After being held against her will for months in western Pennsylvania, a woman began scrawling desperate pleas for help on scraps of paper last week, secretly leaving the notes in public bathrooms for others to find whenever she was taken outside.
“If I don’t make it tell my family I love them,” she wrote in one of the clandestine messages, KDKA reported.
On Sunday, police finally found the woman and 38-year-old Corey Brewer, who allegedly held the victim captive for more than two months and was charged with multiple crimes, including sexual assault and strangulation. The victim, who wasn’t named, said she had been held against her will since May 1 and accused Brewer of threatening to kill her and her children if she tried to escape, according to KDKA.
An attorney for Brewer did not immediately return a request for comment. Brewer declined to speak with local reporters after he posted $500 bail and was released from jail.
A stranger found the woman’s first note on a mirror inside a Walmart bathroom in Carnegie, Pa., on July 8, according to a criminal complaint reported by ABC News. The victim detailed how Brewer had allegedly held her prisoner, beaten her and sexually assaulted her. She also gave a description of Brewer’s car and provided the address where she was being held.
According to the criminal complaint, no one answered the door when police went to the address, but officers heard shuffling noises inside as if furniture was being moved. Without a warrant, they could not go in.
On Friday, officers phoned Brewer and asked to speak to the victim. She talked to police on speaker phone as Brewer listened, telling them that she was with her boyfriend. Brewer told the officers that he and the victim were on vacation New York, WPXI reported. Police said the victim had been dating Brewer, and she sought a now-expired protection order against him in August 2020.
A day later, a second note appeared in a public restroom near the Frank Lloyd Wright Fallingwater museum in Mill Run, Pa., ABC News reported. It said the victim was not really on vacation with her boyfriend in New York and that she was still in danger.
The message was found just days after police knocked on the door of the address in the first letter. The new note said the victim had “heard the police knocking at the residence, that the abuse hasn’t stopped, and please don’t give up,” according to the criminal complaint.
On Sunday, police obtained a warrant, searched the home and arrested Brewer. The victim was taken to a nearby hospital, WTAE reported.
The woman told police that, over the course of more than two months, Brewer had sexually assaulted her, beaten her, and strangled her multiple times, ABC News reported. He allegedly took the woman’s cellphone away and threatened to harm her children if she fled. She also said Brewer had taken nonconsensual, explicit photos of her, according to the criminal complaint.
Brewer was charged with involuntary deviate sexual assault, sexual assault, unlawful restraint, strangulation, simple assault, and making terroristic threats. His preliminary hearing is set for July 22, according to court records.
More reading:
