SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP) — A Pennsylvania woman who disappeared more than 30 years ago in a case that stunned authorities who later declared her legally dead has been found alive in a nursing home in Puerto Rico.
Patricia Kopta left her husband and siblings and wandered in northern Puerto Rico for a while before being taken in by a care home for “indigent” adults in 1999, according to details announced at a news conference this week in Ross Townships. where he once lived.
Kopta, once known as a street preacher in her hometown, initially kept her past a secret while in Puerto Rico.
But he began to reveal details as he suffered progressively from dementia, said Ross Township Deputy Police Chief Brian Kohlhepp.
Last year, a home social worker had enough information to alert authorities at the now 83-year-old woman’s home.
A DNA test confirmed his identity, Kohlhepp said.
Her husband, Bob Kopta, and her surviving sister, Gloria Smith, 78. he offered details about Kopta’s life at a news conference and in telephone interviews with The Associated Press on Friday.
Patricia Kopta had been nicknamed “Sparrow” because of her thin build and often frequented parking lots and busy streets in the largely residential community of about 31,000 north of Pittsburgh, where she warned passersby and motorists of the end of the world.
But before she started preaching, Kopta was a student. She became a model and a dance instructor. After graduating high school, she worked in finance at a glass company in Pittsburgh and attended weekly ballroom dance events, according to her family.
He often vacationed in Puerto Rico with his friends before they got married, Smith recalls.
“He loved the ocean, the beach, the warm sun,” Smith told the AP.
Smith said her sister left her job at the glass company after 10 years because of migraines that doctors attributed to stress. He then got a job as an elevator operator at the Art Institute of Pittsburgh.
Then family members noticed a change in her.
“He said something about seeing an angel there,” Smith recalled.
Soon after, Kopta began preaching and was briefly institutionalized after doctors diagnosed her with “delusions of grandeur” and said she had signs of schizophrenia. After his release, he continued to preach until his death in 1992.
“I came home one night and she was just gone,” Bob Kopta told the AP.
They have been married for 20 years.
Kopta, now 86, recalled how they met by a river in Pittsburgh where he had a boat. He gave her and her friends a lift and fell in love. In 1972 they got married.
The disappearance stunned both the authorities and the family. Police went so far as to consult a psychic, while Kopta recalled that his wife once said she would like to go to Puerto Rico because of the warm weather. So he placed ads in Puerto Rican newspapers, but got no response.
Years passed without a trace of her. He obtained a death certificate about seven years after she disappeared.
“I’ve been through a lot,” said Bob Kopta, a retired truck driver. “Every time they’d find a body somewhere (I’d say) ‘Is that Patricia?’ Is that Patricia?’”
Meanwhile, Patricia Kopta was apparently wandering around the northern island towns of Naranjito, Corozal and Toa Alta, located just southwest of the capital San Juan. When she was first admitted to the nursing home, she suggested arriving in Puerto Rico on a cruise ship from Europe, Kohlhepp said.
After a social worker contacted police in Pennsylvania, it took nearly a year for DNA evidence to confirm that the woman was indeed Patricia Kopta.
“It’s a sad thing, but it’s a relief to my mind,” her husband said. “When your wife goes missing, you’re a suspect.”
Bob Kopta, who has not remarried, said he has no plans to visit her and is now trying to forget the past, although he is glad to know she is being taken care of.
Smith, on the other hand, wants to go to the island to see his older sister. He says he couldn’t talk to his older brother on the phone because he can’t hold a conversation because of his dementia. A twin sister of Patricia Kopta died without knowing that her twin was still alive.
“Whether she knows me or not, I still want to see her and hug her and tell her I love her,” Smith said. “I thought maybe he was dead.”
AP Researcher Rhonda Shafner contributed from New York.
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