Louisiana family held autistic woman as a sex slave -- and forced her to eat her mother’s ashes

A Louisiana family allegedly held a relative with autism in slavery after her mother died -- and then forced her to eat the dead woman's ashes in a case of horrific abuse.

Five family members have been indicted on federal charges in the case after prosecutors said they held the 22-year-old woman captive for 10 months in a padlocked shed and backyard cage, reported The Times-Picayune.

The abuse began about a day after the Aug. 12, 2015, death of the victim's mother, when four of the family members moved from the home they shared with the deceased woman and her daughter to a mobile home in Amite.

Raylaine Knope was the ringleader of the abuse, according to prosecutors, and ordered her husband and Terry J. Knope II and their three adult children to participate in the forced labor conspiracy.

They allegedly beat, tortured and threatened to kill the woman, forced her to take methamphetamines and prescription painkillers, ordered her to make sexual advances to men and stole nearly $8,800 of her Social Security payments.

The 42-year-old Raylaine Knope forced the disabled woman to pour her mother's ashes from an urn into a cereal bowl with milk and eat the mixture, which caused her to vomit onto the table, while Terry Knope, Jody Lambert and Taylor Knope watched and laughed.

The family also pushed the woman's hand into a flame, held her underwater in a hot tub, shot her with a BB gun and covered her with the contents of a septic tank.

They forced the victim to perform sex acts and advertised on social media that she would be forced into prostitution, according to prosecutors.

The family members were arrested in June 2016 after police investigated reports of a caged woman on their property.

Raylaine Knope, 45-year-old Terry Knope II, 23-year-old Jody Lambert and 20-year-old Taylor Knope were charged with conspiring to obtain forced labor, forced labor and using force and threats of force to interfere with the victim's federal Fair Housing Act rights.

Raylaine Knope and Terry Knope II were also charged with attempted sex trafficking, and Terry Knope was charged with a hate crime because he called the victim a "retard" who doesn't deserve to live as he shot her with a BB gun.

Another daughter, 21-year-old Bridget Lambert, lived with her parents occasionally and was charged with conspiring to obtain forced labor.