Cop's long fight to get justice for Alzheimer's victim who was dumped at a mall

[Valasca]

Elba Soccarras couldn't remember. And Eduardo Ojeda couldn't forget.

The elderly woman, ravaged by Alzheimer's disease, was stripped of the past: her tiny village in Colombia, her only daughter in Brooklyn, her cruel abandonment at a New Jersey mall.

Even her own name remained a mystery.

The tale of a woman being tossed aside like trash gnawed at Ojeda. The police lieutenant took six years to uncover her identity - and now, convinced there are people hiding the truth, he wants justice for Elba.

"Whoever left her there didn't want her identified," Ojeda said.

"They didn't want her traced back to them. You don't do that to a dog."

Soccarras, one of 16 siblings, left rural Villa Nueva in northern Colombia in 1969. She found love in her new home of Brooklyn, and became pregnant. When the father fled, Soccarras raised their girl alone.

The devout Jehovah's Witness supported her family with factory jobs - most in the garment industry, one as a doll-maker.

She and her daughter moved around Brooklyn, struggling to make ends meet over the next two decades. Then Alzheimer's struck the proud immigrant with the always-perfect hair.

By the early 1990s, Soccarras and the daughter were fighting over the girl's boyfriend. Evicted from her apartment, a deteriorating Soccarras moved in with two friends for eight months.

After she was found wandering on the Verrazano Bridge, the couple told Ojeda, they returned Soccarras to her daughter.

On Nov. 2, 1994, an unidentified woman brought Soccarras to the security desk at the Woodbridge Center mall. Soccarras was well-dressed, her hair fixed neatly. She clutched a purse, but carried no identification.

The woman who left her there disappeared. Ojeda believes the sick and helpless Soccarras was dumped as her care became increasingly difficult.

"She had to be somebody's mother, somebody's sister, somebody's daughter," said Ojeda, whose 86-year-old mom is still alive. "She had to have a story."

The woman couldn't recall it - or anything else. No one ever reported "Jane Doe" missing. She went into a New Jersey mental hospital.

Ojeda, of the New Jersey Department of Human Services police, received the cold case in 2003. It wasn't until he brought the story to a New Jersey newspaper last year that he got answers.

The veteran cop was suddenly taking 18 calls a day, most with anonymous tips. Ojeda contacted the Colombian Consulate and federal immigration officials.

The digging paid off. Jane Doe was ID'd last month as Elba Leonor Diaz Soccarras, now 75.

Ojeda located her daughter, now a 36-year-old mother of three. The woman identified Soccarras, but insisted that she believed Soccarras had returned to Colombia after their falling out.

Soccarras will spend the rest of her days in a New Jersey nursing home - a move made possible once she was identified and found eligible for Medicaid. The woman was previously kept in state psychiatric facilities.

The local prosecutor was never asked to probe the incident, mostly because it was unclear if a crime was committed. And the statute of limitations for abandonment is five years.

Ojeda hopes one of his callers still harbors the outrage that gripped him.

"Maybe there's somebody out there thinking, 'I know who did this, and they're a monster,'" Ojeda said. "They need to do something."

Read more: "Cop's long fight to get justice for Alzheimer's victim who was dumped at a mall" - http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local...ce_for_alzheimers_victim.html#ixzz0F9MpGPJc&A

 

[jo_momma_82]

 

[Abroad]

God(s) bless lieutenant Ojeda for keeping at it.

 

[Just my luck sucks]

"Maybe there's somebody out there thinking, 'I know who did this, and they're a monster,'" Ojeda said. "They need to do something."

So the cop is suggesting "someone" take the law into their own hands and what "punish" the daughter? Seems a little reckless to make such a statement to the public.

 

[Whisper]

Unfuckingbelievable.This is so disgusting beyond comprehension.I am a geriatrics nurse and responsible for 36 alzhiemers patients by myself 9 hours a night.I cant imagine any of my guys being dumped somewhere and just forgotten about.In fact my floor is a lockdown floor that you have to know the code for the key pad inside the elevator if you want it to stop on that floor.That woman that dumped her needs to be investigated and charged.What the fucks she going to do get tired of looking after her kids and dump them off???I know how stressful alzhiemers patients can be.But every city has funding and daycare for them.Every city has support groups and if its to much then admit them to a nursing home.If this all began 6 yrs (her being stressed and dumping her) then by now most likely shes in 3rd stage and will be gone soon.If thats the case and even if it isnt that fucking bitch better hurry up make her amends with her mom (even though she wont have a clue whats going on).Because karmas a bitch and if thats the way shes raising her daughter then one day she will turn up and nobody will know who she is!!

 

[Whisper]

What I forgot to say was the reason my floor is a lockdown is b/c 11 yrs ago another nursing/retirement home(mines a retirememnt home for rich old people).A woman wandered outside and we are on the river.She wandered down by Fords.They found her drowned in the river.So we have a panic pad on the elevator and people have to know the code in order for the elevator to stop on 5th floor.And believe me they have some times where they remember things and slip back out again b/c we now have our panic pad upside down so they cant get right now!!We have a lady that memorized the code by glance and we had to put it upside down.My point being if she had wandered away she wouldve been reported as missing so basically her daughter didnt report her afterwards proves she dumped her.But even 6 yrs ago wouldnt there be video??

 

[Abroad]

After 6 years, wouldn't that video have been played order, and over, and over, and over, and over........? You get my drift?