by John Glatt
“The morbid curiosity,” she said. “That’s what’s most disheartening. It’s tunnel vision to that house and not respecting everyone else.”
Wendy Martinez told The Press-Enterprise that this “will be a scar on our neighborhood forever. Every car that passes is a stare-down.”
Outside 160 Muir Woods Road, the motley collection of balloons, candles, and flowers was still growing. Among the dozens of moving messages left on the porch, one from another abuse victim stood out.
“Sweet children,” it read, “I come from an abusive childhood as well. I learned to trust God and truly rise above it. This is now your story to help other kids recover from something similar too. The road is long and painful, but you will rise and be strong from it. Trust the Lord and keep your faith in him.”
* * *
On Friday, February 16, DA Hestrin announced his intention to put some of the Turpin siblings on the stand to testify against their parents if the case went to trial.
Speaking at the Corona Chamber of Commerce’s monthly meeting, he said that over the next few months, his highly trained victim advocates would be helping the Turpin children become acquainted with the court process.
“When you have a child victim,” he explained, “you just can’t put that child on the witness stand like you would an adult. They’ve got to understand and feel comfortable with the process.”
Hestrin said that the Turpin siblings would likely go to court several times before they testified, to meet the judge and familiarize themselves with the courtroom and experience sitting on the witness stand.
“It’s traumatizing,” explained Hestrin. “Imagine a child who’s been abused by a parent, victimized by a caregiver, and now we’re going to ask [them] to come into court and relive that crime in front of a jury. In front of strangers. Imagine having to recount the most painful moment of your lives, when you were the most vulnerable, having to talk about it in public, and be questioned about it and have your credibility questioned.”
The DA said he had personally prepared child victims for court before and would always tell them never to look at their abusers as they testify.
“[I told them] ‘You can look at me, and we’re going to talk,’” said Hestrin. “‘Look me right in the eye, and we’re going to have a conversation, just like we’re doing right now.’ And it would start to get these kids to feel comfortable. Get them to be able to talk and to testify in what would otherwise be an impossible situation.”
* * *
Meanwhile, a Riverside County probate judge had appointed attorneys Jack Osborn and Caleb Mason, of the Los Angeles–based law firm of Brown, White & Osborn, to represent the seven adult siblings. “[This] is a new experience for them,” said Osborn, “understanding that they do have rights and they do have a voice.”
The attorneys told CBS News that their new clients were all progressing well at the Corona Medical Center, although their discharge had been put on hold after a flu outbreak.
The siblings were using their new iPads and catching up on Harry Potter and Star Trek movies. For the first time in their lives, they had the freedom to spend their time however they wanted. “That’s a big deal,” said Osborn, “deciding what they’re going to read, deciding what they’re going to wear. These are all decisions they make every day that are new and empowering. It’s been more like being on a cruise ship than at this hospital.”
Although the six younger and seven older siblings had not seen one another since their escape, they communicated daily on Skype. The older ones wanted to go to the beach or to the mountains or watch movies, said Osborn, and would like to eventually attend college and have careers.
“They all have their own aspirations and their own interests,” he explained, “and now they may have an opportunity to address those, which is really exciting.”
Corona mayor Karen Spiegel, married to Chamber of Commerce president Bobby Spiegel, told People magazine that she received daily progress reports on the older siblings from their nurses.
“They are warm and loving kids,” she said. “Even though they’re adults, we keep calling them kids; they just have some growing up to do.”
* * *
On Friday, February 23, David and Louise Turpin were back in court, where they were each charged with three additional counts of child abuse. Louise was also hit with another felony assault charge.
“Further investigation has led us to amend the complaint,” explained Riverside County DA spokesman John Hall. “It could add more time to the exposure they are facing.”
David, who was in shackles and wearing a black suit with a blue shirt, had had his hair trimmed since the last hearing. Louise, in a navy blue suit, seemed unusually animated, swiveling and rocking in her chair as she glared at reporters.
Both sets of lawyers told Judge Emma Smith that their clients pleaded not guilty to all the new charges. Prosecutor Kevin Beecham told the judge that he would only call police officers to the stand if the case went to trial to avoid the children having to testify.
With the preliminary hearing—where it would be determined if there was sufficient evidence to proceed to trial—scheduled for May 14, defense attorney David Macher argued that he may need more time to prepare.
“Given the voluminous discovery in this case,” he said, “including audio and video statements, significant physical evidence, I am skeptical of being ready on May 14. I’m willing to set that date as a good faith date and will make the effort to be ready, but I don’t know that we can.”
“Your skepticism is noted,” said the judge, setting another status hearing for March 23.
26
“SHE’S LIVING IN A FANTASY WORLD”
Three days later, The Dr. Oz Show flew Elizabeth Flores and Tricia Andreassen to California to visit Louise and David Turpin behind bars. They were picked up at their hotel by the show’s crime correspondent, Melissa Moore, the daughter of Keith Jesperson, the notorious “Happy Face Killer.” After surviving the trauma of growing up with her father, who was convicted of killing eight women and is now serving three life sentences in Oregon’s state penitentiary, Moore wrote a book and became an advocate for the relatives of other serial killers.
As the cameras rolled, she assured the women that she understood what they were going through. “When I was about fifteen years old,” she told them, “I had to go see my dad in jail, and I remember I didn’t sleep all the night before.”
On the drive to the Robert Presley Detention Center, Moore asked Elizabeth why she wanted to visit her sister in jail.
“Nothing changes the fact that she’s my sister,” replied Elizabeth, “and nobody in the world is supporting her. And I don’t support what she did, but I do support the fact that she’s still a human being.”
Still, she was very nervous about seeing Louise, afraid to look her in the eye and see “pure evil,” or that she had been brainwashed by David.
“I really believe he’s almost like a puppeteer,” said Tricia. “Like, ‘If I do these things, I will get more of what I want and he won’t bring his wrath onto me, because we’ll be partnered up as a team.’”
As they arrived at the jail, Moore asked Elizabeth what she most wanted to ask Louise.
“Could she tell me why,” said Elizabeth. “What was she thinking? What led to this?”
More than two hours later, Elizabeth and Tricia emerged from the jail, looking stunned. They said Louise was in complete denial.
“She’s living in a fantasy world,” said Elizabeth. “I kept thinking, Am I going to see evil in her eyes?”
Louise had cried at first but was happy to see them. She never once asked about her children and appeared to think she had done nothing wrong.
“As I was talking to her,” said Elizabeth, “I realized that it’s all fantasy. She’s living in a movie. She’s rewriting her own story.”
The next day, Melissa Moore drove them back to the jail, this time to visit David Turpin. According to Elizabeth, Louise ha
d asked them to go and see him, as she felt bad that he never had any visitors.
Elizabeth said the idea of seeing her brother-in-law again made her sick. “I do wish Louise would not have asked me to do this.”
Added Tricia, “I feel like I’m going to see a sadistic person.”
But after their visit, they had totally changed their opinion of David Turpin.
“He knew he had done wrong,” Elizabeth explained. “He was remorseful. He cried the entire time. It wasn’t fake.”
She said David had broken down and sobbed uncontrollably at one point, even apologizing for watching her in the shower so many years earlier.
“It was like I was looking at a little boy that was ready to confess everything he had done. He kept saying, ‘I wish I could tell you about what we’ve done. What happened.’ But he’d been advised not to.”
The next day, they were scheduled to visit Elizabeth’s nieces and nephews at the Corona Regional Medical Center. Before leaving the hotel, Moore filmed them putting the final touches on pillows they’d made for each of the seven siblings. They had embroidered uplifting messages on them, like “Let Your Light Shine.”
But when Elizabeth and Teresa arrived at the hospital, they were turned away at the front door. They left the pillows with the siblings’ attorney, Jack Osborn, expressing their disappointment at not being able to see the children.
Moore then drove them to Perris to see the infamous House of Horrors for themselves.
“I feel like it’s a nightmare I can’t wake up from,” said Elizabeth on the drive over. “Every step is so nerve-racking.”
After being filmed walking up to the front door and reading some of the messages left outside the home, Elizabeth broke down in tears.
“What hurts so bad is everybody else cared more about the kids than their parents,” she sobbed. “The kids just wanted help. They just wanted somebody to reach out. What they endured was hell for so long. Their cries nobody heard.”
* * *
On March 2, world-famous cellist Yo-Yo Ma played a private concert for all thirteen Turpin siblings at the Corona Regional Medical Center, after hearing about their love of music and being moved by their tragic story. It was the first time all the children had been together since the escape, an emotional moment for everyone.
“They were just really amazed,” said Mark Uffer, “awestruck by the level of the talent. They really enjoyed it.”
Ma, who was in California at the time for a concert at the Hollywood Bowl, did not respond to media requests for comment or mention it on his official website. The private concert was arranged by the Corona Chamber of Commerce after Ma said he wanted to do something special for the Turpin children.
“He decided he wanted to go and visit with the kids,” said Bobby Spiegel, “and just interact with them a little bit. And it was beautiful. One of the kids said, ‘Hey, this is great, but who are you?’ They had no clue.”
* * *
Four days later, Good Morning America (GMA) revealed that Jordan Turpin had been active on social media before her escape, posting a series of videos on her own YouTube channel and posting to Twitter and Instagram under the alias Lacey Swan. In the segment, promising “a new look inside the House of Horrors,” GMA reported that her last video was posted just a week before she escaped. Clips were shown of Jordan singing several of her songs, her face blurred out.
As soon as the story broke, YouTube and Instagram immediately took down all her accounts, but her Twitter remained.
The Riverside County District Attorney’s Office refused to confirm or deny the videos were posted by one of the Turpin daughters.
“There has been a recent media report about one of the victims in the David and Louise Turpin case being on social media,” read a statement issued by the DA’s press office. “Our office has not commented on that report nor will we be confirming or commenting on it as this continues to be an active investigation.”
* * *
In the first week of March, ninety-three-year-old John Thomas Taylor gave a brief telephone interview. He said he was aware that Louise had been arrested for torture and neglecting his great-grandchildren.
“No, I don’t know anything about it,” said Taylor. “I just know they’re in trouble. I’ve seen that on the news. They have been prosecuted, and that’s all I know.”
When asked about the growing allegations of sexual molestation leveled at him by his female family members, he was noncommittal, though he’d previously denied the claims to the Dr. Oz producer.
“Well, I don’t need to be interviewed [about that],” he said. “I can’t understand what you’re saying, [and] you don’t need to know what my business is.”
Suddenly, he announced that he had made a will three years earlier and was leaving everything to his only surviving son, James.
“I ain’t leaving the grandchildren nothing,” he snapped, hanging up.
27
A NEW LIFE
On Thursday, March 15, the seven Turpin adults were secretly whisked away from the Corona Regional Medical Center, where they had lived for two months. Their attorney, Jack Osborn, and their public guardian escorted them to a rural house at an undisclosed location to begin the next stage of their recovery.
“The adult siblings want to be known as survivors, not victims,” said Osborn, adding that their pet dogs would soon be joining them.
Their nurses and doctors, who had all formed close emotional attachments with the siblings, threw them a going-away party before they left.
They dined on pizza and sandwiches, and then a karaoke machine was brought in so the siblings could sing their favorite songs.
“They love to sing,” said Mark Uffer, “and love to interact with people. They can sense people that actually care for them, so they were very attached.”
During their two-month stay at the hospital, the seven siblings made a deep impression on everybody they met. Despite all the years of abuse and neglect, they were still capable of feeling love and returning it.
“That is what is so heartbreaking,” said Uffer. “We only read what the parents allegedly did to them. [When you] interact with them on a day-to-day basis, you find it really hard to understand how seven young adults and six children could have been abused yet so capable of giving love back.”
The siblings and hospital staff were emotional when it came time to say their final goodbyes.
“This has been their home away from wherever they were at before,” said Uffer. “It was a very touching experience for all of the staff, so [the goodbye] was a little bit tough. If you asked the nurses, they would all tell you it was a life-changing experience.”
At the end of the party, the siblings gave each of the staff presents they had made to show their gratitude.
“It was like a birthday party environment,” said Uffer. “They made gifts for each of us, little crafts for each one of us. They made bracelets out of beads that they gave to the nurses. They had little scrapbooks that they wanted us to all write messages in before they left so they had something to remember us by.”
The nursing staff were also given personalized bracelets the siblings had lovingly made as mementos.
“They gave them from their hearts. That is all they had to give. They truly loved the people they were interacting with over the last two months.”
Leaving the hospital was a very traumatic moment for the siblings. When the public guardian arrived to collect them, they cried. And when they were taken to the vehicles to take them to their new home, they kept sneaking back into the hospital.
“They were tearful,” said Uffer, “and I think a little bit afraid. I told them we weren’t going to say goodbye—we are going to say, ‘Until we meet again.’ We are hopeful it wasn’t a goodbye.”
The location of their new home is such a closely guarded secret that no one at the Corona Regional Medical Center has been told where it is. Mark Uffer had wanted to have the nurses and physicians, whom the children now
trusted, continue their treatment out of the hospital, but the public guardian and their appointed attorneys immediately cut off all communication.
“It is a little bit disturbing for us,” said Uffer. “We were hopeful we could do a transition with them and get them to their new place, and wanted to send the nurses and therapists out to make sure. But we have no idea where they are.”
The hospital CEO said he was also concerned because it could be years before the siblings are ready to live on their own.
“They have to learn basic skills,” he said. “Shopping, cooking, laundry, things that we all take for granted. I don’t think they have those basic skills yet. It’s going to take some work.”
* * *
While their stay at the hospital had helped heal some of their physical wounds, child trauma expert Allison Davis Maxon observed that the Turpin siblings would now move on to the complicated process of healing emotionally and mentally.
“Trauma, neglect, and deprivation hits us typically on three general levels,” Maxon explained. “You have the body—how it’s going to hit our physiological system. Extreme neglect may cause some permanent physical issues that the kids may have. They may have medical issues or diseases that weren’t treated. Things that occurred from starvation and extreme neglect.
“Then you have their psyche. Their mind. Why did it happen to me? Was it my fault? Children often think like that. So how their minds heal from this will be important to address in therapy. How they tell the story of their life and what happened to them is critical in their healing from these events.”
Finally, there was the emotional piece of the healing puzzle.
“You have children,” she said, “exposed to tremendous amounts of distress, pain, trauma, violence, and torture. So emotionally, they have accumulated a tremendous amount of toxic stress and pain that needs to be addressed as well.” One positive, said the trauma therapist, was that the siblings all went through the nightmare together. This would be an important part of their healing journey.
