A kidnapping case involving a 97-year-old woman victim in Melbourne, Australia can beat the plot of a movie storyline or a convoluted soap opera.
The old woman identified as Dimitra Pavlopoulou was kidnapped from her Melbourne nursing home by a 51-year-old woman who claims the 97-year-old woman is her own mother.
The suspected kidnapper, Irene Moschones, has been charged with kidnapping and unlawful imprisonment after the elderly lady was taken from her Clarinda nursing home yesterday. Moschones appeared today before the Melbourne Magistrates Court.
Authorities say the 97-year-old woman was wheeled out of her room ar Clarinda Manor around midday and was put in a car, leaving behind her wheelchair.
It took nine hours before the elderly woman was found at a Cheltenham home. Police say Moschones allegedly brought the senior citizen there. An associate of the suspect called the police to tip them of the whereabouts of the elderly lady after he saw Pavlopoulou lying on a mattress in the living room.
The strange thing is the motivation behind the suspect’s actions. Moschones is said to be under the notion that the elderly woman is her own mother, even though investigators have established that Moschones’ real mother died in 2013.
Police prosecutor Sergeant Daryl Eales said Moschones believes “there was a conspiracy against her committed by a group of people to get her inheritance from her mother.”
Moschones has previously requested the authorities to exhume her mother’s body so that a DNA testing can “disprove her mother’s death and funeral.”
Moschones has been making the rounds of nursing homes in search of her “real” mother.
Authorities maintain that Moshones is not related in any way to the kidnapping victim. Neither is she known to anyone in the elderly woman’s family.
Moschones bail attempt was denied. Magistrate Ross Betts said they are concerned about Moschones’ mental state. The magistrate added: “She requires psychiatric assessment due to her delusional thoughts towards the victim and her thought processes of the victim being her mother.”
Police also expressed worries that should she be allowed to post bail, the suspect would again attempt to kidnap the elderly woman from her nursing home and put her life and frail health at risk. The 97-year-old has several conditions that require medical care given her advanced age.
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