SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — A Pennsylvania woman who disappeared more than 30 years ago in a case that baffled authorities, who later declared her legally dead, has been found alive in a nursing home in Puerto Rico. .
Patricia Kopta left her husband and siblings and wandered northern Puerto Rico for a while before being taken as a ‘needy’ person to the seniors’ residence in 1999, according to details revealed during a press conference this week in Ross Township, where he was living at the time.
Known as a street preacher in her hometown, Kopta initially kept her past in Puerto Rico a secret, but because she suffered from dementia she began to reveal details, the Ross Township deputy police chief said. , Brian Kohlhepp.
Last year, a social worker at the residence had enough information to alert authorities in her country to the woman, now 83. A DNA test confirmed his identity, Kohlhepp said.
Her husband, Bob Kopta, and his 78-year-old sister, Gloria Smith, provided details of Kopta’s life during the press conference and in phone interviews Friday with The Associated Press.
Patricia Kopta had been nicknamed “The Sparrow” for her slender figure and often frequented parking lots and busy roads in the mostly residential community of about 31,000 people north of Pittsburgh, warning passers-by and motorists of the end of the world. .
But before she started preaching, Kopta was an exceptional student who became a model and a dance teacher. After graduating from high school, she worked in finance at a Pittsburgh plate glass company and attended weekly ballroom dancing events, according to her family.
Before getting married, she was vacationing in Puerto Rico with her friends, Smith recalls.
“He loved the sea, the beach, the hot sun,” Smith told the AP.
Smith added that her sister quit her job at the glass company after 10 years due to migraine headaches which doctors attributed to stress. She then got a job as an elevator operator at the Pittsburgh Art Institute. It was then that those close to her noticed a change in her.
“He said he saw an angel there,” Smith recalled.
Soon after, Kopta began preaching and was briefly admitted to an institution after doctors diagnosed her with a “delusion of grandeur” and concluded that she had signs of schizophrenia. Once released, she continued to preach until her disappearance in 1992.
“I came home one night and she was gone,” Bob Kopta told the AP.
The disappearance baffled the authorities and the family. The police even went so far as to consult a psychic, while Kopta recalled that his wife once mentioned that she would like to go to Puerto Rico because of its mild climate. So he placed ads in Puerto Rican newspapers, but never received a response.
Years passed without any sign of her. He was issued a death certificate approximately seven years after his disappearance.
“I’ve been through a lot,” said Bob Kopta, a retired truck driver. “Every time they found a dead body somewhere (I wondered), ‘Is that Patricia? Is it Patricia?