In 2018, thirteen children were able to escape their Perris, California home where their abusive parents, David and Louise Turpin, had been holding them captive for years. Now, the foster family tasked with watching over the Turpin children after their rescue has confessed to abusing them.
Marcelino Olguin pleaded guilty last week to three counts of lewd and lascivious acts on a child under 14, one count of child endangerment, and one count of false imprisonment. His wife Rosa and daughter Lennys pleaded guilty to child endangerment and false imprisonment charges.
The Riverside County Sheriff’s Department began investigating the Olguins in 2021 after some of the Turpin children came forward with allegations of physical and sexual abuse. District Attorney Mike Hestrin went public with the allegations of foster abuse in a 2021 interview with ABC News' Diane Sawyer.
In addition to the criminal case, the victims filed civil suits against the Riverside County Department of Public Social Services in July 2022 for gross negligence. The attorney for the Turpin children says his clients “endured worse treatment in foster care” than in the “house of horrors” they initially escaped from.
The Turpin children’s story has revealed systemic failures at nearly every level. A 600-page report from 2022 included a series of recommendations to improve Riverside County’s broken social services system.