Canadian great-grandmother, 80, suffering from Alzheimer's reportedly raped at Bahamas resort: 'Unimaginable nightmare'



An 80-year-old Canadian woman suffering from Alzheimer's disease was raped at a resort in the Bahamas last month by a fellow tourist from Canada, according to her family.

The woman – who was not named – was on a vacation with her daughter at the Warwick Hotel Paradise Island resort in the Bahamas.

The woman's son, David Ahrens, wrote in a LinkedIn post: "Rape is never ok. I'm going to share some very difficult news with you. On January 28th, at the Warwick Hotel in Nassau, Bahamas, my 80-year-old mother, who is a grandmother and great-grandmother, and who has Alzheimer's, was sexually assaulted and raped by a guest at the hotel."

While at the resort, a man allegedly invited himself to dinner with the vacationing family and their friends. Ahrens said his sister got separated from her mother while taking an elevator – leaving the elderly woman alone with the dinner guest.

Aherns said his sister and others searched floor by floor for the mother for about 45 minutes.

Joining the search for the 80-year-old woman was Homeland Security Investigations Special Agent Tom Justice, who was in the Bahamas on an assignment.

Ahrens told WSOC-TV, "The doors open up and there is my mother with this assailant," adding that Justice "pinned the guy in the elevator."

"Down the elevator they went to the lobby," Ahrens continued. "He pulled him out, the police took over."

Ahrens told CTV News, "Of course my mother was frightened, and while we don't need to go into a ton of detail, but what I will say, and it is horrendous, that she was holding her own underwear in her hand at that point in the elevator."

The son wrote, "He assaulted her in his room. This is a vile, unthinkable, and an unimaginable nightmare."

Ahrens said security video shows his mother resisting the man as he forced her into a hotel room.

Ahrens' mother was reportedly taken to a local hospital, where she tested positive after a rape kit was administered.

The son claimed that a 61-year-old Canadian man from Nova Scotia was arrested.

"He was denied bail and could face life in prison if convicted," according to the New York Post.

Ahrens said he flew down to the tropical island immediately after finding out about the rape allegations and noted that the police in the Bahamas have assisted the family greatly during the investigation.

Global Affairs Canada – Canada's diplomatic and consular relations agency – confirmed to CTV News that a Canadian was arrested in the Bahamas.

"Our concern is the combination of Alzheimer's plus this incident of being sexually assaulted and rape, you know, that's playing with her mind. So we're just worried it's playing in her subconscious and it's just making things worse at the moment," Ahrens said.

The rape accusations arrive at nearly the same time that two American mothers claimed they were drugged and raped at a resort in the Bahamas.

As Blaze News previously reported, two women from Kentucky say their tropical cocktails were spiked with drugs and then they were raped by staff members at a Bahamas resort.

An American nurse who treated the two women said, "Out of my 20-odd years of practicing, it was the worst scene that I had ever had to work. It was a horrible situation for both girls."

Two men were arrested in connection with the alleged sexual assault.

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Kentucky moms demand justice after they were allegedly drugged, raped by staff at Bahamas resort during cruise



Two moms from Kentucky are warning others about their harrowing experience at a resort in the Bahamas during a Carnival cruise.

Longtime friends Amber Shearer and Dongayla Dobson went on a kid-free vacation earlier this month. During their Carnival cruise, the duo went to a beach in the Grand Bahamas on Sunday.

The Kentucky moms said they were relaxing on a beach in Freeport when a resort staffer offered them a two-for-one drink deal. Around noon, the pair ordered one pineapple and one coconut drink and took a photo with the tropical libations.

However, the women said that the drinks were far stronger than they expected.

"Less than a few [sips] into the second drink, we knew something was wrong. Something was terribly wrong," Shearer told NewsNation.

The women said that they had only had one drink at the resort that day.

Dobson said loved ones back home noticed that they appeared to be highly intoxicated just 15 minutes after their first sips and questioned whether they had only one alcoholic beverage.

The women said they were looking for shells on the beach when a male resort staffer pointed them to an area with plenty of shells.

But the next thing Shearer could recall was waking up while she was being assaulted by a uniformed male resort worker.

"I came to in the process of my rape," a teary-eyed Shearer said.

The women claimed that the local authorities didn't administer proper sexual assault test kits

Once back on the Carnival cruise ship, the women had rape tests administered. They also had a breathalyzer test, which showed them to have little or no alcohol in their systems. However, toxicology tests showed that they had benzodiazepines, among other drugs, in their bodies.

Police identified two male suspects in the alleged sexual attack through surveillance footage. Both were employees at the resort, and one of the men reportedly had only worked there for about a week.

On Sunday night, Royal Bahamas Police arrested two men – a 40-year-old of South Bahamia and a 54-year-old of Eight Mile Rock – in connection to the alleged sex crimes, the department said in a press release.

Police said the investigation is ongoing.

WLEX-TV reported, "The pair is now receiving medical care at home, which includes thousands of dollars of preventative care, including HIV prevention medication which costs nearly $4,000."

The women are demanding justice for the alleged sexual assault.

"We want justice for what happened to us. We want to raise awareness for others," Shearer wrote in a Facebook post.

The women are upset with Carnival Cruise Line for not making them aware that the U.S. State Department had recently increased its travel advisory level for the Bahamas and advised travelers to "exercise increased caution in The Bahamas due to crime."

“The majority of crime occurs on New Providence (Nassau) and Grand Bahama (Freeport) islands,” the State Department’s Bureau of Consular Affairs stated in the "level 2" travel advisory posted on Jan. 26. “In Nassau, practice increased vigilance in the ‘Over the Hill’ area (south of Shirley Street) where gang-on-gang violence has resulted in a high homicide rate primarily affecting the local population.”

"Violent crime such as burglaries, armed robberies, and sexual assaults occur, but generally not in tourist areas," the advisory noted.

Shearer said, "You need to be aware because our cruise line did not make us aware of a travel advisory. We had no idea what was going on in the Bahamas."

The women said they didn't know about the travel advisory until "four hours after we were raped."

The mothers are warning other women of the potential dangers of traveling.

"Be safe. Two is not a group. Do not buy any drinks that come unless they come in a sealed container, in a bottle," Dobson said.

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