Relatives scour woods for missing woman, 57

By James Drew | Sun reporter

July 20, 2008

Relatives of a 57-year-old Pasadena woman missing for four days continued to search for her yesterday in a wooded area near her home.

Kathy Kovacsi, who was diagnosed about two years ago with Alzheimer's Disease, was last seen at about 1 a.m. Wednesday as she slept in her home in the 7600 block of Solley Road, where she lives with her husband and two adult children, relatives said.

After being notified, Anne Arundel County police used dogs to track her to a park at Solley Road and Fort Smallwood Road, but the dogs lost the trail there, said Kovacsi's brother-in-law, Earl Leach.

"If she did get in a car, it's hard telling where she could be," Leach said.

Police said Kovacsi might be wearing a long-sleeve red paisley shirt with a white tank top underneath, pants, white ankle socks, and white canvas shoes with polka dots. She may be wearing glasses. Kovacsi is 5-foot-3 and weighs about 140 pounds. She usually wears her shoulder-length brown hair in a ponytail and she is missing two upper teeth, police said.

Mary Kate Kovacsi said her father, Imre, got up to go to the bathroom and poked his head into the room where his wife was sleeping about 1 a.m.

When he got up about 6 a.m., his wife was gone. Kovacsi's son, Thomas, said the family found a side door open.

Mary Kate Kovacsi, 28, said her mother had wandered away from the house four or five times before.

"This is the longest she has been gone," Mary Kate Kovacsi said. "She's usually not gone more than an hour or two."

She said relatives and neighbors have distributed fliers in the area and also near Kovacsi's former home in Takoma Park.

Imre Kovacsi said research shows some people with Alzheimer's disease wander no farther than a mile and a half from home.

"They walk to where they cannot walk, and stop and hide," he said.

Imre Kovacsi said he believes his wife was carrying a blue blanket and had several fast-food meal toys with her, possibly little cars and a dinosaur.

"She may have dropped those by the side of the road," said Imre Kovacsi, who is the night shift foreman in a lab.

He said he has been able to care for his wife at home because his children also live there. But it has been a challenge.

" I go home. I feed Kathy. I go to sleep. I get up. I feed Kathy and clean her up. I go to work," he said.

james.drew@baltsun.com

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Relatives scour woods for missing woman, 57

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