(via neogaf)
th kidnapper apparently had an xbox live profile under his real name, and had a picture up on gamertagpics, of the kidnappee in front of the house.
http://www.gamertagradio.com/vbporta...ead.php?t=3172
In case you missed the news story earlier this week 13 year old William “Ben” Ownby disappeared after getting off his school bus in suburban Missouri. A witness told police he saw a white truck speeding away from the area, when the owner of the truck was identified a search warrant was issued for the apartment of Michael Devlin, 41 of suburban St Louis Missouri. Upon serving the warrant police found Ben at Devlin’s apartment, and in a shocking twist they also found Shawn Hornbeck, now 15 years old, who had disappeared after going for a bike ride 4 years earlier.
It turns out that Devlin is not only the owner of Xbox Live gamertag appropriately named “DevilDevlin”, but had also registered an account on Gamertagpics.com. Gamertagpics.com is a popular social networking site for Xbox Live members. While 41 year old Michael Devlin was the owner of the profile on Gamertagpics, the profile features a picture Shawn Hornbeck which appears to have been taken outside Devlin’s apartment. The profile on Gamertagpics was registered in 2005 and has been inactive for 232 days, but DevilDevlin was last seen online playing Saint’s Row on 1/13/2007 according to his gamercard. The gamertag was likely shared by Michael Devlin and Shawn Hornbeck, or used by Shawn exclusively, as this Sunday’s Washington Post reported “Residents said they often spotted Shawn out and about, visiting friends on his bicycle or playing video games with the apartment door open.” Either way I know speak for everyone at Gamertag Radio when I say we’re just glad this tragic story had a happy ending. Game on Shawn!
Special thanks to Zamees and Misty of Gamertagpics.com for their help with this story.
It gets deeper than that. Shawn apparently posted on his parents "missing son" website under an assumed name.
Shawn's whole story just sounds strange. I'm sure we'll get more of it at some point but something tells me his "kidnapping" was a little different than William Ownby's. I know victims bond with kidnappers and get pretty screwed up emotionally, but something isn't quite right about it.
Shawn Hornbeck was 11 when he was taken. 11.Originally Posted by Skipper
A consenting, 37-year-old adult took him against his will, and hid his whereabouts and state of wellbeing from his parents.
That isn't "kidnapping", Skipper. That's fucking kidnapping, period. There's nothing fishy about it; the kid was threatened repeatedly with a gun early on, and brainwashed into believing his parents didn't want him and that his kidnapper was his "dad" (note proper use of quotation marks here). That's monumentally fucked up beyond words, and blaming the victim for it (and thus tacitly showing empathy for the sick piece of shit who did this) is really, really off-putting.
Where have you seen this info as I haven't seen any details of what happened come out yet.
I don't think there's any empathy for the kidnapper, just some message board speculation on the strangeness of the circumstances.
Yeah... The whole "leaving the door open while he was gone" thing is a little fishy, as even the most deluded of children would understand a man with a gun is not a good guy.
Oh well. He's safe, thats all that matters, as is the other boy who was kidnapped recently.
Well, how many men in the US has a gun? ;)
I think people underestimate the Stockholm Syndrome.
How many times would you have to tell an eleven-year-old "If you run away I will find and kill your family" before he doesn't run out an unlocked door?
7 year old african american girl, Erica Pratt: Kidnapped in philly, bound with duct tape, and locked in the basement of an abandoned building. She freed herself by chewing through the tape, smashing through a door and breaking a window to yell for help, police said.
11 year old white boy, William Ownby: Kidnapped. Stays put for 4 years, gets a bunch of piercings, plays xbox.
Someone needs to call up the KKK and inform them that we are no longer the master race.
This is an 11 year old kid, from a very rural part of Missouri, neither savvy or street-smart. What he knows about crime is what he's seen in movies and on television, where the villains are smart and cunning and have elaborate plans. We look at his captor and see a dysfunctional moron. He looks at his captor and sees a guy twice his size, who appears to be smarter than smart, and who has threatened him and those he loves with bodily harm and murder....
...and Hornbeck spends some of his most difficult emotional and intellectual developmental years shackled to this freak, learning what Devlin wants him to know, being conditioned with ideas that Devlin wants to plant in his brain.
If we can believe that folks like Jim Jones, Tim Koresh, or Charles Manson can brainwash dozens and dozens of adult followers, why is it so tough to believe that a 40-year-old man could establish a psychological prison for two emotionally and intellectually immature little boys?
dude, if you can't see the humor in my post, you really just need to quit the internet.
That being said, I'm sure there is more to it than teh kidnaper hypnotizedinated him with hiz devil eyes. I'm sure the press will beat this to death and drag all out and it will make for a great lifetime movie of the week.
Last edited by Angrycoder; 01-16-2007 at 12:22 AM.
One day, I hope to meet that girl. The only way she could have more completely pwnt those kidnappers is if she had beaten the shit out of them with a plush toy prior to tying them up and getting the police.
I seem to recall Dave Chappelle talking about that girl getting on the bus and heading home after escaping, because she not only recognized where she was but knew which line to take.
Wow you WAY overread my statements there. It was speculation that we don't know the entire story. The quotations on "kidnapping" were meant to imply there is a LOT more than kidnapping going on here. This kid in particular simply gave up even trying to flee. He was either beaten into submission, or traumatized immensly, or in some strange way, grew to think his family wouldn't want him back, probably from embarasment of heavy abuse. I neither said nor meant to imply I don't believe the kid was tramutized. I also neither said nor implied I don't feel for him and the family in this situation.
I don't blame the victim here for anything. Only one person here commited a crime and thank god the guy is in custody now. Before blowing a gasket on me next time, read a little about what all the kid has done. His actions are strange. They don't jive with simple kidnapping. It sounds like a lot more.
I understand it's hard to read into what people say in email and on a forum but your reply really is reading way to much in to what I was trying to say. I blame myself for not stating it more clearly.
Dude, you're the one who gets all crybaby and tells people to "wave their flacid (sic) modcock around, I'm outta here"....quitting the internet seems to be your style sweetie, not mine.
Wow, bringing up cross forum drama, I am flattered that you remembered my words.
And I wasn't suggesting that you quit the internet either, but since you seem too fucking dense to pick up on any of my other points, I don't know why I'm surprised.
You seem to have a pretty vested and passionate interest in this affair, would you care to show us on the doll where the bad man touched you?
Get a room you two.
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