Mrs. Georgette Edri, 75, remains hospitalized following her potentially fatal ordeal. The senior citizen last week traveled to the Nahariya shopping center for a dental appointment but failed to return home. After realizing his wife was very late and should have been back from her dentist appointment, her husband phoned their son Chanan, 45, who in turn called the local police station as well as his dear friend Shalom Dahan, who is chief of detectives in the city.

Dahan and Chanan traveled back to the shopping center and began the search. This was already a number of hours after the disappearance. They learned that she never arrived for the dental appointment. Security camera video footage confirmed she arrived in the building and they saw her get into the elevator but instead of going to the dental clinic, she apparently became confused and went to the roof, which was left open by a technician who worked there a short time earlier.

When police asked to search the roof shopping center security personnel told them they already checked three times with flashlights and she was not there. They explained that they even emptied the trash receptacles on the roof, assuming the worst; that perhaps someone dumped the body chas v’sholom, but nothing was found. The search began to expand as they combed the entire shopping center complex.

Night arrived and they had been searching for over five hours. Major Dahan insisted on going onto the roof one more time. He found a woman on the ground, in an altered state consciousness – it was Mrs. Edri.

It appears she took the elevator to the roof by mistake, perhaps confusion, and once she got onto the roof she was unable to find her way back. “I shouted ‘police help’ Mrs. Edri explained but her frightened shouts were not heard.

She explained as nightfall set in she no longer has the strength to remain standing and fell a number of times, accounting for her facial bruises.

The security guard who insisted that she was not on the roof was fired from his job. The manager of the shopping center was summoned for questioning. He may face charges of negligence along with the shift security supervisor since the technician failed to lock the roof.

Baruch Hashem Mrs. Edri is recovering in a local hospital.

(YWN – Israel Desk, Jerusalem)