Montreal family wants answers after 93-year-old woman pinned inside motorized Murphy bed
CBC
Carol Smith can still hear the sound of the Murphy bed's electronic motor ringing in her head.
Smith says she keeps reliving the incident that put her in the hospital just days after her 93rd birthday in late December. She'd been staying with her daughter and son-in-law in Montreal for the holidays and went to sleep in a wall bed, also known as a Murphy bed, they'd bought for guests from Lit Mural in 2020.
Smith says she awoke to the sound of a motor and the sensation of the bed closing up into the wall.
"At first, it didn't register and then suddenly it registered with me, 'I've got to get out of this thing,'" said Smith.
John Hanrahan, Smith's son-in-law, says the bed's remote control was on a dresser across the room. Smith said she tried to get out of bed to get it, calling for her daughter.
"Suddenly, I couldn't move at all. And then I must have passed out because I could feel the bed starting to crunch me," said Smith.
Luckily, Hanrahan was working on the first floor and heard a faint cry.
"This was very early in the morning," recalls Hanrahan. "My wife, Caroline, thought maybe it was just nightmares."
Caroline rushed to the guest room to check on her mother. She found the bed open just a crack — as if something was preventing it from closing. Something — or someone.
"I thought, 'Oh my God, she must be in there.' And I'm calling and there's nothing," said Smith's daughter. Grabbing the remote, she pressed it, but the bed didn't open.
"I just started pushing all the buttons and nothing happened. So I ran round to the side of the bed, and I just threw the remote down on the floor and grabbed the end of the bed to try and pull it down. I couldn't budge it."
She yelled for her husband to come help.
John says he grabbed the black metal bar at the top of the bed and pulled down on the frame with all his might, breaking the bed's pistons. It came crashing down on top of him and onto the floor.
Caroline says they found her mother at the head of the bed, curled up in a fetal position, unresponsive.
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