Black woman who escaped basement dungeon says 2 others killed by Missouri abductor

Timothy Haslett Jr., a 39-year-old white man, has been charged with the rape, kidnapping, and assault of a 22-year-old Black woman who managed to escape captivity.

A 22-year-old Black woman, who was allegedly abducted and tortured for weeks locked in a Missouri basement, says she was not the only one who was held captive by 39-year-old Timothy Haslett Jr., a white man who has been charged with her rape, kidnapping, and assault.

The woman, who was identified only as T.J. in court filings, escaped from captivity and told witnesses who helped her that her friends “did not make it out,” fuelling outrage from Black community members in Kansas City. Last month, neighbourhood advocates went public with fears that a “serial killer” was targeting Black women and girls after an alleged four murders and three kidnappings occurred in the span of weeks.

At the time, Kansas City Police said the claims were “completely unfounded.”

T.J. escaped captivity from the basement of a home in Excelsior Springs, a neighbourhood of Kansas City, on the morning of Oct. 7 after being imprisoned for about a month. She was found still wearing a metal collar locked with a padlock that police had to remove. She also had duct tape wrapped around her neck and was wearing latex lingerie.

Court filings detail that Haslett kept T.J. locked in a “small room in the basement that he had built. He kept her restrained in handcuffs on her wrists and ankles.”

T.J. told police she had been whipped and raped repeatedly by her captor. She managed to escape when Haslett left the house to drop his child off at school. T.J. then went door-to-door, banging on multiple neighbours’ houses seeking help.

“It was readily apparent that she had been held against her will for a significant period of time,” said Lt. Ryan Dowdy of the Excelsior Springs police at a press conference outside Haslett’s home. He said authorities are still processing evidence from Haslett’s home.

According to authorities and media reports, T.J. said that Haslett had also kidnapped and killed her two friends, though investigators have yet to find other missing people in Haslett’s home. Cadaver dogs were seen searching his backyard, KMBC reported.