Officers Drive 88-year-old Woman Home, More Than 100 Miles
— -- Two Georgia police officers are being hailed as heroes after driving a lost elderly woman from Georgia to her destination in North Carolina.
Officer Bill Lowe was dispatched to a Roswell, Georgia gas station last Tuesday where 88-year-old Betty Hill Morris had pulled over to ask for directions. Morris, who had already driven about seven hours from Tampa, Florida, was trying to get to her brother's house in in the small, Smoky Mountain town of Sylva, North Carolina.
A man whom Morris asked for directions had called police because, "His assessment was she needed more help than directions,” said Lowe.
When they arrived on the scene, Roswell Police found Morris seemed to be disoriented. Paramedics assessed her and found that she was alert, but, “probably not in a position to drive much further." Morris was taken to the nearby North Fulton hospital and later released.
Lowe and a 911 dispatcher, Cristy Way, spoke to Betty and her 90-year-old brother, Don Hill, who didn't seem capable of making what would be a more than 300-mile round trip to pick up his sister.
That's when they teamed up and decided to lead the way. Lowe led in his own truck, while Morris rested in her 2000 Chrysler, driven by Way.
“Cristy and I both felt like we were doing our jobs," Lowe said. “She was well outside the scope of her job description.”
She arrived at her brother’s home safely, where she is still visiting.
"She's doing fine,” Hill told ABC News. He said the trip wasn’t anything unusual for Morris, but she got lost and the timing may have been off. "She's made that trip a lot, but she usually stops and hits a motel overnight."
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