2 Suspects Held in Assault on Elderly Woman

Arizona authorities arrested two men believed responsible for kidnaping, beating and stabbing an elderly La Canada Flintridge woman July 8, Glendale police said.

Arizona Highway Patrol officers seized Paul E. Terry, 19, and Randall J. Countryman, 18, both of Arizona, on suspicion of possessing a stolen vehicle July 14. The men were seen driving the 1988 Cadillac Seville taken from Eloise Purdy, 77, who survived the attack, said Sgt. Dean Durand, spokesman for the Glendale Police Department.

Apprehended on Highway

Officers arrested the two men along Interstate 10, 100 miles west of Phoenix, Durand said. They are being held in a Phoenix jail on $3,425 bail each, Durand said.

Glendale authorities will seek to extradite the suspects, Durand said.

The men fit the descriptions of Purdy’s assailants, who introduced themselves to her as brothers Paul and Randy Robertson, Durand said.

Purdy told police the men approached her in the Glendale Federal parking lot in Montrose on July 8 and asked for help. They told her they had just arrived from Iowa and needed a ride to Verdugo Hills Hospital to visit a sick cousin.

Purdy consented to drive them, but moments after they got into the car, one of the men ordered her to pull to the side of the road so that he could drive. The men then drove her to an Indio palm grove, where they stabbed her twice in the chest, beat her until she lost consciousness, then left in her car, police said.

Purdy was able to walk to a nearby road and summon help from a passing motorist, she told police.

Durand said police know of no motive for the attack.

Purdy, who was recently transferred from John F. Kennedy Hospital in Indio to Verdugo Hills Hospital in Glendale, was in stable condition Wednesday morning, a hospital spokeswoman said.