To the editor:
My 99-year-old mother recently had a diamond ring stolen off her finger – literally – while a patient at MTMC. I suppose I should thank the thief for being kind enough to use lotion or something to help slide the ring off and not just ripping it off, though perhaps I can be excused for not being in too thankful a mood. Fortunately, she was unconscious at the time it happened.
This was not showy, flashy jewelry left on ill-advisedly. She doesn't even own any of that. This was a subdued, simple engagement ring mounted on a gold band (at least it was at the time of the theft) which my late father gave her in the 1940s and which she had worn every day of her life since. And I suppose I also should thank the thief for leaving her gold wedding band. It probably just wasn't worth as much as the relatively small diamond.
It's very unlikely whoever did this reads newspapers. But, whoever you are, it'd be hard to find anyone low enough to steal a ring off the finger of a 99-year-old woman trying to recover in a hospital. Yet you answered that bell. One day, another kind of bell will ring for you.
I don't write this to come down on anyone (except the thief or thieves). The hospital is in the health care business, not security. And law enforcement is limited in situations like this, unfortunately.
My mother had been in MTMC three other times over the past couple years without incident. But, hard as it may be to accept or even believe, loved ones of hospital patients at MTMC – or elsewhere – need to be sure to remove any valuable rings or other jewelry. These days, sadly, you just never know. In my mother's case, the fourth time was the charm.
Steve Butler
Rutherford Blvd, 37130
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