News February 11, 2022
Daughter Saves Mother from Naked Intruder After Noticing Missing Daily Wordle Score
CBS Chicago
A daughter saved her mother from an intruder after she became suspicious when she didn’t receive the 80-year-old’s daily Wordle score.
As reported by CBS Chicago, Denyse Holt, 80, was asleep Sunday at her Lincolnwood, Illinois, home when she woke up and saw a bleeding, naked man standing by her bed, holding a pair of scissors.
As she told police, the man — later identified as 32-year-old James H. Davis III — allegedly slid into bed next to her, saying that he would not harm or molest her.
Holt said Davis allegedly dragged her around the house disconnecting the phones and forcing her to take a bath with him — although she was fully clothed in her nightgown.
Then, she alleges Davis barricaded her in an unheated bathroom in her basement.
“I didn’t think I was going to live,” Holt told the outlet, noting she was without medications, food, and heat.
For the next 17 hours, Holt did marching exercises and stretches in the dark room to stay active and warm.
“I don’t want to die like this, and I don’t want my kids to hear that their mother was murdered,” she added to the Washington Post.
However, Holt’s daughter Meredith Holt-Caldwell, who lives 2,100 miles away in Seattle, noticed that her mother had not read her texts from the previous night and had not sent her daily score from Wordle, a popular word game where players have six attempts to guess a five-letter word.
“I didn’t send my older daughter a Wordle in the morning,” Holt told CBS Chicago. “And that was disconcerting to her.”
Holt-Caldwell then called Lincolnwood Police, who rushed to the scene to perform a wellness check. Following an hours-long standoff, Davis was arrested and charged with home invasion with a dangerous weapon, aggravated kidnapping while armed with a dangerous weapon, and aggravated assault against a police officer.
He has yet to enter a plea, and it is unclear if he has retained an attorney.
Per CBS Chicago, police believe Davis suffers from mental health issues.
“I still feel lucky to be alive,” she told the Washington Post. “I never thought I would come out of that alive.”
