Thread by @IhuezeMD

Sylvia Likens.

Aged 16.

She was held captive and subjected to increasing levels of child abuse and torture.

She was tortured over a period of three months, by her caregiver, and several other neighborhood children, before ultimately succumbing to her injuries.

Sylvia was the third of five children born to her parents. She was born between two sets of fraternal twins— Dianna and Daniel (two years older than she), and Jenny and Benny (one year younger).

Jenny had suffered from polio, causing one of her legs to be weaker than the other. She was afflicted with a notable limp and had to wear a steel brace on one leg.

Their parent's marriage was unstable; they often sold candy, beer, and soda at carnival stands, moving frequently, and regularly experiencing severe financial difficulties.

The sons regularly traveled with their parents in order to help out, but due to concerns for their younger daughters' safety and education, they didn't particularly like Sylvia and Jenny traveling with them.

Both girls frequently resided with relatives often their grandmother, so that their schoolwork would not suffer while their parents and brothers traveled.

In her teenage years, Sylvia occasionally earned spending money by babysitting, running errands, or performing ironing chores for friends and neighbors, often giving her mother part of her earnings.

She was described as a friendly, confident and lively with long, wavy, light brown hair extending below her shoulders, and was known as "Cookie" to her friends.

By June 1965, Sylvia and Jenny resided with their parents.

On July 3, their mother was arrested and subsequently jailed for shoplifting.

Shortly thereafter, Lester Likens arranged for his daughters to stay with Gertrude Baniszewski, the mother of two girls with whom the sisters had recently become acquainted while in High School.

Gertrude assured Lester she would care for his daughters until his return as if they were her own children.

Shortly after, the sisters moved in, with the understanding that Gertrude would receive weekly boarding fees of $20 to care for their daughters until they return.

Gertrude Baniszewski.

The first week of Sylvia and Jenny's lives at the Baniszewski home went relatively well.

They attended high school & attended teenage social functions with the Gertrude's children as well as church with Gertrude on Sunday.

When Lester's $20 payment failed to arrive, though, Gertrude threw a temper tantrum, screaming at the girls, "I took care of you two bitches for nothing!".

She'd force them to lie across her bed with their skirts and underwear around their ankles while Baniszewski beat their buttocks.

Shortly thereafter, Lester and Betty Likens came into town to check on the girls; neither of them made any reference to the beatings.

The next week, Sylvia and Jenny went through the neighborhood garbage, collecting old Coca Cola bottles to sell in order to get money for candy.

When they came home with the candy, Gertrude accused them of stealing; when Sylvia explained how she had gotten the candy,...

Gertrude accused her of lying & made her bend over her bed as before while she beat her with a paddle.

Shortly thereafter, Gertrude's children came to her after a church social and told her that they were disgusted with the amount of food they had seen Sylvia eating.

Gertrude then forced Sylvia to eat a hot dog piled with condiments; when Sylvia vomited, she forced her to the vomitus.

Soon afterwards, Lester and Betty Likens again came into town to check on the girls, Sylvia made no reference to the vomit eating incident.

The incident which appears to have either precipitated, triggered, or coincided with the sharp decline of Gertrude's mental stability occurred in August of 1965 when she overheard Sylvia remark that she had once allowed a boy to feel her up.

Gertrude inexplicably burst into a fit of obscenities, accused Sylvia of being a prostitute, and informed the rest of the house that Sylvia was pregnant because she had let a boy touch her vagina.

Gertrude then attacked Sylvia, repeatedly kicking her in the crotch.

When Sylvia attempted to sit down afterwards, Gertrude threw her out of the chair & informed her, "You ain't fit to sit in chairs."

From there on, Gertrude only allowed Sylvia to sit in a chair with permission.

Around this time, Gertrude also began allowing her older children to use Sylvia as a sort of living "play thing", with the "games" ranging from beatings to being pushed down the stairs.

Why Sylvia's story so enraged Gertrude remains uncertain.

It has been theorized that she saw in Sylvia the beauty and opportunity for happiness that had long ago escaped her, and so encouraged and participated in Sylvia's degradation and torture as an act of self loathing.

Others have theorized that Gertrude's hard life and current living conditions resulted in a mental break.

Some others theorized that the violence against Sylvia was an extreme form of domestic abuse, in which Gertrude directed her rage onto Sylvia.

Whatever the case, Gertrude manifested this rage by justifying her attacks by accusing Sylvia of being a prostitute, and delivering bizarre "sermons" to her children and Sylvia about the filthiness of prostitues and women in general.

Gertrude encouraged a certain boy from the neighbourhood to come to their apartment, during which she would instruct the boy to practice his judo on Sylvia, then rape her afterwards.

Sometime later, Sylvia went out to sell old soda bottles for money. When she returned home, Gertrude accused her of prostitution.

Took her into the living room of her home and forced Sylvia to strip naked in front of her sons & several neighborhood boys.

Once Sylvia was fully naked, she handed her a glass Coca Cola bottle, and forced Sylvia to masturbate with it for the boys.

After which she'd instruct the boys to take turns in raping her.

Following the Coke bottle incident, Sylvia became incontinent(she couldn't control urination); as a result, Gertrude decided that she was no longer fit to live with humans, and locked her in the basement.

The lack of a toilet in the basement forced Sylvia to defecate and urinate on the floor.

Often, Gertrude and her 12yr old son would make Sylvia clean the basement by forcing her to eat her own feces, & gave her a container to collect her urine, which she was then made to drink.

Gertrude's children turned Sylvia into a money-making opportunity, charging neighborhood boys a nickel to gawk at the nude Sylvia or to push her down the stairs to the basement, where she was now kept when not being bathed or put on display.

Throughout the period of Likens' captivity in the basement, Gertrude frequently restrained Sylvia before placing her in a bathtub filled with scalding water before proceeding to rub salt into her wounds.

In order to muffle her' screams, her tormentors would regularly rub faeces on a piece of cloth, place the cloth gag in her mouth as they tortured her.

On different occasions, Gertrude would heat a piece of rod on fire, then insert it into Sylvia's vagina 😩

On October 25, Sylvia attempted to escape from the basement after overhearing a conversation between Gertrude & her son pertaining to the family's plan to abandon her to die.

She attempted to flee to the front door, although due to her extensive injuries & general weakness, Gertrude caught her before she could escape.

She was then given toast to eat but was unable to consume the food due to her extreme state of dehydration.

Gertrude forced the toast into her mouth before repeatedly striking her face with a curtain rod repeated times, rendering her unconscious. Gertrude then dragged Likens into the basement.

By the morning of October 26, Sylvia was unable to either speak intelligibly or to correctly coordinate the movement of her limbs.

Shortly thereafter, she became delirious, repeatedly moaning and mumbling.

She died shortly after.

Gertrude and her children were arrested and convicted.

Gertrude was later released from prison but died shortly from lung cancer.