Foreclosures get serious as desperate homeowners attempt suicide
As the vice-presidential candidates talked about the financial crisis gripping this country and the House and Senate sparred over the $700 rescue bill, the crisis got a little darker for at least one family as CNN reported that a 90-year-old woman shot herself in the wake of an eviction attempt. The woman, from Akron, OH, survived, and has become a flash point for the debate -- she was mentioned on the floor of the House on Friday.
Foreclosures have all sorts of victims and we've been reporting on them since the beginning of the crisis, but the stories of real people may have gotten a little lost over the past few weeks as the banking crisis has spiraled out of control. How do you process the plight of one woman losing her home against the backdrop of a $700 billion rescue plan? Both are impossible to fathom. And this woman has not been the only one to come to national attention for attempting suicide -- there was a case back in July of a Massachusetts woman who committed suicide as she faced eviction.
Perhaps as Congress considers the big picture of the financial crisis, it's important that they are reminded of the very real human costs of our economic condition.
