David and Louise Turpin pleaded not guilty to a combined 75 counts that included charges of torture, child abuse and false imprisonment.
The Turpin case is a child abuse and captivity incident discovered in Perris, California, United States, in which David and Louise Turpin imprisoned their thirteen children for years.
On January 14, 2018, one of the children escaped and contacted police using a deactivated cell phone to call 911. The police who, upon entering the home, found some of the children in a dark, foul-smelling room chained to their beds. The siblings ranged in age from 2 to 29, with seven of the thirteen children being legal adults (ages 18+) at the time of the parents' arrest in January 2018.
The Turpins shackled, beat and strangled their children, allowing them to eat just once per day and shower just once per year. According to investigators, the older children were so malnourished that they appeared to be much younger. The eldest, a 29-year-old woman, weighed just 82 pounds (37 kg). Some of the siblings appeared to lack basic knowledge of the world, being unfamiliar with what medicine and police were.
The case is considered "extraordinary for numerous reasons", such as the abuse being done to multiple children by two parents (whereas abuse with only one child victim is more common) and, according to Bernard Gallagher, because "you don't often get cases of children being tortured, where the abuse seems calculated".
The Turpins were arrested and detained but pleaded not guilty to all charges. Various legal charges and court hearings followed in the succeeding months.
On February 22, 2019, the couple changed their pleas to guilty on fourteen felony counts, including "cruelty to an adult dependent, child cruelty, torture and false imprisonment".
On April 19, 2019, the couple was sentenced to life imprisonment with the possibility of parole after 25 years, although experts believed they would never receive parole due to the severity of the crimes.