When Coleen was hitchhiking in May 1977, she tried to be extremely careful. If the driver offering a ride seemed suspicious to her - she did not get into the car. At the last stage of the journey, she found a real treat - a car driven by a young man with his wife and an eight-month-old baby on board. Coleen climbed inside without hesitation. At that time, she had not yet realized how much she had made a mistake.
In May 1977, twenty-year-old Coleen decided to visit friends in California. The girl lived in Oregon, so she had nearly 800 kilometers to travel. She decided to hitchhike this route. This way of traveling was very popular in the United States at the time.
She made it to Red Buff in California without any problems. It still has about 80 kilometers to travel. Coleen was extremely careful in choosing the drivers she would join. She avoided lonely young men, and had no problem refusing if she felt something was wrong.
Finally, the Hooker family's car pulled up on the side of the road where she was hitchhiking. Cameron sat behind the wheel, and next to him was his wife Janice with her eight-month-old daughter in her arms. Everyone smiled broadly and invited the hitchhiker to the car. Coleen agreed cheerfully.
The four of them traveled in silence until they stopped at a gas station. Coleen went to the toilet. When she came back, she saw a wooden box on the seat that had not been there before. She was surprised at the sight but decided not to do it.
The car started, but only traveled 30 km. Cameron stopped suddenly on a lonely roadside. He took out the knife and forced Coleen to put a wooden box over his head. The terrified woman agreed. The box was muted from the inside and completely opaque. It was obvious that no shouting would help her.
The Hookers drove Coleen to their home in Red Buff, California. Cameron dragged the confused girl to the basement, undressed, and slung her hands to the specially prepared scaffolding. Then he started hitting her with his whip.
The martyred Coleen was later forced to watch her torturers have sex. When they finished, Cameron locked his victim in a coffin-sized wooden box. Coleen couldn't move inside it, couldn't see anything, couldn't reach any sounds. This was how she spent her first night in the torturers' house.
Coleen's days had been more or less the same ever since. She was kept in a basement in a wooden box for 23 hours a day. Cameron gave her an hour a day for a cursory toilet and eating a mean meal. Whenever he felt like it, he would put her by the wrists and wire her: he hit her with a whip or a thin metal wire and electrocuted her.
The girl did not know what time of day or day of the week it was. She was completely cut off from the outside world. When she was "polite" she got the reward of being treated slightly better. For example, she might have been outside the wooden box longer. For disobedience, Cameron punished her cruelly: he starved, beat, and stretched her body on a homemade torture machine.
A month after Coleen was kidnapped, she was able to shower for the first time. She was in poor condition - she lost 10 kg, and she was very weak. For obedience, she was allowed to do minor housework. The Hookers did not give her the clothes back, however. She had to address them as mister/madam and be at their every command.
On January 25, 1978, Cameron told Coleen that he belonged to a powerful organization he called the Company. The company sold female slaves like Cameron. He forced Coleen to sign a handmade contract in which the woman confirmed that she was Hooker's slave and that Hooker had the right to do whatever he wanted with her.
The man threatened Coleen that if she ever opposed him, she would be handed over to another "master" who would be even worse for her. The Hooker House was to be packed with cameras and eavesdropping devices to keep every step of the slave under the Company's control. If she tried to escape, not only she would suffer, but also her whole family.
The contract was also signed by Janice - Cameron's wife. She was also supposed to be a slave, but in this arrangement, she acted as a witness to the transaction. The document stated that Cameron would now take full control of Coleen's body, soul, and property under severe penalties. The girl later received a special collar with an identification number.
Janice was the first victim of Cameron - a sexual degenerate and maniac, fascinated by BDSM. The man seemed completely normal on a daily basis - he worked in a sawmill, was not prone to aggression, and never caused problems.
When he met Janice - an insecure girl with poor health, he turned her into a sex slave and an object of unbridled, brutal fantasies. At first, Janice humbly agreed to it, but at one point she announced that she had had enough.
Cameron found a solution to appease Janice - he suggested that they look for a sex slave for him together. Thanks to this, they will be able to lead a normal life as a family - Cameron will have someone to express his lust on, and Janice will regain her composure. Perhaps even a man will agree to get pregnant.
Janice agreed to the offer. The couple then began cruising the roads of Northern California in the car in search of a suitable candidate for a slave girl. The woman sat next to her partner to ease the possible fears of hitchhikers.
The Hookers' first victim was Marie Elizabeth Spannhake. She was kidnapped a year before Coleen was abducted. She, too, ended up in the basement of a house in Red Buff and was subjected to elaborate torture.
Cameron was not yet able to control his emotions sufficiently at the time. In one of his gruesome sessions, he shot Marie in the stomach. The girl died. The Hookers got rid of her body by throwing it out of the car somewhere on a deserted road. The body has never been found.
From the moment she signed her contract, Coleen lived in perpetual fear. She was firmly convinced that this worthless piece of paper had in fact legal force. She believed every threat the Hookers made.
However, it can be said that since she "declared herself" as a slave, her torturers have placed more trust in her. They knew that the girl was already brainwashed and would not dare to do anything stupid. They allowed her a little more freedom to move around the house.
The Hookers made the decision to move at some point. In the new house, they installed a waterbed with a huge container for bedding. It was this container that became Coleen's new bedroom. The girl spent 23 hours a day there. She was raped with various objects and orally. Cameron had promised Janice that he would never have "real" intercourse with the slave girl.
In 1980, Coleen's situation improved. She was able to leave her prison more often, and even - from home. She accompanied Janice on the trips to the bars. Women drank alcohol then, and Janice seduced lovers for herself. She was jealous of Cameron and resented him for paying so much attention to Coleen. The man understood his partner's frustration, so he allowed her to have sex with casual partners.
What was the Coleen family doing at the time? At first, her relatives did not know that the girl was missing at all, because she did not praise anyone for her trip to California. Her roommate was the first to worry - she was surprised that Coleen had just disappeared without warning.
When the girl's parents realized the situation, they started searching on their own. They traveled the entire route their daughter was supposed to take, questioning service at gas stations and motels. But no one saw the hitchhiker. The State of State reported their daughter missing to the police.
In 1980, Cameron agreed to have Janice call her parents. The girl did not say a word about her real situation. She claimed to be safe and happy to be working as a nanny for a couple she met while hitchhiking.
In March 1981, Coleen and Cameron visited the house of the girl's parents. She maintained that the man was her fiancé. Parents noticed that their daughter had lost a lot of weight and her hair was very thin, but they did not want to spoil the joyful atmosphere.
They suspected that she might have joined a sect because she wore self-made clothes and did not have any money of her own. In the photos from that visit, however, Coleen seems happy. He hugs Cameron and smiles broadly. She did everything so that no one would guess the truth. She was convinced that the Company was watching over her all the time.
In 1983, Coleen was so trusted by her tormentor that she was free to leave the house to work in the garden. During this time, she was seeing the Hooker neighbors, who introduced the girl as a nanny to their two children.
The girl also got permission from her master to work in a nearby motel. Cameron wanted her to contribute to the home budget. Coleen never took advantage of these opportunities to try to escape. She was too scared of the consequences the Company would take against her.
At one point, Cameron proposed to Janice that Coleen become his second wife. For the woman, it was a drop that filled the cup of jealousy. She was furious, but at the same time was afraid to stand up. To deal with her emotions, she began going to church and reading the Bible more often.
Gradually, she felt more and more doubts about the lifestyle she led with her husband. Admittedly, Cameron kept telling her that she had to be obedient as a wife, even citing specific Scriptures to support his words, but Janice couldn't shake the thought that she was doing something very wrong.
Janice finally confided her dilemmas to the pastor. At first, however, she did not tell him the whole truth. She said her husband makes her live in a threesome and she refuses to accept it. The pastor made the woman aware that her husband's behavior was reprehensible, and she had the right to object.
After talking to Cameron who said she wanted an entire harem of slaves, Janice finally decided to act. One day in August 1984, she went to the motel where the girl worked. She revealed that no Company exists and that the contract the three of them signed was a worthless piece of paper. Coleen is free and can leave whenever she wants.
Since then, things have happened very quickly - Janice took Coleen to the pastor. He stated that both women had to escape from Cameron's house as soon as possible. It also happened. The next day, when the man left for work at the sawmill, they both packed in a hurry. Janice took Coleen to the bus station while she went to her parents.
Coleen still made a call to Cameron. She said she was leaving and would never come back. The man cried out and begged the woman to change her mind. But Coleen was free now - despite brainwashing, she broke her fear and there was no force to stop her.
Janice agreed to tell about her husband's crimes, provided the prosecution did not bring any charges against her. And so it happened. Her testimony was corroborated by an investigation that found the torture devices, as well as photos and still undeveloped videos of Cameron's macabre fantasies.
The trial began in 1985. The man was accused of kidnapping, rape, oral rape, foreign body rape, and sodomy. His defense attorneys maintained that Coleen had voluntarily consented to sex and cruel treatment. They argued that she had never made any attempt to escape, although she had had many opportunities to do so, and therefore there was no question of any detention.
During the hearing, as many as 6 expert psychologists were appointed, who explained what was brainwashing and Stockholm syndrome. In their words, Coleen's behavior was perfectly normal under the circumstances.
Cameron Hooker was sentenced to 104 years in prison. Coleen Stan expressed her joy that she would never hurt anyone again. She also stated that she has forgiven her torturer and even prays for him.
After all this nightmare, she tried to get her life back together. She got a job as an accountant, and she was also a volunteer at a telephone line for victims of domestic violence. She married several times and also gave birth to a child. Unfortunately, her marriage ended in divorce and the child was imprisoned. He lives in California to this day, just like Janice Hooker.
Sources:
- https://criminalminds.fandom.com/wiki/Cameron_and_Janice_Hooker
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kidnapping_of_Colleen_Stan
- https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/news-life/girl-in-a-box-who-was-kept-as-sex-slave-in-coffinlike-crate-under-bed-for-seven-years/news-story/69abec75096b8a2b8cbc1a76632aae1f
- https://www.redbluffdailynews.com/2022/06/17/first-step-taken-to-designate-cameron-hooker-a-sexually-violent-predator/
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