RIPlEY, W. Va. — A West Virginia woman brutally attacked in her home and left for dead more than two years ago awoke last week from a two-year coma ready to name names.
Wanda Palmer had been in a long-term care facility in New Martinsville, West Virginia, since authorities discovered her savagely beaten in June 2020, according to the West Virginia Metro News.
“When we got there, to be honest we thought she was dead,” Jackson County Sherriff Ross Mellenger told the newspaper.
The victim’s brother, 55-year-old Daniel Palmer III of Cottageville, was arrested Friday and charged with attempted murder and malicious wounding after his sister identified him to police as her attacker, WCHS-TV reported.
“From an investigator’s standpoint, this is about as rare as it gets. I think it’s a true testament to the perseverance and the strength of the victim herself,” Mellinger told the TV station shortly after Daniel Palmer’s arrest.
According to NBC News, officials said they believed that Daniel Palmer attacked his sister with a machete or hatchet. A weapon has never been recovered, WCHS reported.
“The keys to the whole thing lay with the victim herself, and with her unable to communicate, we were left with nothing. Now, lo and behold two years later and boom, she’s awake and able to tell us exactly what happened,” Mellenger told Metro News.
Court documents following Wanda Palmer’s assault cited a “violent history” between the siblings, but Daniel Palmer denied any involvement in his sister’s beating, stating he had not been to her home in days leading up to the June 10 attack. A witness, however, told investigators that they saw Daniel Palmer in the front doorway of Wanda Palmer’s home at midnight on the night she was assaulted, WCHS reported.
Daniel Palmer’s bond was set at $500,000, Metro News reported.