A MARRIED COUPLE from Armagh have been jailed for “an appalling litany of crimes carried out against an extremely vulnerable woman”.
The PSNI today welcomed the sentences handed down to Keith and Caroline Baker who pleaded guilty to a range of offences, including a number of sexual assaults over an eight-year period.
The pair kept their victim, now 53 years old, in a cold, unfurnished and unlit room (there was no lightbulb, curtains or carpet) in their Craigavon home. Its door had no handle on the inside, and there was a video camera installed which filmed some of the abuses.
Appearing in court today, the 61-year-old man was handed down a 15-year sentence, while his wife will be jailed for 18 months with another 18-month term to be carried out on licence.
“For eight years, these defendants kept this woman imprisoned in a room that could not be opened from inside and sexually abused her, some of which was filmed for their own sexual gratification,” the head of the PSNI’s public protection branch, Superintendent George Clarke, said this afternoon.
There was no door handle on the inside of her room and food was only brought to her occasionally.
“Put simply, this was an inhumane way to treat anyone. Her basic human rights were stolen from her by people who can only be described as evil,” he said after today’s hearing.
“What she went through is unimaginable and any right minded person will be horrified to hear about the suffering this victim endured at the hands of these cruel people. It doesn’t bear thinking about what this victim endured over the thousands of days she was kept prisoner.”
Today, a court heard that the victim was brought to Northern Ireland by Baker in 2004 and police rescued her in December 2012.
According to the BBC, sentencing judge Patrick Lynch QC today said that Keith Baker is a ‘Svengali-type figure’ who had full control over his wife who was a ‘pawn doing his bidding’.
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