"She lived in filth, so large she couldn't move from her sofa, even to use the bathroom," writes Pat Moore.
Moore's article continues:
Early Wednesday, still fused to the couch, Gayle Laverne Grinds died following a six-hour effort by rescue workers who struggled to lift the 480-pound woman and get her to a Martin County hospital.
Unable to separate the skin of the 39-year-old woman from her sofa, 12 Martin County Fire-Rescue workers slid both onto a trailer and hauled her behind a pickup to Martin Memorial Hospital South. She died a short time later.
Sheriff's investigators questioned how Grinds lived in such conditions without more help from family or authorities. ...
The medical examiner performed an autopsy of the 4-foot-10 woman and listed her cause of death as "morbid obesity"...
"I tried to take care of her the best I could," said 54-year-old Herman Thomas, who lived with Grinds in the duplex apartment ... "I tried to get her to get up, but it wouldn't do no good."
He said the woman that he called his wife hadn't been off the couch for six years. ...
"I wish I could have pulled her off the couch, but she wouldn't let me," he said, covering his face and sobbing.
Inside the home, the floor and walls were matted with feces, and trash was strewn across the floors... Furniture was toppled, and pictures were knocked off walls. ...
Workers wore protective clothing and installed large air handling hoses to ventilate the horrendous odor emitting from the home while trying to figure out how to get the [still living] woman and her [attached] couch to the hospital.
Summary of the final hours for the woman: Recuse workers tried to remove her from her couch, but it was too painful for her, and they gave up. Using hammers and saws, they removed her living body [still attached to the couch] from her apartment but could not fit her into the ambulance. Instead, they used a trailer. She died later, still fused to the couch.
Article source and full credit [link now defuct]:
The Palm Beach Post, http://www.palmbeachpost.com/localnews/content/martin_stlucie/epaper/2004/08/12/m1a_mcbody_0812.html
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