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WAGONER COUNTY, Okla. – Rosalynn McGinnis disappeared from her Wagoner County home when she was just 12-years-old, and she wouldn’t see her family again for nearly 20 years.
McGinnis says she was always happy as a child, but things changed when she turned 10. Just days after her birthday, she says her stepfather, Henri Piette, began sexually abusing her.
When she was 12-years-old, Piette said he was taking her to school but never brought her back home.
“The next thing I know is my mother’s not there,” she told KJRH in an exclusive interview. “I am by myself with this man.”
McGinnis says Piette dyed her hair, changed their names and moved her to Mexico. The physical and sexual abuse continued, which led McGinnis to have nine children.
19 years after she was kidnapped, McGinnis told KJRH that she met an American woman who would change her life.
“Henri had been drinking like always,” she said. “She brought a birthday cake and he had walked into the other room and she was like, ‘I know there’s something wrong. If you can ever get away, I will help you.'”
When Piette passed out a month later, McGinnis gathered the kids and ran to the woman’s house.
After learning who McGinnis really was, she called the Center for Missing and Exploited Children.
Ultimately, McGinnis and the children were sent to relatives in the United States and Piette was arrested. He is now facing charges including rape and child abduction.