He gave his mistress orange soda. She woke up in shackles, ‘Charlotte’s slave,’ cops say

The last thing she remembered was the orange soda he offered her at a gas station, she said.

After she drank the soda on Jan. 14, the 51-year-old woman lost consciousness, she told police in Ovilla, Texas. And when she woke up, she was in chains and shackled to a bed, CBS reports.

The bed belonged to a Jean-Claude DeMars, 51, who had carried on an on-again, off-again affair with the woman for eight years before the incident, she told police. DeMars and his wife, Charlotte, 48, allegedly informed the woman that she was now “Charlotte’s slave,” according to WFAA. The victim was sometimes unshackled to clean the house, she said.

More than a week later, police discovered the woman Jan. 26 after someone in the area reported a woman was being held against her will at the DeMars’ residence, according to the Ovilla Police Department. The victim had alerted a friend to her situation using a tablet the couple gave her to entertain herself with on Jan. 26, police said.

The woman told police she had been “drugged, kidnapped and held against her will,” police said. The couple “handcuffed, shackled and chained her to a bed,” she said — only releasing her so they could force her to clean their home.

Officers got the woman medical care and arrested the couple. Both DeMars now face charges of kidnapping, NBC reports, and have been held at the Ellis County Jail, each on $150,000 bail.

Jean-Claude DeMars had picked up the alleged victim on Jan. 14 from a women’s shelter where she was living, she told police. Before the woman moved into the shelter, DeMars had paid to put her up in a Dallas, Texas, hotel. But when DeMars tried to cut off the affair he stopped paying for her hotel stay, she told police, so she moved into a women’s shelter.

After picking her up at the Irving, Texas, shelter, DeMars took her to a gas station for the orange soda, she told police.

When police responded to the home on Jan. 26, Charlotte and Jean-Claude DeMars led them to the bedroom where the victim was chained to the bed, according to a police report. There was also a bucket in the room, which the victim said was for her to use as a restroom.

Jean-Claude DeMars told police the woman in chains was a “female friend,” CBS reports. When she began to act “loopy” following some drinks, he told police he took her to his residence.

And while Jean-Claude DeMars admitted to shackling her, he said that he did it “only because (she) requested it to avoid killing them in their sleep,” a police report said.

Neighbors expressed shock at what had allegedly been going on in the nearby residence.

“It was a little scary,” Brittany Phillips told NBC. “There are kids in the neighborhood, so it was kind of scary knowing that was going on right across the street from us.”

Other neighbors described the DeMars’ home as a mess, overrun with dogs the couple was breeding there. There were as many as 40 beagles on the property when police arrived, CBS reports.

Cleaning up dog feces throughout the house was among the tasks the woman was forced to do, she told police.

“They kept to themselves. Everyone on this street … we talk to each other,” Damien Velasquez, a neighbor, told NBC.

But the DeMars were different, he told the TV station.

“I’ve never once physically talked to them,” Velasquez said.

Handcuffs, leg cuffs, chains and collars that police found in the residence were seized, WFAA reports.

This story was originally published January 31, 2018 at 3:39 PM with the headline "He gave his mistress orange soda. She woke up in shackles, ‘Charlotte’s slave,’ cops say."