Kingston family charged after woman flees captivity

Husband, in-laws beat and confined her for 11 months before her escape, police allege

Three members of a Kingston family have been charged by police after an investigation revealed that a woman underwent 11 months of beatings and confinement.

Police said in a release Thursday that in 2017 a woman moved to Canada from the United States to marry a local man. After the wedding she moved into a home with him, his parents and his brother.

The family took the woman’s citizenship papers and her jewelry to ensure she had no financial security. Over the next 11 months the woman was told she couldn’t leave the home unless accompanied by another family member. The husband and his family isolated the woman from her own family and friends and started to monitor her calls. They even followed her around the house to watch her.

Last April the woman’s husband, his mother and his brother became increasingly violent. They would regularly hit her, pull her hair, threatening to remove her from the country and to kill her. They told her that police wouldn’t help her because she had no identification and no proof she was a Canadian citizen.

After she was intentionally burned with a pair of hot tongs, the woman finally seized an opportunity to escape her prison. She fled the house, went into hiding, fearing that her husband would come and kill her. It was only when she was reassured by a lawyer that police would be able to help her that she returned to Kingston.

In the middle of the night the woman went to police and told them what she had endured for the past 11 months.

On Wednesday, police executed a search warrant at the family residence of the woman’s husband. The 29-year-old husband, his 52-yearold mother and 27-year-old brother were all arrested at the scene.

The husband and his mother were jointly charged with possessing identity documents of another person without a lawful excuse and theft. The husband and his brother were jointly charged with uttering threats to cause death. The mother was also charged with assault with a weapon, and then all three were jointly charged with forcible confinement, assault and harassment by threatening conduct.