Filmmaker and actor Tyler Perry has reportedly been providing support to the Turpin family, who were rescued from their California home in 2018 following years of neglect and abuse.
Oprah Winfrey revealed Perry’s chartible acts in California earlier this month when he received The Paley Honors Award for his achievements in media. Winfrey said Perry learned about the Turpins from a primetime special with Diane Sawyer and reached out, according to People.
“Wntil this moment, no one has known that Tyler Perry has been taking care of those now almost grown children, making sure they have the financial, the psychological and the emotional support to grow themselves forward,” Winfrey said at the December 4 ceremony.
The 13 children’s parents, David and Louise Turpin, were sentenced to 25 years to life in prison in April 2019, more than a year after their 17-year-old daughter, Jordan Turpin, escaped their Perris home through a window and called police using a deactivated cell phone.
David and Louise Turpin withheld food from their children, limited their bathroom use, and allowed them to shower only once a year. The children, who ranged in age from 2 to 29 when they were rescued in January 2018, suffered physical and cognitive impairments due to the years of neglect.
Jordan Turpin previously told ABC that she and her siblings planned their escape for two years, though she was compelled to act as they were moving to Oklahoma the next day. Additionally, Jennifer Turpin recounted her parents instructing the older children to put her younger, unruly siblings in locked dog kennels.
Jennifer Turpin recounted feeling relief as she woke up in a hospital the morning after being rescued.
“Music was playing, I got up,” she said. “I made sure there was a little bit of a floor cleared out and I danced.”
[Feature Photo: Richard Shotwell/Invision/AP; Facebook]
