A 17-year-old girl’s desperate escape from the window of a Southern Californian house has revealed to the world the strange and secret horror she and her 12 brothers and sisters had been enduring.
Her parents had made their suburban home a private school, a prison, and a torture chamber for the siblings, who were aged two to 29, authorities said.
Until the emaciated girl – who was said to look closer to the age of 10 than 17 – jumped out of a window with photographic evidence before calling police, it appears no-one, neither neighbours nor public officials, knew anything about what was happening inside the house.
Deputies said some siblings had been shackled to furniture amid filthy, foul-smelling conditions. They were so malnourished the older ones still looked like children, officials said.
Few details have been released about how the parents kept the siblings captive despite what appeared to be opportunities for them to leave.
The parents, 49-year-old Louise Anna Turpin and 57-year-old David Allen Turpin, have been held on nine million dollar (£6.5 million) bail. Charges including torture and child endangerment could be brought on Wednesday, with a court appearance scheduled for Thursday, authorities said.
In one of many surreal details that emerged as the investigation grew, it appears that an Elvis impersonator who performs weddings in Las Vegas is one of the few people who had direct dealings with the clan. He claims he saw a different side to the family.
“It’s very disturbing because I felt like I did know them,” said Kent Ripley, the Elvis impersonator who led the parents through at least three vow renewal ceremonies in recent years – most recently on Halloween 2015.
He looked back at YouTube videos of the ceremonies after hearing the news, including two that show all the children dancing and smiling, with matching outfits and similar haircuts.
“Watching them now it’s kind of haunting and disturbing,” Mr Ripley said.
“They all looked young and thin but I figured it was just their lifestyle. Maybe the activities they did, maybe because of their religious beliefs. I didn’t get that in depth with them, but I knew they were a fun family.”
Neighbours said the family kept to themselves and never so much as waved. No calls about trouble ever reached police or child welfare officials. Their house doubled as the Sandcastle Day School, where David Turpin is listed as principal and its roll of six includes only the couple’s younger children.
However, the house inside was a stinking mess, and conditions were “horrific,” Riverside County Sheriff’s Captain Greg Fellows said.
He said: “If you can imagine being 17 years old and appearing to be a 10-year-old, being chained to a bed, being malnourished, and injuries associated with that, I would call that torture.”
He said there was no indication any of the children were sexually abused, although that is still being investigated.
Mr and Mrs Turpin, who had been married 32 years, sometimes dressed their children alike in pink dresses or Dr Seuss T-shirts, kept them away from outsiders and cut the boys’ hair in a Prince Valiant-style resembling that of their father. Photos show nearly all the girls with shoulder-length brown hair parted in the middle.
Seven of the children are being cared for at the Corona Regional Medical Centre.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here