Crime Library: Criminal Minds and Methods

The Case of the Seven-Year Sex Slave

A Grim Black Limbo



As morning arrived, Colleen felt exhausted.  She'd hardly slept at all, and now she had to wonder what would happen next.  Cameron came to get her.  He removed the head box and then opened the body box that had kept her pinned in position.  She breathed in relief, but was still afraid of this man.  Would he now let her go, or was there more in store?

He starved her for the rest of the day, and finally gave her a meal of water and potatoes.  Cameron hung her for a while and then put the head box back on.  She had no idea when he was going to come or go, or what he had planned for her.  She was allowed to use a bedpan, and was then stretched out on a rack, where she lay immobile for hours.

Another whole day went by before she was allowed to eat again.  Cameron forced her to drink some water and eat an egg salad sandwich.  She ate it but the day was hot and humid, so she declined to finish a second one.  He angrily reminded her that she ought to be grateful.  She protested that she was full, but she quickly learned that a slave did what she was told, no matter how she felt.

For her disobedience, Cameron hung her up again with some leather cuffs and whipped her until she passed out.  When he finally took her down, she was still not hungry and she was in extreme pain, but she forced herself to eat the rest of the food.  Satisfied, he tied her up, replaced the head box and left.  Colleen was deeply relieved to finally be left alone, but still very much afraid.

Perfect Victim
Perfect Victim

This was to become her routine: a single meal for the day, torture, isolation, and uncertainty.  "She existed in a grim black limbo," wrote Christine McGuire and Carla Norton in their book on the case,  Perfect Victim: The True Story of the Girl in the Box by the D.A. Who Prosecuted her Captor. "Helpless."

"Sometimes I thought I was just going to go crazy," Colleen said.

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