Subject:      Skater Curry dead at age 44

Olympic skater John Curry dead of AIDS at 44 LONDON (APRIL 15) DPA -
British gold medal Olympic figure skater John Curry has died at his home
in the English Midlands of an AIDS-related heart attack, his agent
announced Friday. He was 44.

His agent said Curry, who had returned to England from America in 1991
when he came down with AIDS, died in Stratford-upon-Avon.

Curry won the gold medal at the 1976 Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria, and
was proclaimed world figure-skating champion at the Gothenburg
championships the same year.

Candid about his homosexuality, Curry knew as early as 1987 that he had
been infected with the HIV virus known to cause AIDS. When he was
diagnosed as having AIDS in 1991, he left New York for his native
England.

"New York is no place for sick people," he said at the time. "And I want
to be here with loved ones when things take a turn for the worse."