A 70-year-old woman is fighting for her life in an intensive care unit after being brutally attacked with a stone by a homeless man in the coastal suburb of Glyfada, south of Athens. The woman has been in extremely critical condition for six days following the assault.

According to reports, the 38-year-old suspect had a long history of psychiatric hospitalizations and minor criminal offenses. Authorities had issued a court order for his institutionalization in 2024, but it was not implemented until six months later. Despite that, the man managed to repeatedly escape from care.

In May and July 2025 alone, he fled twice from the Aiginiteio Psychiatric Hospital and once from the Nikaia Psychiatric Clinic. Records show that since 2016, he had been in and out of several psychiatric institutions.

Investigators revealed that just three or four days before the attack, the man had argued with the victim. Police had responded to the earlier dispute, but the man continued living in a makeshift shelter near the Glyfada Marina, where he reportedly frightened residents and passers-by.

Witnesses say the victim, who regularly fed stray cats in the area, was attacked without provocation. “She came every morning to feed the kittens,” a friend of the woman told local media. “He came out from where he was staying and told her to leave. As she turned to go, he picked up a stone and struck her on the head. We were swimming nearby and didn’t see it happen — when we realized she was late, someone found her lying there, bleeding and unable to speak.”

The same witness added that the man had threatened the woman days earlier. “We had told her not to go there again. He wouldn’t come close to us when we were swimming, but we all knew he could be dangerous,” she said. Local residents are now questioning how a man with a well-documented psychiatric history and multiple escapes from hospitals was still living unsupervised in a public area.