By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

          HAVANA (AP) -- Felix Julian Garcia tried three times to leave Cuba
          illegally. Twice he was jailed; the third try cost him his life.

          Garcia was killed on Aug. 21, 1999 by subfreezing temperatures and
          lack of oxygen in the landing gear of a Boeing 777 jetliner bound for
          London. His frozen body was found by authorities in the British capital
          when the jet arrived.

          The young man's death and the repatriation of his remains a month later
          were not noted in the state media, which last week provided broad
          coverage of two teen-age military cadets who died the same way.
          Instead Lucia Garcia buried her son silently, accompanied by state
          security agents.

          ``It's an open wound,'' Garcia, 46, said of the death of her son, who was
          28. ``I have not become a person again.''

          Holding a picture of Felix in his casket, she told The Associated Press
          Tuesday that her son's burial was ``the funeral of an opponent -- the
          police said so.'' She said her son never made a secret of his opposition to
          the government.

          ``His big problem was that he could not stand this system,'' Garcia said
          of her son, who first tried to leave the island illegally when he was 19.

          Felix Garcia made his first attempt to leave Cuba by sea, but was
          arrested on the shore by Cuban authorities. He was sentenced to one
          year in prison.

          Shortly after his release, he set sail again. He was arrested again, this time
          at sea, and sentenced to 1 1/2 years.

          Garcia said she thought that after two failed attempts her son had given
          up on trying to leave Cuba illegally. He was working at a textile factory in
          Santiago de las Vegas, southeast of Havana.

          And while she prefers not to comment on law or politics, she said if his
          death had been covered in the media -- ``even something little'' --
          perhaps the two cadets who died in the wheel well of a London-bound
          jetliner on Christmas Eve would not have taken the risk.

          The repatriation of the bodies of Alberto Vazquez, 17, and Maikel
          Fonseca, 16, last week and their subsequent funerals received wide
          media coverage in Cuba.

          President Fidel Castro convoked a massive march last week to protest
          the deaths, blaming them on U.S. immigration policies he says encourage
          Cubans to undertake risky journeys.

          The government launched a campaign more than a year ago to protest
          the Cuban Adjustment Act, a 1966 law that allows Cubans who reach
          American soil to apply for U.S. residency.

          The campaign began with the seven-month battle for the repatriation of
          Elian Gonzalez, who survived an illegal departure at sea that killed his
          mother and 10 others. Elian, now 7, returned to the island with his father
          in late June but the campaign against U.S. policies has continued.

          Communist leaders said last week that the cadets who died should not be
          considered traitors, but rather victims of what they call the ``murderous
          law.''

          Garcia believes the cases should have been treated the same.

          ``If we are to keep quiet and say that people who leave don't die this
          way, then fine, everyone keep quiet,'' she said.

          ``But if these things are to be known, then let's know about everyone,
          regardless of their position,'' she said during a walk to the cemetery in
          Santiago de las Vegas where she buried her son -- the eldest of her four
          children.

          ``I don't understand this -- why?'' the mother asked. ``They were all
          human beings.''