by John Glatt
Louise often took two of her oldest daughters shopping with her at Walmart on North Perris Boulevard before stopping off at Taco Bell across the mall for a Burrito Supreme. On one occasion, she was photographed with Joshua and her new baby, eating doughnuts at Krispy Kreme.
Mother was also a regular at Los Primos Mexican Food in Perris Crossing, where she would buy one or two dishes of take-out food.
“She was pleasant enough,” remembered Primos’ manager, Gabriela Del Toro. “There was absolutely nothing out of the ordinary.”
* * *
That Christmas, Jonathan, Jolinda, Julissa, and Jeanetta were caught stealing food out of the kitchen and were chained up. Part of their punishment was losing Christmas. While their siblings enjoyed “the good treatment” and presents, the four “suspects” could only watch the fun.
* * *
On May 14, 2017, Louise celebrated Mother’s Day by giving her daughters a bath. It was their first in a year. One by one, Mother washed their hair and scrubbed their filthy bodies. But after Jolinda got into the bathtub, she asked to use the bathroom.
“Her mom got extremely upset with her,” investigator Thomas Salisbury later testified, “and pinched her and … picked her up off the ground by the neck.”
After their bath, Mother gave them all clean, matching dresses to wear and took them out to pose for photographs, which she later posted on Facebook.
Immediately after returning to the house, Mother handed the girls their soiled clothing to put back on. That would be their last bath for nine months.
* * *
After her parents died, Louise almost completely severed ties with her family back east. She blocked her sister Elizabeth on Facebook, rarely picking up the phone if any family member called. But she did call Elizabeth to inform her that she had just bought some “aunt shirts” for little Janna, who had red hair like Elizabeth—but Elizabeth would never get to see her niece wearing them.
“She told me that since I upset her,” wrote Elizabeth, “she would never send me those pictures … that Janna would never have a relationship with me.”
Instead, Louise sent the photos of Janna in her “aunt shirts” to Teresa, writing that she was no longer talking to Elizabeth. This time, Louise severed all ties to Elizabeth and would have nothing further to do with her.
Cut off from her family, Louise went into a tailspin, taking her angst out on her younger children, who were petrified of her. She was constantly in a bad mood and liable to lash out with her fists at any time without warning. And she began chaining up her “suspects” for longer and longer periods of time.
18
“WHERE IS THE KEY?”
On Halloween 2017, Louise dressed up baby Janna in a spooky costume and took her out trick-or-treating. A few days earlier, she had told Teresa how much she was looking forward to it.
“I was talking to her about taking the kids trick-or-treating,” recalled Teresa. “I said, ‘Well, you’re going to have to send me pictures.’”
A few weeks later, Louise sent Teresa photographs of herself and the baby, but none of the other kids.
“I asked, ‘Did none of the other kids go trick-or-treating?’ And she was like, ‘Teresa, they are not into that. They don’t want to go anymore. They’re too old for that, and since the baby’s here, I figured we’d have fun.’ I didn’t question her any further.”
Later, it would emerge that Mother had already started punishing her baby, pinching her and hitting her on the head with a pencil.
* * *
In December 2017, Joshua Turpin gave Jordan his old cell phone after getting a new one for Christmas. Although deactivated from making phone calls, it was still able to access the house Wi-Fi and get on the internet. David and Louise were confident that their children were now so well conditioned that they would never use these tools to escape.
* * *
Jordan, who had learned about social media from Jennifer, now started setting up various accounts, using the pseudonym Lacey Swan. Her profile picture was a selfie, in which she wore makeup and lipstick.
On December 19, she opened a Twitter account with the tag: @swan_lacey. Her first action was to retweet a post by self-described motivator, influencer, and musician @smthnglikekites that read: “You can’t let other people tell you who you are. You have to decide that for yourself.” But most of her retweets were about Justin Bieber, whom she still idolized. Jordan followed eighty-eight people on Twitter, more than two-thirds of whom were Bieber fans. She also retweeted posts from animal rights activists, one geared toward protecting elephants.
The pretty teenager also opened an Instagram account and set up her own YouTube channel, where she began posting videos of herself performing songs, secretly recorded in a bedroom, behind closed doors.
“Hello, this is Lacey Swan,” she introduced herself in one video. “This is a song I wrote—‘Where is the Key?’”
She then launched into a poignant song, apparently about finding the strength to escape the horrific captivity she had endured all her life. In the video, Jordan is wearing a black top, her long hair tied to one side with a red scrunchie, as her high voice soars and she gesticulates wildly.
Lord, I can do it
Pray, pray to the Lord, ask for help while I’m still down
So broken down so many times
So scared inside so many times
Where is the key to my heart?
Oh, where do I go from here
Let me through the doors
Where is the key?
Where is the key?
Where is the key?
In another song called “Not Today,” Jordan seems to challenge Mother and Father, saying she has finally had enough of their cruelty.
Look at me
Where I am
Standing here
Welcome back
So far what do I see
I see pain that fills me so
I will not go back alive
I will stay until I die
You can take everything I own
But not from today
No, not from today
In a third video, she wears a Rainbow Dash baseball cap and sweatshirt from My Little Pony and a brightly colored wig. A large pile of dirty clothes is clearly visible in a corner of the room, and the door is covered in dark smudges.
“This is a song I wrote about two years ago.” She sighs. “It’s called ‘So Weak.’”
The song, sung to a simple electronic accompaniment, has the words, “I’m so weak! So weak! So weak!” repeated over and over.
Another video shows her playing fetch with Sandy, one of the children’s two small Maltese dogs. The frisky white dog seems well fed and nourished, unlike its owners.
Jordan also began chatting online with a young man in India named Nilesh Potbhar. They became friends, and she told him all about her miserable life and her parents. Shocked, Nilesh encouraged her to escape and alert authorities to what was going on.
Over the Christmas holiday period, Jordan was busy posting on social media. Whenever Mother and Father were out of the house, she would sneak out of her room and chat with Nilesh, tweet about Justin Bieber, and post videos of her new songs on YouTube.
For the first time in her life, she felt empowered.
In a new song called “You Blame Me for Everything,” she sings about betrayal, apparently about some of her older siblings who spy on her.
You are my best friend
I thought I could tell you everything
I thought you were true
I guess I was wrong
You blame me for everything
You blame me in every, every way
You blame me for what to say, what to say
You blame me for everything
I don’t understand
If only you could explain
* * *
On December 23, Louise left a message on her half brother Billy’s phone, asking about legal problems they were having
with their mother’s estate.
“I just realized how late it was,” she said. “I don’t know what time you go to bed. But anyway, I called the lawyer’s office today. Yeah, I wanted to let you know that [I’m] taking care of that this weekend. So, all right, Billy. Love you. Bye-bye.”
The next day, he called her back to discuss dividing the money from the sale of their mother’s house. At the end of the conversation, Billy asked if he could see his nieces and nephews over the holidays.
“She said she would set up a Facebook webcam soon so I could see the children,” said Billy. “But it was all a lie.”
* * *
On New Year’s Eve, Jordan forwarded a message from Justin Bieber to her friend Nilesh, who was now helping her plan to escape her parents’ prison.
“Happy New Year to all friends & all in the world,” it read. “Everyone lives together in Peace.”
Now everything came together for Jordan’s escape plans when she got on social media. For the first time in her life, she had found friends outside the house, who she could open up to about her and her siblings’ torturous life. They gave her the support and encouragement she needed to summon the strength to finally break out. On January 7, 2018, Jordan posted her final video on YouTube. It was a dramatic song of desperation called “What’s Wrong with Me?” It seemed to foreshadow what lay ahead for the seventeen-year-old.
What now?
What do I do?
Look at me
Here I am
Three days later, Louise told Billy that she and David were planning to have their fourteenth baby. He had called about a visit to California he was planning in June, and Louise invited him to stay at her house.
“She said she was busy with homeschooling,” Billy said, “and she and David were looking into buying a school bus, because their fifteen-seat van wouldn’t fit the fourteenth baby they wanted. I said, ‘Are you serious? Why would you want another kid? Haven’t you got enough?’”
Now approaching fifty, Louise said she had already consulted her doctor, who told her she could have another child. Besides, she added, they needed an even bigger family to sell their reality TV show.
“The very last conversation I had with her,” said Billy, “she did actually say that she [felt] that they would be perfect for TV. She thought the world would be fascinated by their lives. It would make them millions and household names.”
* * *
Just before the holidays, Northrop Grumman had informed David Turpin that his aerospace engineering job was soon being transferred to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. It meant yet another move for the Turpins, who spent the holidays packing up boxes of their things for the thirteen hundred–mile move east.
On Saturday, January 13, David and Louise told neighbors they were soon leaving Perris.
“They were getting ready to move,” said Ricardo Ross, who lived a few doors away. “They had moving boxes [everywhere].”
For the Turpin children, this meant another new house full of unknown horrors. Jordan and her siblings must have been terrified of what might happen in Oklahoma and whether they could even survive the move. Jordan knew it was now or never. Early the next morning, she slipped out of her first-floor window and set her plan in motion.
PART THREE
THE MAGNIFICENT THIRTEEN
19
RESCUE
In the wake of Jordan Turpin’s 911 call, dozens of police officers descended on 160 Muir Woods Road and would remain there for weeks. David and Louise were led out in handcuffs, one behind the other. They were driven to the Perris Police Department to be formally arrested and processed.
When the sheriff’s deputies walked into the house, they were appalled at its filthy state and the overpowering stench of human waste. They found the children scattered in different rooms around the house. Jonathan Turpin was still chained up when they walked into his bedroom and freed him. Julissa and Joanna, chained to their bunk beds since October, had already been freed by Jessica on Mother’s orders; Jessica had hastily thrown the chains and padlocks into a closet.
Within minutes, agents from both Child Protective Services and Adult Protective Services arrived to look after the children. Officers from the Riverside Fire Department came soon afterward.
“There was a very foul smell inside the residence,” said Captain Greg Fellows, the chief of police for the City of Perris, who was one of the first officers to enter. “It was extremely dirty. Many of the children were malnourished.”
About forty-five minutes after the police arrived, the Turpin children were led out of the house one at a time wearing pajamas, one of the older daughters carrying baby Janna. An officer standing in the driveway ushered them into a waiting police van. One of the children who had fallen behind ran to catch up.
They were then driven to Perris Police Department, where officers made them comfortable. A deputy went to get food, as the children said they were starving. Medics treated them with IV drips full of antibiotics, vitamins, and nutrients. Blood samples were taken to confirm they were all David and Louise Turpin’s biological children.
Over the next several hours, members of the Child Protective Services and Adult Protective Services gently talked to the thirteen siblings. Although they never mentioned their parents, some did ask about their two dogs, which had been taken to an animal shelter for safekeeping.
* * *
At 1:40 p.m., Deputy Manuel Campos walked into an interview room at the Perris Police Department’s Detective Bureau, where a nervous Jordan Turpin was waiting. On the other side of the police station, Detective Thomas Salisbury of the Riverside County Sheriff’s Department, who had been appointed the lead investigator in the case, was interviewing David and Louise Turpin separately.
Initially, Deputy Campos thought Jordan was only ten years old due to her emaciated body and childish speech patterns. She was filthy.
“She appeared to have the mental capacity of somebody a lot younger than seventeen years old,” he later noted. “Her hair appeared to be unwashed. She appeared to not bathe regularly. She had a lot of dirt on her skin. It looked like it was caked on.”
During the hour-long interview, Deputy Campos asked if she had any injuries. Jordan tried to show him a scar on her foot, but it was impossible to see through all the dirt caking her skin.
Speaking in simple sentences and struggling to pronounce words, Jordan described her and her siblings’ torturous life. She constantly referred to her parents as “Mother” and “Father,” explaining they insisted on being called that “as it was more like the Bible days.”
Campos asked how she had felt during the escape a few hours earlier.
“She said she was scared to death,” he would later testify. “She said it was one of the scariest things she’s ever done.”
Jordan told Campos she had escaped because she could no longer watch Julissa and Joanna wake up crying in pain from being chained up.
“It was hurting her,” said Detective Campos, “and depressing her.”
She also revealed that Mother had been in a particularly foul mood that morning, “yelling” at thirteen-year-old Jolinda and telling her she was worse than the devil. That had particularly upset Jordan, who said she was a good Christian.
“She boldly spoke about her love for God,” Campos said. “And when she would hear her mother call her or her siblings the devil, it really, really bothered her and hurt her a lot.”
Jordan described her disgusting living conditions and her daily routine of spending twenty hours a day in the bedroom she shared with her three sisters, never seeing daylight. She said she slept for more than fifteen hours a day and could not leave her room without Mother’s permission.
“She told me she lived in filth,” said Campos, “that her room was dirty, and that it smelled really bad. There were often times that she couldn’t breathe [and] would stick her head out of her bedroom window.”
Jordan said that even altering the permanently closed blinds to open the wi
ndow was a serious crime, punishable by being beaten or chained up.
“She would be disciplined,” said the detective, “in the form of knocking on her head and pulling her hair. She said she would get hit and smacked in the face and pushed. She used the word ‘pitching.’ Mother would ‘pitch’ them around the room as she was pulling their hair.”
Jordan recounted how Mother had choked her for watching a Justin Bieber video on Jennifer’s cell phone.
Although Jordan said she had never been chained up, many of her siblings had been for several months at a time. The chains were only removed so they could use the restroom, eat, and brush their teeth. Jordan also spoke of her recent activity on social media, posting YouTube videos of her songs, and making friends on Twitter.
“She gave a lot of credit to Jennifer,” said Campos. “She said that almost everything she knows is because of [her], and she feels like she has nothing in her brain.”
The teenager described her life as “nothing,” saying Mother had given up teaching them and Father’s homeschool was a sham. The detective was shocked by Jordan’s lack of basic knowledge.
“She told me that her parents call it ‘private school,’” said Campos, “and she did part of the first grade [when she was fifteen or sixteen] … She knew we were in the year 2018, and she knew we were in the first month of the year. But she did not know the name of the month … the day or the date.”
Jordan said she had only seen a doctor once in her life and had never gone to a dentist. She had no friends, besides her new online ones, and spent her waking hours playing with her Barbie doll and writing songs and stories in her journal. She described how the siblings were only given one meal a day, as they weren’t awake long enough to eat two. All they ate were peanut butter or baloney sandwiches, or a frozen burrito and chips.
