The Independent Uganda: You get the Truth we Pay the Price
An April 2016 photograph shows the same smiling children and the couple wearing jeans and red t-shirts that read “Thing 1,” “Thing 2,” “Thing 3” and so on — a reference to the mischievous twins in the popular Dr Seuss book “The Cat in the Hat.”
In another September 2015 photograph, Louise Turpin holds a baby wearing a t-shirt reading “Mommy loves me.”
Neighbor Jamelia Adams, 39, expressed shock.
“It’s just really, really sad,” Adams told AFP.
“Here’s a beautiful neighborhood, brand-new housing tract, newer cars in the yard, and here’s some kids from 29 to two that was just held captive and malnourished and filthy. It’s just heartbreaking.”
– Bankruptcy –
David Turpin is registered in state records as head of a private school. The address matches that of the Turpins’ home, and the children were apparently home-schooled.
The Los Angeles Times said the couple had lived at the Perris house since 2010, after a move from Texas, adding they went bankrupt twice.
According to court papers, the couple filed for bankruptcy in 2011, at a time when David Turpin was working as an engineer for defense contractor Northrop Grumman, earning $140,000 a year.
“They seemed like very normal people who fell into financial problems,” Ivan Trahan, the lawyer who represented them in that case, told The Los Angeles Times.
The case recalls previous kidnapping horrors in the United States that have made global headlines in recent years.
Ariel Castro abducted three young women and held them captive at his Cleveland home for a decade. He was arrested in May 2013 after one of his victims escaped, and later hung himself in his prison cell.
Jaycee Dugard was kidnapped as an 11-year-old and repeatedly raped over 18 years by convicted sex offender Phillip Garrido in California. She was rescued in August 2009.
