanced stage of AIDS and has a life expectancy of 24 months or less, one of his lawyers said.

U.S. District Judge Eugene Spellman ordered Gomez freed Friday on $250,000 bond pending a full civil trial, scheduled for January. The inmate was released later in the day after Spellman’s order was upheld by the U.S. 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta.

Spellman heard testimony that Gomez, who is taking the anti-AIDS drug AZT, was being treated at the infirmary of the federal Metropolitan Correctional Center near Miami. About every four weeks he was sent to the AIDS treatment center at Miami’s public Jackson Memorial Hospital.