BOLD ESCAPE FROM SEX CAPTOR
Dove through glass after being lured to U.S.
An Alberta model dove through a glass window Wednesday to escape the South Carolina trailer where she had been sexually assaulted and held captive for five days after being kidnapped.
Fred Russell Urey of Norris, S.C., posed as a photographer online and promised to pay the woman $15,000 to come to the U.S. for a modelling job. When she arrived, he allegedly held her captive, threatened her and her family and assaulted her in his trailer.
The woman has safely returned to Canada after being released from hospital, according to Creed Hashe, chief deputy in Pickens County. Police had surrounded the trailer when the model leaped through a window to freedom and fell into the front yard.
Hashe told The Canadian Press that there was no answer when officers arrived at the trailer’s door, but they heard a scream from inside and the sound of someone running seconds before the woman dove through the window.
Police also said Urey threatened to slash his own throat during a standoff before they arrested him. The 38-year-old man has been charged with kidnapping, criminal sexual conduct and possession of methamphetamine.
Local police had been in pursuit of Urey and the model since she managed to alert her family that she was in danger. Her captor allowed her to call family and friends with her cellphone and FaceTime under his close supervision, and she was able to send “coded messages of distress,” police said in a statement sent to the National Post.
Family and friends sensed that she was “extremely frightened” and she was able to “silently mouth certain words as clues to her location and the identity of the suspect” over FaceTime, the statement said. She even secretly sent snapshots to family and friends to help them find her.
Her family contacted the RCMP, who then contacted law enforcement in South Carolina. RCMP investigators “were present for” a cellphone conversation between the victim and her family on May 24, the RCMP said in an emailed statement.
“(The) RCMP shared the victim’s cellphone information and other clues that she had passed on with the police of jurisdiction, Pickens County Sheriff’s in South Carolina,” they said.
The victim has not been named, although police say she is between the ages of 18 and 25. She had been in contact with Urey for about two months “via the Internet and various social media apps” before she flew to Atlanta, Pickens County police said.
“At no time did the victim promise any nudity, any sexual favours, or anything like that,” Pickens County Sheriff Rick Clark told reporters during a press conference on Thursday.
Police believe Urey paid for her airfare and picked her up at the airport in Atlanta on May 18. She spent the first two days sleeping at local hotels and scouting locations for a photo shoot, they said.
On the third day, Urey took her to his home, restrained her and threatened her and her family, WSPA News reported. A police statement said she was forced to engage in sex acts over the next two days, including “bondage, oral sex and sexual intercourse.”
Urey and the model stayed on the move for several days, which helped him evade police. After the woman escaped through a window, police broke into the trailer and found Urey in the rear bedroom. He put a knife to his own throat and threatened to commit suicide before he finally surrendered.
Urey has a prior conviction for possessing methamphetamine, and police say they’re continuing to investigate his background.
“A lot of times I guess people put too much confidence in the Internet or social media. Sometimes they get lured into things that are not as legit or as genuine as they wanted them to be,” Hashe told The Canadian Press in an interview on Friday.
“Unfortunately, it’s a target-rich environment for people who are trying to prey on people that they can lure into their schemes and criminal activity.”