Girl in the Garage: How Laura Cowan Survived Her Imprisonment by Mansa Musa Muhummed

In 1995, Laura Cowan thought she was at rock bottom. Her husband was in prison, and she was financially struggling with trying to take care of her two children, ages three and seven months.

But things would get considerably worse.

That's because she would get together with Mansa Musa Muhummed—an acquaintance of her husband's from their mosque.

She was manipulated into entering a polygamous marriage with Muhummed, who—at the time—had another wife and 12 children. A few years later, he would marry a third woman and have additional children.

Cowan and Muhummed's relationship got increasingly controlling and violent over time, ending in Muhummed imprisoning Cowan and her children in 1998 in his garage—without heat, running water, a bathroom and with minimal food—for about seven months. He nailed the door of the darkened garage shut, from the outside; inside, the victims slept on thin mattresses, and urinated in plastic jugs. Cowan and her children were physically abused during her years with Muhummed; Cowan was also sexually abused.

A&E spoke with Cowan about her experience in the garage and her eventual liberation.

When most people think of abduction, they picture a moment of dramatic force: a chloroform rag to the face, followed by a locked door, for example. But your abduction didn't happen that way. Can you talk about how it did occur?

At first, it was more like: not being released. I'd want to leave, and he wouldn't let me. He would try to talk you out of it, soothe things down.

Then, when I tried to leave, it would be hard. He would never let you use the phone, and if he did—to contact the gas company, say—he'd be on the other end. He'd listen in on everything.

I was trying to find ways to escape. I put a note in the bathroom of a grocery store we went to. That was the last time I tried. And after that, he took me and my two children and he put us in the garage and said this is where you'll stay. Until I say so. And we were in that garage for a little over six months; maybe seven to eight months.

For how many hours a day?

24 hours a day, seven days a week.

The only time he would let me out, it'd be because we had buckets in there to urinate— because he wouldn't let us come into the main house to use the bathroom or wash up. So, every two days or so he would take me and my son, and we'd walk out in the backyard and dump the buckets of urine. Or when he had to go into town and handle some business or something, to talk to someone, he would have me come help him with that. He used me as a buffer for talking to individuals, or handling business.

Were you concerned about the health of your children?

Very. My son, his stomach was extending. And mostly that was from malnutrition, dehydration. His skin was sagging. Even the color of the skin wasn't brown. It was a greenish murky looking brown. We were literally dying in there.

Eventually you were rescued. Can you explain about how that came to pass?

I started looking through the boxes [in the garage]. And I found an old legal pad and an ink pen, and I started writing on the front. It was maybe, 13 pages or so, and then I flipped over on the back because the pad had run out. So, I had close to 26 pages front and back, and I would just fold it up real tight and just keep it with me.

I wrote all the details [of what we were experiencing that] I could think of. I would take those [papers], and I would fold them up and I would sleep with them I would keep them in in my underwear so if he came, in he wouldn't find them.

And I told my son that if I died before him, to make sure someone gets these notes.

And those letters I was able to get out, to a postal worker.

How'd that happen?

Where we lived was real rural. You had to go into town to pick up your mail.

And I had applied for food stamps a month before. When they came, he took me into town to retrieve this package.

So, I was able to go [to the post office] with my letter, but I was so scared. I didn't have a plan. I didn't know what to do with this letter in my underwear. I didn't know anything.

And this guy comes behind us and just started a conversation with Musa. They just start chit-chatting. I was able to get up to the clerk—I [kept] looking over my shoulder [to make sure he was still chatting] and I gave her the slip that I came in for. She had me to sign for it. And as I was signing, I reached up in my underwear and her eyes got really big because I was raising my dress up. And I reached in my underwear, and I pulled this letter out.

I put it on the counter, and she grabbed [it] and put it underneath the counter like she knew something was wrong.

As we were walking out the door, I looked back at her and all she did was nod. That's all she did, like: Everything's gonna be okay.

I was hesitant to tell my kids anything, because I didn't want to get their hopes up.

But two days later, at 5 or 6 in the morning, the sheriff's department was knocking on the door.

[Editor's Note: Muhummed was arrested in November 1999. On June 12, 2008, after years of significant trial delays, he was convicted on 25 counts, including torturing and abusing children and falsely imprisoning his wives. On February 14, 2009, he was sentenced to seven consecutive life terms.]