Burglars turned off 90-year-old woman's oxygen supply

Police are hunting burglars who broke into a 90-year-old woman's home and turned off the oxygen supply she needed to help her breathe at night. Eva Parsons, who has hearing difficulties, woke up gasping for breath and managed to wake her neighbours by banging on the wall with her walking stick. They dashed in and turned her supply back on. Parsons sobbed as she said: "It was a horrible, horrible thing for someone to do. I just don't know why anyone would want to do that. It doesn't make any sense.

"I am quite deaf and I was in bed when they broke in but I didn't wake up until they'd gone. I remember struggling to breathe and wheezing. I didn't know what was happening but knew my oxygen wasn't working. I could have died. Lucky for me my neighbours were in and helped me. The police were wonderful as well, they promised to do their best to find the people who did this to me."


Photo from SWNS.

The burglars rummaged through her purse, stole £50 in cash and ate sweets and chocolates she had been given for Christmas. A family friend, Ken Whitehead, 61, said: "Eva relies on the oxygen to keep her going and I am still fuming to think people could do such a thing. I'd love to get my hands on them. I was seething when I heard about it and I still am. We would be dealing with a tragedy as well as a burglary. There was no reason for them to switch off Eva's oxygen supply.

"That was just callous. Eva is deaf and turns off her hearing aid, so she wouldn't have heard anything. Eva has chest and breathing problems and needs the oxygen to enrich her blood so she has it switched on at night. She really needs it to stay alive. The police have told me that it was teenagers who burgled the house. Why they turned off the oxygen supply nobody knows," he said. The thieves struck at the ground floor flat in Bedworth, Warwickshire, in the early hours of Sunday morning.