Burdens on the caretaker of the elderly was what caused this tragedy to happen, from the Front Page Sections, translated…
The elderly man, Kao in Madou District, was found dead in his own house on the early morning of the 22nd, his eldest daughter-in-law who was his primary caretaker was suspected of leaping off from the roof of their home; the D.A. and the medical examiners autopsied the elderly’s body, the preliminary showed that the cause of death was asphyxiation, they’re not ruling out how the stress from taking care of him experienced by the daughter-in-law, that she’d suffocated him to death, then, committed suicide, causing this tragedy in the family.
The family could NOT believe the D.A.’s theories, the neighbors also commended the daughter-in-law on being the most fitting daughter-in-law anywhere in Taiwan, everybody believed, that because the eldest daughter-in-law saw the father-in-law dead, she was so deep in sorrow, that, was why she’d committed suicide; the D.A. stated, that the medical examiners can’t confirm the cause of death for the elderly man, and they will get answers, after the reports from the autopsy is out.
The manager of the caring services of the city of Tainan, Ren stated, that when the person who’s the primary caretaker started feeling stressed, started showing signs of insomnia, anxieties, along with other physical symptoms, the rest of the family should take over to help out, so the primary caretaker can temporarily get away from the scene, and the families can also ask the Social Services to provide a breather program to help out as well.
The police investigated and found, that the eldest daughter-in-law of the family had, for a long time, looked after the grandmother of her husband, her father and mother-in-law, and because she had long-term experiences in taking care of the elderly, she’d worked as a nurse’s aide at a nearby nursing home. The grandmother and the mother-in-law were both deceased, the elderly man, Kao, three years ago, was diagnosed with liver cancer, the eldest daughter-in-law during the daytime, worked as a nurse’s aide at the facility, at noon, she’d gone home to prepare the meals, and, in the evenings, she’d gone to look after her own father-in-law, she was, burning on both ends at work and at home.
On the morning of the 22nd, at around six, the elderly’s eldest son tried to wake him up but couldn’t, after checking and realizing, that his father wasn’t breathing, he’d asked his daughter to call the ambulance; as the daughter rolled up the steel door and waited outside, she found her mother, lying outside the house, with wounds on her head, bleeding, and the two of them both died, before they could be rushed to the hospitals.
The police found that the eldest daughter-in-law on the early morning hours at around four, on the 22nd, called the nursing care facility, said she’d needed to take a day of to take care of something; there were, signs of abrasion from the elderly man’s nose, and on the corner of his lips, as well as on the pillows, there were also, blood stains, the police suspected that the cause of death wasn’t so clear cut. The coroner after autopsying the body, determined the cause of death as asphyxiation, and he’d already taken sample from the elderly’s lung to get tested.
The neighbors pointed out, that everything that’s happening in the elderly man’s daily life he’d relied on his eldest daughter-in-law for, that she, was really fitting, they’d gotten along very well, “nobody believed that she was capable of murdering her father-in-law”.
And so, this may be a mercy killing, because the daughter-in-law felt awful about her father-in-law had to live like he had, and just, ended it for him, putting him out of his miseries, or, the woman may have killed her own father-in-law, because she’d become, too stressed on taking care of him, but, we really can’t tell, because the only one with the answers to the questions is already gone.