A US woman who was declared legally dead after disappearing more than three decades ago has turned up alive in Puerto Rico, her family and police have said.
Patricia Kopta, who is now 83, had last been seen in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1992 when investigators began looking into her disappearance.
Mrs Kopta, who has dementia, has been living in a nursing home after she was taken in as a ‘person in need’ seven years after she disappeared. SkyNews reported.
Her husband Bob Kopta said he had been married to Mrs Kopta for 20 years before she went missing.
‘It’s a relief knowing that she’s not laying in a ditch somewhere, or murdered somewhere,’ he said.
The 86-year-old husband added that his family suspected she may be in Puerto Rico but she was declared dead around 25 years ago.
He said he has experienced a range of emotions over the years but is content knowing his wife is alive and being cared for.
‘After 30 years, you try to forget about it. Now I can forget about it. We know what happened, and she is taken care of now,’ he said.
Before her disappearance, US-based doctors at a mental health facility had diagnosed Mrs Kopta with ‘delusions of grandeur’ and said she had signs of schizophrenia.
But Mrs Kopta was released from the facility and kept preaching until she disappeared, her family said.
According to SkyNews, Mr Kohlhepp has said police believe Mrs Kopta fled the country because she was ‘concerned she was going to be institutionalised’.
She is thought to have regularly wandered around Puerto Rico’s northern towns of Naranjito, Corozal and Toa Alta, located just southwest of the capital of San Juan, during her time on the island.
Mrs Kopta had kept details about her life secret when she ended up in a nursing home but began divulging information as the years passed.
Mrs Kopta suggested that she had arrived in Puerto Rico on a cruise ship from Europe when she first arrived at the home, police said.
