Slave For 25 Years

A vulnerable woman kept as a house slave for 25 years by a mother-of-ten was failed by social services, a neighbour has said today.

A woman living next to Amanda Wixon, who yesterday was convicted of a ‘Dickensian’ decades-long campaign of abuse and false imprisonment, said she repeatedly rang authorities over concerns for the malnourished woman’s welfare.

Wixon took in the victim as a 14-year-old girl initially for a weekend in 1996, but locked her away in the council house in Tewkesbury, Gloucestershire, until 2021, when the alarm was raised with a secret phone.

The woman, who cannot be named for legal reasons but is now in her 40s, was forced into work and kept in appalling conditions inside the ‘house of horrors’.

Disturbing police footage showed the damp ‘prison’ room that was home to the victim, who was discovered fearful, dirty and without any teeth.

She was punched, stamped on, shoved down the stairs and beaten with a broom, among other abuses. She also had bleach spattered on her face, washing liquid squirted down her neck, and her head flushed in the lavatory.

One of Wixon’s neighbours was a witness in the case against the 56-year-old and says she saw her victim regularly knocking on the windows from inside.

Speaking outside of the court hearing, Kiram, a 33-year-old mother, said that she saw the woman being beaten up, thrown around ‘like a rag doll’, and forced to constantly sit on the floor.

She said: ‘It was disgusting. I’m just so shocked it’s been waiting for so long.

‘I was a neighbour from the age of 13. I mentioned it to my mum because I could see it from my room. I made phone calls to social services, nothing was ever done.’

Kiram continued: ‘Social services failed her massively. She was diagnosed with global developmental delay. And obviously, a lot of other learning difficulties.

‘You could tell that she was vulnerable. The hygiene was not there. It was like a house of horrors. There were a few occasions where she’d come to the window. But that was years later. We didn’t think she was still there.’

Kiram said that she used to see the victim as a child, but then saw nothing of her for a number of years, until around 2016.

She said that during the COVID lockdowns, she saw the woman knocking on windows from the inside, but that ‘nothing was ever said’.

A spokesman for Gloucestershire County Council said: ‘We were first made aware of the tragic situation regarding this individual in 2021 as part of the police investigation, and since that point, our Adult Social Care services have been supporting the victim in this shocking case.’

During a two-week trial, prosecutor Samuel Jones said the modern slavery victim, known as ‘K’, was a vulnerable woman who had effectively ‘disappeared’ from society.

Gloucester Crown Court heard the victim was tightly controlled, rarely allowed to leave the two homes where she had lived with Wixon, required to ask for food, denied washing facilities and medical care and forced to clean extensively, often on her knees.

A jury heard she had been born into a dysfunctional family, and Wixon stepped in to help when they could no longer cope with her.

Jurors were told Wixon had seven children at this point, and soon lodged a benefits claim for the latest child.

Mr Jones told the jury: ‘She was kept in and prevented from leaving the address, and she was assaulted and hit many, many times and forced to work with the threats of violence.

‘She had been denied food and the ability to wash over many years.’

A sickening 42-second clip revealed the damp bedroom, with a filthy mattress and bedding, as well as unpainted walls, which proved to be K’s only refuge as she suffered at the hands of Wixon, whom she dubbed ‘The Witch’. 

The clip captures the moment the officer discovers a gut-wrenching note under her pillow – with phone numbers scribbled on it.

The policeman can be heard heavily breathing as he steps into the room and says, ‘Absolutely filthy bedding.’

Police footage also revealed the moment Wixon was arrested in 2021 when police stormed her home.

The court heard police used voice notes sent by the victim to one of Wixon’s children – in which she expressed fear and said she was unsafe – to help build the case against the defendant, while a neighbour described the victim as resembling ‘something out of a concentration camp’.

Some residents reported seeing the victim being humiliated and abused in the garden; others said they did not see her for long periods of time. When they did, she was often sitting alone at a window, waving.

The court heard that following her removal from the house, the victim initially suffered trauma symptoms and had nightmares about Wixon’s abuse.

A doctor noted large, thick calluses on both ankles, which the victim put down to long hours cleaning floors on her hands and knees, while a dentist said she must have suffered extreme pain at times as a result of her rotting teeth.

But since being rescued from Wixon, the woman’s health has improved, and she has become more independent, jurors were told.

Neighbours described Wixon as a ‘controlling woman’. One said: ‘What has happened is beyond belief.

‘When I first moved here 20 years ago, I would regularly see her (the victim) in the garden.

‘She would be hanging the washing out or tending the garden, but then she disappeared.

‘I thought she had moved, but all the time she must have been in the house.’

According to the neighbour who said she phoned social services, the victim is ‘thriving’ and like a ‘completely different person’ after being liberated five years ago.

Another local, who was not aware of the enslavement, described Wixon as ‘filthy’.

She said of the victim: ‘Obviously, she wasn’t allowed to go to the hospital, the doctors.

‘Social services were always shut down, so how was the family meant to know what was going on? That girl is still suffering, and she lost 25 years of her life.’

Another said: ‘It’s shocking this has happened right next to my house.

‘Amanda just seemed like a normal person, we would greet each other with “hello” and “goodbye”, and that’s it.’

Wixon was found guilty of two counts of requiring a person to perform forced or compulsory labour, one count of false imprisonment and three counts of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

She was cleared of one count of assault occasioning actual bodily harm.

She will be sentenced in March, with the judge telling her a prison term was ‘a certainty’.

Wixon showed no remorse as she left the courthouse on foot with several members of her family. 

Asked if she would like to apologise to her victim, she replied: ‘Why would I say sorry for something I never did?’

A request for more comment has been made to Gloucestershire County Council.

If the victim was regularly seen knocking on the windows, why did no one help this poor woman? Her life could have been significantly different if they had. They should have contacted the police; that should have been their first port of call.

Wixon should get at least 50 years in prison, double what the poor victim had to endure.

Let me guess what will happen through the investigation. The police and social services will say that ‘lessons have been learned.’ That there was a ‘failure of the system,’ and that ‘no one is to blame.’ It’s just rinse and repeat just to cover their backsides.

What has happened to our duty of care in this country? If you see something that is wrong, unjust, cruel or illegal, report it to the proper portals for a response, and don’t quit until you get one.