The sister of Louise Anna Turpin, the 49-year-old California mom who shackled her kids to beds, claimed that she was never allowed to visit the family and has not seen her sister in 19 years.
“Something didn’t seem right about her parenting, but never would I have expected it to be like this,” Elizabeth Jane Flores, 41, the sister of Turpin, told the Daily Mail.
David, 57, and Louise Turpin were arrested Sunday after police discovered that they enslaved their 13 children, aged two to 29 years old, inside their home in Perris, Calif. The children are currently hospitalized.
Flores, a Christian motivational speaker and author, claimed that she was never allowed to visit her 13 nieces and nephews, according to the Daily Mail. Flores lives in Cleveland, Tenn., and said that she and her sister “would talk on the phone from time to time, but every time I would ask to talk to her kids, she wouldn’t let me.”
Flores, who has seven children of her own, wrote on her website that she was a victim of child abuse.
Flores said her parents tried to visit the Turpin family multiple times, but they were not allowed or even given an address to the home, reported the New York Post. “My parents booked several flights to go see them but when they got there, they wouldn’t tell them where to go, and my parents left crying every time,” said Flores, adding, “They died before they got to see them again. It’s just heartbreaking, and I’m so embarrassed about all of this.”
David’s parents, James and Betty Turpin, who live in West Virginia, claim that they have not seen the family in four or five years.
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