Blanche Matilda Roth, 87, Lay Dead in Bed for 8 Months Despite Daily Visits from Caretakers

[Rob Cibik]

N.C. Woman Lay Dead in Bed for 8 Months Despite Daily Visits

Associated Press
December 16, 2009

WILMINGTON, N.C. — The body of an elderly woman remained in her bed
for up to eight months even though caretakers paid daily visits to the
house and kept it tidy, authorities said Wednesday.

Sheriff's deputies were investigating the suspicious death of Blanche
Matilda Roth after the corpse was found in her suburban home in
Wilmington, on the Atlantic coast, on Tuesday following a call to 911.

New Hanover County Deputy Charles Smith said Roth likely died in May,
before her 88th birthday in September. Her body was found after the
911 caller, whose identity was being withheld by authorities, reported
that an elderly woman in the home was unconscious and not breathing.

Smith said caretakers had been going in and out of the house on a
quiet cul-de-sac on a daily basis. He would not specify if the
caretakers were family members but said they were not nurses. At least
four other people also lived in the house, a neighbor said.

Failure to report a death is a felony in North Carolina.

Smith said the residence was very well kept. He said police hadn't
received any calls requesting welfare checks on Roth.

Officials are awaiting the results of an autopsy to determine the
cause of death.

"They were quiet and stayed to themselves all the time," neighbor Ray
Taylor, 72, said of the home's residents.

Martin Pedersen, another neighbor, said he had no idea Roth had died.

Pedersen, 55, said four other family members, a married couple and two
sons, lived in the house and that a younger son went to school every
day.

Pedersen said the family was nice and the news surprised him. He used
to see the elderly woman walking to the mailbox with another family
member holding her arm. "They'd be laughing and everything else."

He couldn't recall when he last saw her.

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[Charlene]

On Dec 16, 3:08 pm, Rob Cibik <lcp...@hotmail.com> wrote:
> N.C. Woman Lay Dead in Bed for 8 Months Despite Daily Visits
>
> Associated Press
> December 16, 2009
>
> WILMINGTON, N.C.  —  The body of an elderly woman remained in her bed
> for up to eight months even though caretakers paid daily visits to the
> house and kept it tidy, authorities said Wednesday.

What the hell.

wd45

[Brad Ferguson]

In article
<9c4fd87f-6afc-4f98...@1g2000vbe.googlegroups.com>,
Charlene <charlene...@gmail.com> wrote:

Sure. The Social Security checks were still coming, weren't they?