This is a chilling story of ordinary people fighting for their physical, emotional and spiritual freedom. Every aspect of their enslavement might well have originated in current news headlines. Religious cults, experimental medicine, sexual manipulation and societal isolation are tools used to achieve domination over vulnerable souls. The conclusion, though, echoes from our distant past, reminding us that the apparent greatest good may conceal the worst evil and that, ultimately, the choice between them is intensely personal.

There was just something about small town America in the 1960s, especially Ohio farm country, that made one proud to have grown up there. Clean air, close knit families with happy kids and unwavering pride in the community. Everyone knew everyone, never hesitated to help a neighbor in need and no one bothered to lock their doors at night. All that changed, at least for a while, in the spring of 1968. Three members of a local family, father, mother and daughter were viciously attacked and killed in their home in the middle of the night. The only surviving member of the family, a...