NY woman dies after spending 21 years in coma

NY woman dies after spending 21 years in coma

NIAGARA FALLS, N.Y. (AP) — The family of a New York woman who spent 21 years in a coma after being beaten by her husband says she would have died years earlier had it not been for the family’s care of her at home.

A funeral was being held today for 51-year-old Bernadette Jones of Niagara Falls. The Buffalo News reports that she died Sunday of pneumonia at her family’s home.

The newspaper reports that her drunken husband beat her into a coma in April 1991. Jones never woke up, though family members say she eventually could open one of her eyes and move her arms.

Jones spent eight months in the hospital after the beating, then was brought to her family’s home, where a special room was set up for her. That’s where her family cared for her for the next two decades.