LIVING HELL
Inside eerie yard where Stephanie Slater was held hostage in wooden coffin and raped in horror kidnap ordeal
EERIE pictures show the yard where Stephanie Slater was held hostage and raped during a horrific kidnap ordeal.
The estate agent, then 25, was kept prisoner in a makeshift coffin inside a wheelie bin for eight days at the home of killer Michael Sams in Newark, Nottinghamshire.
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He had abducted Stephanie after arranging to meet her at an empty house in the Great Barr area of Birmingham in 1992.
The case later became one of the UK’s most infamous kidnapping crimes.
He had kidnapped and killed 18 year old Julie Dart from Leeds six months earlier.
Sams remains in prison for his crimes.
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Interest in the disturbing case was reignited recently when the shocking story was retold in a two part documentary The Girl in the Box: The Kidnapping of Stephanie Slater which aired on Channel 5.
Stephanie was handcuffed naked to a mattress and raped by wooden-legged killer Michael Sams, now 81.
A £175,000 ransom was made in exchange for her release.
While working, Stephanie arranged a house viewing with a "Bob Southall".
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She went to meet the prospective buyer at a Birmingham property in January 1992.
The man turned out to be Sams, who held a knife to Stephanie's throat.
Sams, who had already killed Julie Dart in July 1991, then blindfolded Stephanie and drove her 70 miles to his workshop in Newark.
Dragging her tied up body out of his car, Sams, from Keighley, West Yorks then placed her in a wooden box.
The box was inside a wheelie bin which had bricks on top to keep the lid closed.
Stephanie's arms were strung up like pieces of meat and electrodes shoved down her trousers.
While she was raped during the ordeal, Sams decided to spare her life when she told him she had been adopted.
He had demanded the cash from her employer, Shipways Estate Agency in Great Barr, and warned them not to inform the police.
When Stephanie’s boss Kevin Watts dropped off the cash he was able to evade the cops.
Around a thousand officers were prepared to apprehend Sams at the meet.
But Sams managed to outwit them by sending Watts down a deserted, rural single-track road in the dark, where any cop following in a car would easily be spotted.
Once he'd got the money, Sams then dumped Stephanie outside her parents’ house before driving off.
But a passer-by who had seen the red Metro car Sams was driving gave a strong description of him - as did Stephanie, allowing an artist to create a striking likeness.
And during one call he forgot to disguise his real voice, giving the police, who were recording it, a key piece of evidence.
Police were then able to make an appeal on the TV programme Crimewatch.
The combination of the car, the voice and the artist's drawing were enough to bring him to justice.
Sams’ first wife, Susan Oake, then came forward to help identify him.
He was arrested at his workshop and jailed for life in July 1993 for the kidnap of Stephanie and the kidnap and murder of Julie.
While he admitted to the kidnap at his trial, Sams denied Julie’s murder, but was found guilty by a jury at Nottingham Crown Court.
Stephanie, who gave her first exclusive interview about her ordeal to The Sun and, years later, published a book about it, had been lucky to escape alive.
She went on to work with police to help officers dealing with kidnap victims and also supported survivors to overcome their ordeal.
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Stephanie later moved to the Isle of Wight, where she had holidayed as a girl, and opened a gift shop.
She sadly died of cancer aged 50 in 2017.
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