My Sister and I
We Are Survivors!
The True-life Story of two sisters
Deena and Starla,
sexual victims at the ages of 4 and 5
As told to:
J. Jackson Owensby
A-Argus Better Book Publishers, LLC
North Carolina******New Jersey
My Sister and I
We Are Survivors!
All Rights Reserved Copyright 2008
By: Argus Enterprises International, Inc.
No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, graphic, electronic, or including photocopying, recording, taping, or by any information storage retrieval system, without the permission in writing from the publisher.
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at
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For Information:
Argus Enterprises International, Inc.
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Kernersville, NC 27284
ISBN: 978-1-4524863-5-2
Book Cover designed by Dubya
Printed in the United States of America
~Dedication~
This book is dedicated to every little one who lives, or has lived, with this. Know that I believe you and that you are not alone. It’s not your fault and it never was. I made it out and you can, too.
Thanks for being brave enough to do this, Pop. Love ya!
Deena
~Thank You~
To merely say ‘thank you’ to you, Deena and to you, Starla for the privilege of putting your story to paper seems insignificant compared to the trauma you both lived and the difficulty each of you have had in relating the horrific experiences that you lived through. Still, your courage in exposing such a dire situation may just help some uncertain politician move a little faster in putting into place tough laws that will rid society of such animals, as permeated the lives of two innocent children. Still, the only thing that I can think of to say to you on behalf of all of the little children who have experienced, and who are right now undergoing similar dastardly acts by evil men and women, is that your courage is most appreciated.
Would that there were many others so courageous. Perhaps we could stop this.
J.J.O
~Introduction~
“Can you imagine yourself being a four-year-old baby girl, sitting naked on a kitchen countertop with your step-daddy’s sticky, gooey semen all over your face, your body, your hands, and in your hair and your mouth?”
With those terrible words, Deena, my future daughter-in-law began to describe the sexual horrors visited on her at the innocent age of four, and her sister, Starla, who was only five years old, continuing throughout the rest of their childhood and beyond.
How did it all start?
***
“Pop, would you write my story?”
The question came out of nowhere.
I had been sitting at my desk, leaning back in my chair, contemplating the fate of the universe. Yeah, right!
Okay, so I had my eyes closed while I was contemplating. I really wasn’t asleep, at least not completely but I had been lost somewhere out there.
The question began to soak in and my brain began to awaken. My future daughter-in-law had asked me an interesting question. And as it turns out, it was a lulu of a question.
Write her story? What story? Why would she ask that of me? I had never really considered myself a real author, although I had long wanted to write novels. And in fact, I was lucky enough to even have written one book that was just being published.
It had been my first serious attempt at trying to have a manuscript published, and to my shock and surprise, a publisher had agreed to issue the book. Would you believe on my first attempt? Do you know how rare that occurrence is? Especially when there are literally hundreds of thousands of better-than-I writers submitting manuscripts every day? Such a feat is virtually unheard of, especially when you realize that this writer is not proficient with words, his spelling is atrocious, his punctuation is worse and his grammar is straight out of the hills of his bucolic upbringing.
Despite these handicaps of mine and even with her number one editor screaming, “Save me from this animal!” a feisty, semi-young publisher from New Jersey decided that my story about the abuse a young homosexual man from Indiana was suffering at the hands of the federal authorities merited a look and possibly exposure. It must have been the theme; it couldn’t possibly have been the author. That same publisher urged me to continue writing.
Boy! Talk about an ego booster.
Deena, my oldest son’s fiancé, had been a proofreader of ‘Deliberate Indifference: A Gay Man’s Maltreatment by the United States Department of Justice’, the title of the one book that I had published. She had frequently made comments about the courage of a gay young man willing to reveal his entire life’s troubles in the hopes that the abuse by the authorities that he was suffering would ease, but more in the hopes that the consistent and flagrant abusive practices by the Federal Bureau of Prison authorities and employees that affected thousands of inmates could be brought to light.
But, this was different. I looked at Deena, and she could read the question in my eyes.
“I was sexually abused when I was four years old,” she said. Her tears began to flow, her voice cracked and broke as she sobbed, but she found the strength to continue. “Raped or sodomized almost every day by my stepfather and by my stepbrothers, and then by their friends. So was at least one of my older sisters, Starla, who was only five when it started with her. All the while my mother stood by and did nothing to protect us. And he—that bastard, that cruel, inhuman bastard—is still out there. I, we, want you to help us protect other young and innocent children.”
I’m not sure that I will ever be able to find words that will convey the feeling and depth of the emotional shock that ran through me at those words, delivered with so much apparent agony for the speaker.
Noticing the look of astonishment on my face, Deena broke into tears, weeping and sobbing. While my mind told me that this was a story that I really, really didn’t want to hear, my primitive instincts told me that I must listen. The feeling of outrage that had driven me to write the story about Chris Wehner was nothing compared to the building tide of fury that was beginning to cloud my vision.
Comforting the weeping young woman the best that I could, I assured her that I would be glad to listen and then help expose the villain or villains, if it were in my power.
Once Deena had begun to relate her life story a magical moment happened. Starla, one of Deena’s sisters, also opened herself up and decided that she would be willing to contribute her side of the story as well. This was something most amazing; something that had never happened before. Starla had always refused even to just talk about the sordid events that took place while she was a child. She wouldn’t even speak of the events to other members of her family. Not even to her sisters or other female relatives or friends.
Why Starla relented and agreed to speak with me and also agreed to relate equally disturbing experiences, I’ll never know. Perhaps it was just that the time was right. Or perhaps, it may have been that Deena had led the way.
What follows now is exposure of the sexual rape of two young girls, babies, starting virtually at the age of infancy and continuing into their teen-age years. Not just once, but on and on and on—over and over.
Rape.
Sodomy.
Incest.
Fellatio.
If there’s a name for it, it happened. This is a tale filled with horror and pain, tears and sorrow, degradation and depravity. It is an extremely difficult tale to put to paper and it will be an upsetting tale for the reader to read, as it will expose the true evil of man; men who prey on young children, men who prey on the helpless, men who prey on their own family. It’s a side of mankind that lurks in the shadows; an evil that we don’t even want to admit exists. But it is there—in reality.
***
A sudden uncomfortable thought jarred my consciousness, as I sit here trying to determine where to begin. How can I possibly describe the depth of the horror and terror that these valiant young women introduced to me?
What the hell am I doing writing this genre of a book? It’s certainly not the type of story I long dreamed of writing. Sure, I had made the decision that I wanted to be a writer, to be an author. I wanted to write to entertain or be amusing, a la Louis L’Amour or Dan Brown, or perhaps, Robert Ludlum. Even one of a hundred other mind-grabbing authors. Write an interesting, thrilling novel or series, find a large publisher and get rich. Every writer’s dream. Right!
But, this? This was beyond my wildest imagination. Then, why me?
After all, I am most certainly not a crusading do-gooder, out to make everything right in the world. And I’m definitely no angel myself. But, for the second time in a relatively short span of my life, I have been brought face to face with a situation that shrieks to be exposed, an evil that cries out for vengeance; despicable and vile degradation that must be unveiled for all to witness.
The situation?
Rape—repeated, over and over continuously, never-ending vicious rape of a four-year old baby and of a five-year old infant.
Oh, sure! Be nice. Be politically correct. Don’t offend the monsters. Call it ‘Sexual Molestation.’ That doesn’t make it sound so vile, so harsh. Or, name it ‘incest.’ After all, it’s in the family. Even ‘sexual activity.’ That’s politically correct. Pedophilia.
A lot of fancy names, but deep down, where it gets real dirty, it’s still rape. Pure and simple, brutal and raw:
Physical, forceful carnal sex with a baby and a child by adults—grown men. Even worse, raped by their stepfather, as well by their stepbrothers. Raped and molested also by friends and acquaintances of the family. And that’s just the beginning of the list.
Can you imagine the shock, the horror, the confusion, the terror, and the dread that has to eat at the nubile minds of a four-year-old infant and a five-year-old child who became the sexual targets of a maniacal stepfather and their stepbrothers, not to again mention by their cronies? And others—strangers?
Not once, nor twice, but day after day after terrible day and nights. And it went on for years. Not one year, not even two, but many, many years, with no one available to ease the pain, the grief, the anguish. Not one person No one to soften the agony, to assuage the torture that assaulted these children’s minds and young bodies. No one to explain why an adult would visit such vile actions on two innocents. Not even a loving, caring mother.
***
If you have been watching television in recent years, it’s probable that you have heard Bill O’Reilly’s often-stated tirade regarding Jessica’s Law, and the need for it to be adopted by every state to help protect the innocent. A law that is designed to punish the sexual perverts; to eliminate the predators, or at least to put them away for a very long time; and also those who just stand by while a child is badly used. It is a much-needed piece of legislature.
God, but how badly it is needed. However, that doesn’t address the entire story. It doesn’t touch the most heinous of crimes: incest.
Nor does the media help. It’s easy to sit uninvolved, remaining emotionally calm, and read a newspaper or hear a television news program and learn that yet another adult has been arrested for child molestation. In fact, it is rare that a day goes by when at least one or more such story doesn’t get reported. In the great state of North Carolina alone, in the first two and one-half months of this year, there has already been stories about adults being arrested for the rape of a ten-year old girl in Onslow County; the rape of a thirteen-year old girl by two men in Black Mountain; the rape of a ten-year old girl in Buncombe County; the rape of a nine-year old girl in Wilmington; the rape of a fourteen-year old girl in Burlington; the drugging and rape of one ten-year old girl and twelve-year old girl in Lexington; the rape of a seven-year old girl in Hickory; the rape of two ten-year old girls in Albemarle; the rape of an eight-year old girl by her mother’s boyfriend in Catawba County; the rape of a six-year old girl in Jacksonville; and the rape of a fifteen-year old step-daughter by a man in Durham.
Are you surprised at the amazingly huge number of sexual molestation and rapes that are being reported? Then, you will be absolutely stunned by the fact that less than five percent of all the sexual molestations that occur are ever reported. That’s right! Less than five percent! Did you know that the majority of the rape or molestation cases that are never reported are committed by a family member—often by a father, or stepfather, by a brother, or a stepbrother, and less frequently, by a mother or a sister or an aunt.
And, in many (even most) instances, fear of retaliation or the fear of the shame or embarrassment keeps other members of the family from exposing the molestation. These members are often persuaded that the public exposure of such a crime is a stain or stigma on the entire family.
B.S.
Wake up, damn it! And, yes. I mean you!
Have I caught your attention? Are you sitting there, reading this in the warm security of your own world, wondering what this blazing outrage is all about? Has the constant outpouring of negative media brought you to a state of emotional numbness that will allow you to become aware of these statistics and still remain somewhat aloof?
Well, so was I.
At least, I remained remote from it all until it came closer to home. In my own family! Or at least, what is soon to become my family, as I learned of the unbelievable childhood tortures that my future daughter-in-law and her sister had experienced. Hearing only the first few vague details caused me to choke with rage. Rage because, in this great country that has been freely given to us, there are a considerable number of despicable individuals who, for whatever reason, deliberately prey on the young, the innocent, the defenseless. And, for the most part, we—you and I, the public—just casually read about the situation. Then we just go ahead and play golf, enjoy the theatre or partake of a fine meal.
For me, that attitude has changed. My emotions have been touched. No, not touched—assaulted; flailed. And, as I write these words, it is difficult to keep those emotions under control. Had these events occurred in the mountains where I spent my childhood, the perpetrators would not have survived. He, she or they would have been shot or lynched.
Sure, many of my mountain-bred ancestors married young. But there was a marriage, agreed to by the parents if not the children. There existed no such vileness, as that which is often only a commonplace matter of form today, so easily ignored by a non-caring and uninvolved public. Or softened by pleasant sounding names created by well meaning psychoanalyst’s efforts to describe what is truly monstrous behavior. This is a most evil behavior that must be brought to an end—now.
Once, I believed in the death penalty. Kill the low-life! Let God have them. In fact, as jury foreman, I once voted for a vicious human being to be executed. My views have changed, as I believe that for certain sadistic individuals, an easy death is much too forgiving. Saddam Hussein didn’t suffer nearly enough.
Punishment for this sexually perverted type of individual should not be terminated so abruptly, but should go on for decades, if not eternity. And it should be the worst imaginable; locked into some hellhole, such as solitary confinement—hidden away from all human contact.
Such monsters’ lives should be a continuing, fiery eternal hell such as they have created for their innocent victims. And I would vote to do everything we could to keep them alive as long as we could so that they could continue to suffer.
The ‘Good Book’ says that we should forgive and love our neighbors. As hard as that is, when you consider Hitler, Stalin, Genghis Khan, and Attila the Hun, I do try. But these evil people?
Forgiving an individual might be possible, perhaps, but not his or her sadistic actions. Certainly, not in the evil that has been visited upon my son’s future wife and her sister, and upon the hundreds of thousands of children that have no advocate. May a loving God watch over these young infants and may a caring public awaken to their danger.
***
This manuscript is not undertaken with any great sense of happiness, only with a feeling of impending disgust with mankind. In fact, I’d rather not put these horrific words down on paper and expose these women and my family to the public mortification that will certainly occur. This declaration is certainly an indictment of society at large, and I am a part of that society.
In addition, I know that I will hear and will learn things from these women that I would rather not imagine that any one human being is willing to do to another human being, especially young, innocent, children. Emotions that I don’t want to surface will be felt. Tears will be shed for the anguish that these two children experienced; but my tears will be nothing like the tears that the young victims, and others like them, have wept.
And, as hard as it will be for me to listen and to write the words, it will be much worse for the women to tell.
As difficult as it is for the two women to talk about the evil actions that only deranged and vile beings could cause to happen to the innocent, Deena and Starla know that out there in the real world, their stepfather and his two sons still live. They enjoy their freedom, feeling absolutely no remorse for the evil they perpetrated on these two children. Nor are they repentant for the emotional havoc each of them has foisted onto young minds and souls.
And still, the same kinds of vicious assaults are occurring today and tonight. Deena and Starla are aware that every day and every night some predator is stalking the young, the unprotected. And they also know that too many people, especially those in a position to know, will sit idly by, doing nothing, hiding their heads in the sand, pretending that nothing unusual is taking place.
Those uninvolved and uncaring people, many of them relatives, even mothers or fathers, would rather allow the viciousness to continue than face the fact there is evil in the family. Dirty family secrets are kept in the closet, or swept under the rug.
Perhaps those bystanders are afraid they will lose their husband, or their son, or their brother. Afraid what the ‘neighbors would think’, of the stigma if the truth were to be revealed. Afraid that the rest of their family would shun them, should they speak up.
Or it may be fear that they could be forced to live alone, without the companionship or support provided by the abuser.
Deena, especially emphatic, and Starla are committed to revealing what happens all too often when a sexual monster is in a position to take advantage of a youngster, a prey unable to defend herself or himself (oh yes, it happens to males, too; remember the Catholic priests recently in the news?), children without a champion within their family. Perhaps somewhere, in another family, Deena’s story and Starla’s story may give someone courage to act, to stop or prevent similar evil manipulations of their own young children. Not very likely, considering that such protective actions have been minimal in the past. But hopefully at least one person or one parent who reads these words will be moved to interfere, to say “No!”
These happenings will be related in a mélange of bits and pieces, fragmented, as the trauma of Deena and Starla’s childhood memories surface, as the women try to relate the wicked events that their depraved stepfather and stepbrother executed on each of them.
But, it was not only the family who committed these vile acts. It was also friends and companions of the family as well as others—from bad to worse.
It is the author’s intent to convey the emotions and the feelings, using as close to Deena and Starla’s precise words as is possible, while bearing in mind the sensitivity of the subject and the reader.