A nanny who traveled to Woodbury, Minnesota, from China was found wandering two miles from her home by police. She had two blackened eyes, and following a trip to the hospital, x-rays revealed several broken ribs and a broken sternum.
Her alleged captor Lili Huang is being charged with five felony counts, including labor trafficking, false imprisonment and assault. The nanny told authorities that she wasn’t allowed to leave the house and was fed a starvation diet of crackers that brought her weight down from 120 lbs to 88 lbs in about four months. She finally ran from the premises when Huang threatened to kill her with a knife.
The nanny began working for the Huang’s in Shanghai, caring for their daughter, but was allegedly not abused during that time. She agreed to come with them to the United States, and that’s when things changed. The Associated Press reports that the nanny was looking for an airport to fly back to China when she was found. Also:
A bag hidden under the nanny’s mattress contained a large amount of her hair, which Huang allegedly ripped from the woman’s head. The nanny had been hiding it so Huang wouldn’t find it “and force her to eat it,” the complaint said.
The Washington Post reports that Huang took her alleged captive’s passport after she said she wished to return to China. The woman told authorities that she was forced to crawl around the house for hours “like a dog” after being beaten too badly to stand up. She has said she felt trapped without her identification, money, or able to speak English, but she did manage to take photos of bruises, cuts and scrapes on her cell phone, which she then shared with authorities and a department translator.
Image via AP.