Marcela Coronel is enduring days of deep distress after reporting her mother Berta, who is 100 years old for physical and verbal abuse. The journalist and her family discovered what was happening through security cameras installed in the woman’s apartment, a situation that led to a police report and the detention of the caregiver.
In an interview with Teleshow, Marcela explained how they learned of what was happening, what they did to protect her mother, and how she feels facing a situation that left her shaken. She also provided an important detail about Berta’s condition: due to her age, disability, and worsened dementia, she requires permanent assistance and has no means to defend herself on her own.
“My sense is one of helplessness, and not mine, but my mother’s, because she is a hundred-year-old person, disabled, with dementia aggravated by age, and she has no way to defend herself against something like this,” she said, moved.
How they uncovered the assaults on Marcela Coronel’s mother
According to the journalist, it was her sister who began to thoroughly review the security camera footage installed in various rooms of Berta’s apartment. Upon watching them, she found records of shouting, insults, threats, and blows.
“My sister yesterday started looking at the cameras carefully to see what was happening at the time, and began sending to the family chat a bunch of videos where you could hear the screams, threats, insults, and where the blows could be seen,” Marcela told Teleshow.
Given the gravity of the footage, the family decided to act quickly, but not out of desperation. “We started thinking about how we could address this issue, not in the heat of the moment, because otherwise we would do anything, but rather preserving my mother and acting sensibly,” she explained.
The following morning, a nephew of the journalist appeared before the authorities to file the report and provided the videos as evidence. According to Marcela’s account, the response was swift: the officers went to Berta’s home and, after judicial intervention, ordered the detention of the caregiver.
The woman was identified as Norma Noemí Sandín, 58, and was charged with bodily harm and threats, according to the journalist.
How is Berta, Marcela Coronel’s mother
One of the aspects that angers Marcela the most is the situation of vulnerability of her mother. Berta turned 100 this week and, as her daughter explained, has dementia worsened by age and a disability that prevent her from fully understanding what is happening and from easily communicating what is happening to her.
After the alleged aggressions came to light, Berta was moved to the Hospital Italiano, where tests were conducted to assess her health. At the time of the Teleshow interview, she remained hospitalized.
“It is a terrible pain. Honestly, a very strong pain, especially for what my mother endured,” the journalist said when speaking about what happened.
The situation highlighted a concern shared by many families: how to guarantee the care of an elderly person who requires permanent assistance and cannot notice or report possible abuse on their own.
“What do you do when your parents are old and you hire people to care for them?”
Marcela also spoke publicly about the case on Primicias Ya, the América TV program where she works as a panelist. There she explained why she decided to share what had happened and to use her position in the media to raise visibility about a situation that, in her view, may affect many other families.
“I, who have a voice, choose to use it for good, because if there is someone who has a voice, it is us, who are in the media,” she said.
In that intervention, she posed a question that sums up one of the concerns the case exposed: “What do you do when your parents are old and you hire people to care for them?”
In one of the records that publicly emerged, the caregiver is heard shouting at Berta: “Always screwing things up, nothing else. Don’t make me go crazy. It’s the same thing with you all morning.”
Referring to those images, host Marina Calabró noted that in the audio the centenarian seemed to be blamed for what happened. Marcela, for her part, again stressed her mother’s inability to defend herself in such a situation.
The case left the family facing a painful reality: people who require permanent assistance can be exposed to abuse within their own homes. For Marcela, discovering what was happening through the cameras was devastating, but it also allowed her to take action to protect her mother and file the complaint with the authorities.
