by Hall, Shyima
It helped too that my English was now passable. Most people understood me, and I understood them. Learning the language of my new country had been a long, slow process, but it had been totally worth it. It’s hard to make lasting friendships or understand why things are the way they are when you cannot communicate.
Life was getting better, but inside I was still a jaded person. I can look back now and see that I wasn’t the friendliest person to be around, but my history was that the vast majority of the people in my life had not treated me well. Because of that my ongoing issues with trust were still with me.
One person who helped me gain trust was my new friend Amber Bessix. We went to the same high school, and although I had seen her in passing in the hallway, we had not spoken before we met through work. Amber and I became a great team at Godiva, and she went on to become one of my best friends.
I liked my job, even though I hadn’t specifically been interested in a retail store position. Meeting new people and having pride in a job well done were extra bonuses. I found too that when someone who wore traditional Egyptian clothing, or spoke a bit of Arabic, came into the store, I was instantly brought back to my early years with my family. In that way my job offered a small but comforting piece of home.
Since then every job I have had has been in a retail store. Unfortunately, the hours I spent on my feet at work were hard on my rheumatoid arthritis. I had been diagnosed with RA after I’d come to live with my new foster family. During my sophomore year of high school I had scary swellings on my body and raised bubbles on my knees, and my joints were so painful that I was limited in what I could do. Plus, my muscles would get tight and I often couldn’t move in the morning. On some days I had many sharp pains and couldn’t go to school. In fact, I was often so stiff that it would take me hours to get up and out of bed.
Even though I had been telling my doctor and my foster parents about my symptoms, not a single person took me seriously. “You’re fine. You’re just being a teen,” my doctor said. This man treated a lot of kids in foster care. I don’t know if he thought we weren’t worth his full concern and attention, but the way he dismissed me bordered on rude.
To make matters worse, my symptoms worsened as I grew older. One day I realized I had dropped twenty-five pounds in a short period of time. “I can’t eat,” I said to Patty. “I can’t move.” My foster parents followed the doctor’s lead and did not think that anything was wrong with me. I didn’t speak to my foster mom for three weeks. I was that mad!
Eventually Steve qualified for better insurance, and as soon as I could, I took the initiative to find a new doctor on my own. When the tests came back, my new doctor told me that not only did I have rheumatoid arthritis, but my disease was advanced enough that my joints looked like those of a woman in her eighties. While I was not pleased to find that I had RA, I was comforted that there was actually a name for what I had been experiencing. Until then, I’d had no idea what was wrong with me.
The diagnosis was a huge relief, because now that my doctor and I knew what we were dealing with, we could develop a plan to treat it. The first step in that plan was for me to go to a specialist. He was extremely helpful, and I regularly saw this physician until a few months ago, when he retired. Among many other things, he showed me how my knees and wrists were the most affected parts of my body. I was glad to hear this, because I had been telling people for a long time how much these joints hurt.
The medication I was now taking for RA was hard to adjust to, especially because I had not yet discontinued the medications I had been taking for years for insomnia, depression, and anxiety. With all of the meds combined I ended up with mouth sores and hair loss. But I quickly gained back the weight I’d lost—and then some!
During this process my doctor asked for my parental and family medical histories. I had none of that. At times I don’t want to tell people about my past, and for some reason this was one of those times. In lieu of the truth I told him I had never met my biological family. My social worker then went the extra mile to try to find some information for me, but there was no information to be had. That is another sad fact of slavery, of human trafficking. Other people will be able to take specific preventative steps toward good health if, for example, they know breast cancer or strokes run in their family. I will probably not have that opportunity.
RA is not curable, but treatment can make a world of difference in how well a person feels and how much they are able to do physically. Now that I know warmth helps my joints, I often take long, hot baths. I have never done well in cold weather and can see how fortunate I was to have ended up in California rather than Maine, Montana, or Minnesota.
Today I still take medication, but I also get steroid shots in my hips every two months. It helps if I stay active with gentle exercise, so I walk as much as I can. Left untreated, RA will take a lot of out of you. I know it did me. That’s why I am careful to take extra good care of my body now.
Sometime after my diagnosis I made the decision to stop taking the other medications I had been taking. The insomnia medicine, the medication for anxiety, and the prescription for depression: gone. All of it. I stopped because I did not like the way they made me feel, and even I could see that I was too quiet and too withdrawn when I was on the meds.
I believe under certain circumstances that taking medication under the supervision of a doctor or therapist can be helpful. I also believe that those prescriptions helped me tremendously early on. After I was rescued and into my years with my first two foster families I was too nervous, anxious, and depressed to function well. But now I was no longer that intimidated young girl. For me, the medication did what it was supposed to do, and then I was done with it. Besides, it was way too much with the addition of the medications for my arthritis.
The big concern I had about having RA was that because of it I might not be able to go into my career choice: law enforcement. From the day I had been rescued, I had wanted to help others like me—people who were held in captivity. I later found that my RA would not affect my goal, but that small scare made me focus on taking the first step toward my dream, and that was to become a citizen of the United States.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
All throughout this time legal battles were brewing for my former captors. Mark Abend was a frequent visitor and often drove me back to Orange County to meet with prosecutors. By now I looked forward to these sessions because with each meeting I felt The Mom and The Dad were that much closer to getting what was due them. What goes around comes around.
There were many interviews, and the officials kept me up to date about their plans to bring me justice. At one point they asked if they could use a letter I had written to my former captors. I don’t know if The Mom and The Dad ever saw the letter, but my therapist thought it would help me if I wrote it. Now Mark and his team thought it would help the case if the judge could see it. I am not sure of the date of the letter, but from the style of my writing, I was probably about sixteen. Here is what I wrote:
Hi,
My name is Shyima Hassan. I have a big family in Egypt, five brothers and five sisters. I had the best brothers and sisters in Egypt. I had the best time being with them. I loved them so much because they loved me back and they made life easy for me. When I needed someone they were there for me.
I also had friends in Egypt. I had this person that was there for me, that I played with. Yes, I had friends, too, like everyone else. I also had a mom and a dad who loved me before you blackmailed them and you made them give me up. That was the day I thought life was over, and you know why? Because you took me away from my life. That’s when I also lost faith in God. You guys made me lose my one true love in the world because of all the things you guys told my family and the things you did to me.
You made my life miserable and you did not care. You guys treated me like crap in Egypt and in the U.S.A. I had to keep my mouth shut because of what you said you would do to my sister. And, yes, I am away from my family because of w
hat you said she did. So I had to deal with you because I love my sister and would not want to see her in jail. You not only blackmailed my mom and dad, you blackmailed my heart.
Now I have a better way of life away from you guys. I have a great family. I am almost done with high school, too. Life is just great without you guys and I know I have God with me, too. I am living my life like a real teenager and everyday I thank God and everyone else who saved me away from you.
I was surprised to learn that Mark was so determined to see The Mom and The Dad pay for what they’d done to me that he was going to fly all the way to Egypt to meet my parents. I think he hoped to get facts to back up the prosecution’s case. I tried to prepare him as to the kind of people he might find, but even so, he must have been quite taken aback when he met my family.
Mark later told me that when he met with my mom and dad, a lawyer and a stenographer were there. It sounded as if my parents were afraid they might get into trouble and wanted to be sure the meeting was recorded in a legal fashion. I believe that The Dad paid for these services for my parents. Mark said that at the meeting my dad looked quite frail and in poor health. My dad told Mark that he’d recently had open heart surgery and that my captor, The Dad, had paid for that, too.
Mark must have been astounded at the lack of compassion my parents showed. Even after this much time, rather than saying, “We miss Shyima. We love her. When can we see her?” they made it clear to Mark that they wanted me to go back to my captors.
I have to hope that some of that was their not understanding that what they’d done to me was wrong. Most of us enjoy a decent standard of living here in the United States, but it was not unusual for poor families in Egypt to sell their children into service to a wealthier family.
My parents, I think, saw their children as income opportunities. My mom and dad had so little that in their eyes everyone needed to contribute financially, even the kids. My placement with The Mom and The Dad had brought my family about one hundred Egyptian pounds every month. At the time, that converted roughly to seventeen US dollars. Many families in the US spend more than that for a meal at McDonald’s.
I had always been told that most of my “wages” had gone to repay what my sister had stolen. How much could it have been? Even with the debt of honor thrown in, I believe I was held by my captors long after my sister’s debt had been repaid.
Through Mark I learned that by this time my parents were living in a dirt house, which meant that whatever money they’d lost when I’d been rescued was missed. And through pictures that he either took or was given, I could see that my family’s clothes were as dirty and worn as they had been when I was taken away from them. But you know what? It didn’t matter. It had not been my choice to leave my family. I was not given the option to stay, and I can tell you that if I had been given the choice, I never would have left my loved ones. It didn’t matter that we had next to nothing. We had love for one another, and when all is said and done, love is the only thing that is important in life. That my captors’ home had been nicer than my family’s was of no importance to me. Not many would trade a nice house for twenty-hour work days, no pay, no vacations or days off, no medical care, being slapped, and continually being told that you are stupid. Even now I get angry just thinking about it.
My sister was willing to testify on behalf of my captors too, the sister who’d stolen. After hearing this I can only assume that she had been told either by my dad or their lawyer what to say. “They treated me very well when I was there,” she said over and over again in her videotaped pretrial interview. If that was the case, then why had she stolen from them?
• • •
After that it was “hurry up and wait.” Again. I was learning that the legal process in the United States takes a long time. While I waited, I kept busy at work and going to school, but I didn’t tell many people what was going on. For the most part I kept my former life private. Especially at school. Even though I knew a trial was looming that could potentially bring me a great deal of personal satisfaction, few people outside my family knew about it. Part of that was because I wanted to be a regular kid. The other part was that the last thing in the world I wanted to do was see The Mom and The Dad again. But when the time came for me to confront them, I did.
I so badly wanted my former captors convicted that I could taste it, but speaking up against The Mom and The Dad with them in the room was one of the hardest things I ever did. I was glad Mark was there to help me through this unpleasant task. My foster dad was supportive, but I always thought first of Mark whenever the word “dad” popped into my brain. I am still blown away that Mark spent so much time over many years to try to convict The Mom and The Dad. He didn’t have to do it, and honestly, most others would not have.
Early on in the proceedings Robert Keenan and Andrew Kline had been assigned to my case. I needed two lawyers because they each handled different areas of the law, and this case was complex enough that there was a lot of legal ground to cover. Robert was based in Los Angeles, and Andrew in Washington, DC. Both men prepped me for the trial and took me through many last-minute changes. I hated revisiting the terrible memories in the depth that we did, but I knew it was the only way to make these people pay. I had no notion of what that “pay” might amount to in terms of jail time, but I hoped it would involve a long stay behind bars. I knew, though, that the more information Mark and the lawyers had, the better chance we would have of a conviction and a strong sentence.
One of the things I had to do was watch video footage that had been taken while I’d been in captivity. This was a tense process for me. The footage had been seized along with other documents and records, not long after I had been rescued. While I watched, Mark and my lawyers asked question after question about what was going on with the family when each video was shot. Who was in the video? What were they doing? Saying? And most important: Where was I?
We wanted to show through video that I had not been part of the family. The Mom and The Dad were apparently going to claim that I had been. In one video the family is celebrating their youngest daughter’s birthday. All of the family members are shown seated at a table in the dining room and are surrounded by plates, cups, glasses, silverware, and food. There is a lot of food. I pop in and out of the video as I hurriedly clear plates from the table, bring more water, and place other food out for people to eat. If I was part of the family, then why wasn’t I seated at the table having a good time like everyone else?
I was surprised to learn that my biological family had consented to being filmed for a video. In it many members of my family stated how much they loved and missed me, and how they wished I were back home with them. That video was the hardest for me to watch. I had many mixed emotions, but mostly, looking at the footage made me feel sad inside. Then I thought of the many times my dad had yelled at me for not going back with my captors, and all the times my mom had told me I had to stay. I thought too of my sister who had changed the course of my life with her actions.
Eventually I began to cry. Mark was in the room with me, as were Robert and Andrew. Mark gave the lawyers a look, and they stepped away. Then Mark sat next to me and tried to give me courage. “It doesn’t matter what they say,” he said. “These people aren’t in your life anymore. You have a lot of support here; do not let these people bring you down.”
He was right, but more than what my family said on the video, the saddest part of watching my family was that, other than my mom and dad, I didn’t remember any of the people. How wrong is that? I should have recognized every person caught on camera. I should have known how my mother moved, how my sister tilted her head. But I didn’t. I didn’t recall any of it, or any of them. All I could recognize was that my mother looked much older, and my dad, who had always been small and thin, had lost even more weight.
On the surface it looked like this should have been a pretty open-and-shut case. My captors had held me against my will, which is a violation of many different laws, both state and
federal. But a case like this, I learned, is never easy. Initially there are jurisdictional issues to settle. Which law enforcement agency gets to prosecute, and for which particular crime? Then there is the fact that in the United States we operate on a system of innocent until proven guilty. Everyone here has the right to an attorney, and once The Mom and The Dad lawyered up, their legal team did everything they could to delay justice. It is amazing how many kinks one side in a legal battle can throw into the mix.
Mark, my lawyers, and I prepared over and over for the trial. I was extremely nervous about it. I didn’t want to have to go through that, to sit in a courtroom day after day and look at those people who’d stolen my childhood. But I was ready for it and would have done it. However, at the last minute The Mom and The Dad both pled guilty. I guess even their lawyers could see that the evidence against them was strong enough that my captors were certain to go to jail. The only thing up in the air was which jail and for how long. The Mom and The Dad’s legal team must have advised them that they’d never win in a jury trial, and that their sentences would be lighter if they pled guilty.
I was not there when they gave their pleas, but I later heard that the judge cried. I am beyond glad that people who can make a difference saw through my captors’ lies.
The guilty plea meant that I would not have to sit in the courtroom like a specimen for my former captors to view. I only had to sit in the gallery (the audience part of the courtroom) for the sentencing hearing. The purpose of a sentencing hearing is to determine what punishment the defendant deserves for the crime he or she committed. Witnesses can be called at the hearing by both sides, which helps the judge better decide on the appropriate punishment. Defendants can speak on their own behalf, and the people they have wronged have the opportunity to address them. This meant that I had the chance to say anything I wanted to The Mom or The Dad and they had to sit there and take it.