Passersby on a street of Goudi neighborhood of eastern Athens made a macabre discovery short after 5:30 afternoon last Saturday. The body of an old woman, a dementia patient living in the area, was wrapped in a blanket and abandoned on the pavement.
They alerted police that cordoned the area and started seeking for the perpetrators.
The blanket was tied with rope, the victim’s legs with a plastic bag.
The woman had no serious wounds on her body except a bruise on one cheek.
All indications pointed out that perpetrators were carrying the body to an unknown location but for some reasons they abandoned the effort, left the body in the middle of the road and fled.
In an effort to identify the body first of all, police started to question passersby and residents and evaluate material from security cameras.
According to initial information, the body belonged to a woman over 85 years old, living in an apartment near the spot where her body was found. Neighbors knew that she was suffering from dementia and other health problems and was living together with her daughter.
An eyewitness reported to police that seen at least one person carrying the body.
Investigation continued until late at night, the perpetrator was soon identified and a family tragedy revealed.. It was the daughter of the 92-year-old victim who killed her mother.
The 68-year-old daughter reportedly confessed the murder. She told police that she lost her patience and temper, hit her bed-ridden mother and at some point she closed her mother’s nose and mouth until she stopped breathing.
The 68-year-old daughter said among others that she was tired of taking care of her mother. She wanted to relieve her mother from the suffering but also herself.
Arguments were daily in their home, the mother would forget things and accused her of stealing them, she told police, “each day was worse than the other.”
She described how she tied the body with ropes and the blanket. She carried it about a street block away but she got tired and abandoned it.
“I got tired from dragging the body and left it where you found it. I returned home and thought the issue was over,” the daughter told police.
Mother and daughter live together for the last 26 years after the latter’s divorce.
An autopsy on Tuesday is expected to shed light into the true causes of the woman’s death.
PS Dementia is not only a torture for the person affected by the disease that destroys one’s personality. It is also a heavy physical and emotional burden for the person’s family and caretakers especially when they are family members.
