The author has been suffering

from pneumonia.

BANGOR (AP) – Author Stephen King, who has been hospitalized for more than a week with pneumonia, was reported to be making progress in regaining his health.

A doctor at Eastern Maine Medical Center on Tuesday removed the tube that was inserted in King’s chest last week to help extract fluid from his lungs.

As King’s condition improved, there were fresh developments in the case of the 38-year-old Czech man accused of stalking the author last month at his home in Bangor.

An immigration judge in Hartford, Conn., ordered Bretislav Bures removed from the United States and returned to the Czech Republic.

Bures, who had recently been living in Austell, Ga., was arrested Nov. 16 while sitting in a car across from King’s home after he reportedly harassed the author and left notes on his mailbox asking to speak with him.

The next day, Bures pleaded innocent in District Court to one charge of stalking. Because his visitor’s visa expired in 2000, Bures was in the custody of the Bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement less than 24 hours after his arrest.

King, 56, was diagnosed with pneumonia before his recent trip to New York to receive the National Book Foundation’s 2003 Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters.

“We know he’s getting stronger every day and he’s making progress,” Warren Silver, King’s attorney in Bangor, said Tuesday. “His stay in the hospital is sort of on a day by day basis.”

AP-ES-12-03-03 0217EST