A woman who endured two years chained to a bed while being beaten and sexually assaulted was finally rescued after a repairman heard her muffled screams. The ordeal took place in North Dakota, where police discovered the victim shackled to a bed frame with a padlock fastened around one of her ankles.
Victim's Account and Arrests
Rushed to hospital, the woman allegedly revealed she had been sexually assaulted and beaten by her ex-husband, 40-year-old Arturo Calzada Becerril, and his girlfriend, 41-year-old Erendira Amoles. The pair reportedly sought to exploit her to bolster his immigration status.
Communicating via a translation app, the victim told authorities that Calzada Becerril had brought her over from Mexico in 2024, keeping her imprisoned inside the property for years, with a security camera trained on her bed and the bedroom windows blacked out with tin foil, according to Valley News Live.
Details from Court Documents
Court documents reveal that Amoles returned to the flat with her eight-year-old daughter shortly after authorities freed the victim, and all three are said to hail from the same town in Mexico.
According to the court documents, Calzada Becerril allegedly kept the woman locked up so that "she did not run away" because she was addicted to drugs and he did not want her to start using again, Inforum reported.
"The chains on the headboard appeared secured together with large bolts, washers, and nuts," an investigative report viewed by Inforum read. "The chain was wrapped around the headboard and sheathed in a foam pool noodle. The chains at the head and the foot of the bed both had Master Lock brand padlocks on them."
Impact on Neighbours
The victim was discovered with bruising across her arms, legs and face, and told authorities she had been punched, leaving a scar on her forehead. She also informed police that on one occasion Calzada Becerril and Amoles allegedly pinned her down, beat and sexually assaulted her.
Prosecutors allege that Calzada Becerril and Amoles held the woman, who is a US citizen, against her will in order to secure immigration status, according to Valley News Live.
Erin Schauer, a resident in the building, told Valley News Live: "We have security coming through from like 6pm to 11pm every single night. They stop in the hallways, they walk through every single building, they drive around."
"That is really scary. You hear about that all the time on the news, but the fact that it was literally right over there."
Fellow neighbour Reed Bertsch remarked: "It's unbelievable. I just can't believe no one heard it, or you know, had any suspicion of something like that going on," he said. "It's usually a little quaint place to live, but Fargo is getting crazy."
