Jan 7, 2009 11:13 pm US/Eastern
Missing Sunrise Woman Is Found Dead Inside Her Car
SUNRISE (CBS4) ―
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Dorothea Langholtz was last seen the night of Tuesday Jan. 6, 2009 leaving the Sunrise Lakes Club House.
CBS
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A Sunrise police diver searches a canal near the area where 91-year old Dorothea Langholtz was last seen.
CBS
Wednesday night Sunrise Police confirmed they found the car and body of a Sunrise woman who was reported missing after leaving a card game with friends the night before.
Tire tracks mark the spot where 91-year-old Dorothea Langholtz drove her Dodge Stratus into the canal behind the Sunrise Lakes clubhouse.
Sunrise Police told
CBS4's Carey Codd detectives positively identified Langholtz late Wednesday evening. Her family is expected to arrive from Pennsylvania Wednesday night.
Langholtz's friends said they saw her play cards Tuesday night at the clubhouse, then leave to drive home. Dorothea never made it. Instead she drove over part of the Sunrise Lakes Golf Course and into a canal behind the clubhouse at the development.
"She's 91-years-old and I think she got disoriented and maybe she thought she was making the turn to go to phase 1," said friend Patricia Siegel.
Phase I is where Langholtz lived in Sunrise Lakes.
She was discovered in a canal near the club house of the Sunrise Lakes Phase III development at 93rd Street and Sunrise Lakes Boulevard. Later in the evening they identified the body inside.
The Florida Department of Law Enforcement had issued a Silver Alert for Langholtz after she was last seen walking to her car in the parking lot of the club house Tuesday night.
Sunrise Police Sergeant Rodney Hailey said officers combed nearby neighborhoods and canals all day Wednesday searching for Langholtz and her car. They passed out flyers and drove through marshlands on airboats, while divers searched canals.
Wednesday afternoon police caught a break when a resident spotted a car submerged in the canal behind the Sunrise Lakes clubhouse.
"You want it to come to a successful conclusion and we didn't want her to be in the water," said Sgt. Rodney Hailey of the Sunrise Police Dept. "We were hoping we'd be able to find her in her car or somewhere where she'd be fine but unfortunately that wasn't the case."
Langholtz's friends said the 91-year-old lived life to the fullest. She loved to play poker and other card games, lived alone and enjoyed a close relationship with her daughter, who lives in Pennsylvania.
Police say they will await autopsy results to determine how Dorothea Langholtz died.
Concerned friends who played cards with her Tuesday night said she was a bit disoriented and not feeling well.
"The ladies that play cards with her said her bronchitis was acting up and wanted to go home," neighbor Sally Romano told
CBS4 News.
Friends say Langholtz played cards every day and when she got home, she would call her out-of-town daughter. When the daughter did not receive a phone call Tuesday night, she called a neighbor for help.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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