|
Stephen Roye |
It's been nearly two years since Stephen Roye returned to
Los Angeles, and life has not been easy for him. His years-long ordeal in
Thailand "just completely broke him," Moorman told Crime Library in a recent interview. At first, it was not immediately clear just how deep the psychic wounds he had suffered, or perhaps inflicted on himself, had been. Not long after his return to the
U.S., he was placed on a kind of probation, released from jail and seemed to be on his way back, Moorman said. "He was let go and he stayed with a friend for a while and eventually got an apartment of his own," Moorman said. "He seemed to be doing well, except... he couldn't quite face the world." When he was taking medication to control his psychological problems, "he was very nice to be with, very controlled," she said. But little by little, the pressures of life back in
America and on the streets began to take its toll. "He started losing it," she said, failing to take his medicine and turning up on the streets at all hours of the night. Recently, and for what Moorman is convinced is his own good, Roye was placed back in custody at the federal detention center in
Los Angeles. "He needs treatment," Moorman said, "he needs time to cool down, even though he's been back for a year and a half. It was more than eight years in that miserable... terrible place."
For the moment, Roye's life remains on hold. Authorities have told Moorman that they hope to "put him in a halfway house, but they haven't found a place that has a bed available so that leaves him in limbo," she said.
All the same, she said, if you dig deep enough, you can still see the faintest glimmer of hope in Stephen Roye. Now a grandfather - his son fathered a baby girl, born in January - Roye still "feels he has a future," Moorman said, before adding softly, "I hope he's right."