Hospital bedside reunion

Press, 16 November 1981, Page 2

Hospital bedside reunion

NZPA Washington An Auckland couple were reunited on Saturday with their daughter, the victim of a brutal sex attack in Florida last week. The couple arrived in Tallahassee and were taken to their daughter’s hospital bedside after a briefing on the crime and the psychological effects their daughter is likely to suffer. They saw her for several hours. The hospital continued to report her condition as “satisfactory.” The parents had a highly emotional arrival in Tal-

lahassee, a city of about 82,000 which has been shocked by the brutality of the crime. Sweets and cakes, cards and telegrams poured into the sheriff’s office and the hospital from local wellwishers. More awaited the parents at the home of a woman who lives on her own and has offered to put them up during their stay in Florida. Department stores have offered them clothes, supermarkets have given baskets of groceries, and a rental car

company has put a vehicle at their disposal. The girl aged 20, who recently graduated as a registered nurse in Auckland, was bn a hitch-hiking holiday in the United States. She was raped, choked, battered with a cement slab, and left for dead by the roadside after accepting a lift from a motorist last Tuesday. The police still have no trace of her attacker. It is not known how long the girl, in a critical condition when admitted to hospital, will have to remain under.medical care.