The woman charged with kidnapping a 97-year-old resident from a Melbourne nursing home in the belief the elderly woman was her mother will undergo psychiatric treatment in prison, a court has heard.
Irene Moschones, 51, is accused of pushing Dimitra Pavlopoulou in her wheelchair out of her Clarinda nursing home in Melbourne's south-east around midday last Saturday and taking her to a home in Cheltenham.
Ms Pavlopoulou was returned to her nursing home on Saturday night when an associate of Ms Moschones saw the elderly woman on a mattress at the property and contacted police.
The 97-year-old was reunited with her relieved family on Sunday.
Ms Moschones appeared via video link before Melbourne Magistrates Court on Wednesday, charged with kidnapping and unlawful imprisonment. Defence counsel Nick Tehan said his client had undergone a psychiatric assessment and would receive mental health treatment while she was in custody.
Police told the court on Sunday that Ms Moschones believed Ms Pavlopoulou was her mother, even though investigators had established her own mother died in 2013. The two women are not related and had never met, the court was told.
Ms Moschones had also gone to other nursing homes searching for her mother, the court heard.
The AGE
