Easiest answer......because wearing jail issued clothing can give the appearance of guilt according to SCOTUS.
Keeping your malnourished children shackled to the furniture in their own filth can also give the appearance of guilt.
I can't believe these people would think they have a snowball's chance in hell regardless of what they're wearing.
) and I wouldn't be surprised if more charges of this nature are brought against the father as some of the perhaps-more-reluctant victims are coaxed into telling their stories.
Keeping your malnourished children shackled to the furniture in their own filth can also give the appearance of guilt.
Interesting that they were planning to move within a couple of days. I'm very curious to know if or how that may have played a role in being the triggering event for them to attempt an escape. I'd imagine sorting through their hoard in preparation to move would be a likely opportunity to stumble upon a forgotten cell phone, so perhaps that's how that happened. And I wonder if there was a reason the kids may have felt it was "now or never" with the move imminent. Did they see this as one more step further into isolation, or did the parents go as far as threatening to leave the kids behind like they'd done with pets, locked in to starve to death? Or maybe the two events had nothing to do with each other and the timing was just coincidental. I'm sure this will all come out at some point.
According to the criminal complaint, the lewd act charge was on behalf of the 17 year old, the same girl who made the escape, for an incident(s?) that occurred when she was approximately twelve. From what we know, she strikes me as one who is ready to take these jerks down (yay for her!
As if my jumbled thoughts aren't all over the place enough already, I've been meaning to comment on the mother being "perplexed" when the police showed up. She wasn't perplexed (unless her perplexed expression was due to her trying to figure out how she was going to try to weasel out of this now that the police were standing in her living room.) No, remember, three of those kids were shackled when the cops showed up and the Turpins rushed to unchain them, successfully freeing two before the police came in. She knew what she was doing to those kids was wrong.
Also, they'd previously lived in far more rural areas where it would be harder to get to help, and take longer for help to arrive or even find the address. This house was near others in a more densely packed neighborhood. Perhaps fear of moving to another rural location played in
I beleive they are all still hopitalized at the moment (with the possible exception of the toddler)
It would probably have happened when one parent finally died and the other could no longer keep them all prisoners by him/herself.I hate they are going to be split up. That is going to be so hard on them.
before the abuse began, when he was very young and still in regular school, he showed and aptitude for music or art. When the abuse started, he found a way to appease his mother, change her mood, by singing/playing music/drawing art, probably Disney related, so he didn't get abused as much as the others. (I say mother as she was the one who actually took the time to drive him to classes & wait for him.)
This was surprising to hear. I thought the news said he was studying music or art courses. Maybe,
He could have also been used as an example to the others. "If you are really good and don't keep trying to escape, we may let you go to college too, someday." Of course the rest never would. The parents didn't have the money for them. Nor would they spend the money on them if they had it. They'd probably make up reasons to keep punishing them.
I wonder though, if he was the one who got the info for the 17 yr old on who and how to call 911. It would be easy to casually talk to other students while at class. He took 6 semesters at the college. (3 years.) They had been planning the escape for 2 years. Possibly, after the first year, he & his sister then planned how to get the info they'd need to escape while he was in class, borrowing someone's phone or tablet, now & then, to look up info on the Internet. The 17 yr old KNEW to have pics taken and on the cellphone of the other children chained up, either to send to 911 or so the cops who arrived to talk to her would believe her before going to the house.
True, but I don't mind that they are wearing street clothes. I think that the prosecutors do not want to jeopardize their case in any way.Keeping your malnourished children shackled to the furniture in their own filth can also give the appearance of guilt.
That's interesting (and i know it was brought up earlier in the thread as well). I don'T think I ever saw anything tht indicated that the father was unemployed. Everythign I saw listed him as employed, by the same one company, and oftne listed the 140k annual salary (usuaully when talking about the bankruptcy filing). Working days and keeping the kids up nights does seem like a strange choice----I suppose it could have been to allow him to be home to help keep control, or for him to "enjoy" poor treatment of the kids as well. But then, when did Dad sleep?
I assume the toys are probably a mix of two things. 1) Disney collectable stuff like vinylmations that were never meant for the kids to have because one or both parents were buying the items for themselves, and 2) What @cabanafrau said. Toys that were acquired to taunt the children. I came across a comment somewhere from one of their Texas neighbors who said at one point the Turpins had eight shiny, brand new kids bikes lined up outside their house that never moved, were never played with, and sat outside weathering and rusting for years. My first thought when I heard about the pies was that that wasn't a random choice. One of those poor kids probably mentioned once that pie was his favorite food and then taunting them with pies became a thing. Something similar happened in my house with Christmas stockings.Abusive people will turn anything into a weapon. It's all about exerting power and control.
Completely unrelated, but I just have to mention how incredible it is for that 17 year old to have found the courage to break out. We, those of us existing in normal society, can see how abnormal and heinous their situation was and we would know that once someone blew the whistle it would be all over for those parents. But she couldn't have known that. She's lived this crazy isolated existence with no sense of what's normal or what resources might be out there to help them and no guarantees that anyone would believe her if she even managed to successfully escape in the first place. It really is truly remarkable that she did what she did.
