Kaylene Lewis, the 14-year-old schoolgirl who was persuaded to run away from home by a 35-year-old man pretending to be a teenage boy, has spoken for the first time about her experience.
She said she was shocked by his appearance when she met him and she had second thoughts about going with him. “He told me he was 17 but he looked old. I was scared from then onwards,” she said in an exclusive candid interview with the Sunday Tribune at her Durban North home this week.
She also said she couldn’t believe how someone who did “bad” things could still be “good” by making sure she was fed and clothed well while being kept against her will.
But she is relieved that Jean Lyle Oliver, who was arrested by police on Wednesday evening and charged with abduction, will now have to answer for his actions. He is expected to appear in court tomorrow.
With her father Quinton Lewis and grandmother Bernadette seated beside her during the interview, Kaylene said she was happy to be reunited with her family. “It was nerve-racking living with him. I used to dream about going home. At night I used to cry for my dad and best friends from my youth club. It was really tough living there. I heard of people who had similar experiences, but this was too much for me.
“But he always took good care of me and gave me food on time. I couldn’t understand how someone can care but be so bad,” she said.
Kaylene met the 35-year-old man on Facebook last year, when he claimed to be just 17. So when she agreed to run away with him at midnight on May 19, she was shocked by his appearance.
“After I packed my bags to leave home I had second thoughts, but I said to myself it’s too late for that now.
“I sensed something was not right when I got into his car. It was the first time I’d seen him. Last year he told me he was 17, but he looked old… Previously he told me he was from Pinetown, but when he told me we were going to Queensburgh I became hopeful somebody would find me because my dad’s girlfriend was from that area,” Kaylene said.
Her sudden disappearance sparked an intense search which had police, leading private investigators and security agencies spreading their nets countrywide until the breakthrough came earlier this week when Kaylene sent an SMS to a friend in Cape Town, pleading for help. She said the suspect realised police were hot on his trail and asked her to find a new hideout, so she used the opportunity to send out the distress call which her friend directed to her father.
Police did a Rica check and Warrant Officer Vis Pillay of the Durban North police and his search party were directed to the Malvern house where the suspect lived with his mother.
“His mother only realised who I was when she heard about me on East Coast Radio, a few days before I was found. (She)… made a huge scene. She didn’t want me there,” Kaylene said.
A police source said when they swooped on the property on Wednesday evening they found the suspect trying to hide a laptop under a sofa, and a short while later, found Kaylene hidden in bushes behind the house.
“He took me into the bushes behind the house when he realised that police were at the front gate. He told me to hide there. I didn’t hide myself well – I just stood between two trees hoping someone would see me.
“When I heard lots of arguing and shouting from where I was standing, I was not sure if it was safe to come out. I said to myself that when things calm down I’ll come out. Police were shouting at him, asking about me. He… said I jumped over the wall and ran up the street,” she said.
After searching through the bushes, police eventually found Kaylene with no physical injuries but highly distressed.
When the Tribune arrived at the suspect’s home on Friday to speak to his mother, she asked who we were from behind a closed gate that obscured her face. She immediately ducked into the house, slammed the door and phoned the police.
Neighbours, who did not want to be named, said the suspect and his mother were known to have heated arguments. They described the suspect as a “shady guy and unusual character”.
“He never worked in his life. I always find schoolboys hanging around his house,” said one neighbour.
On the night Kaylene was found, police escorted her to hospital where she underwent tests and was given medication. After being questioned, Kaylene was reunited with her family at about 4am on Thursday.
“We were so pleased she was alive and that we could be together again,” Lewis said
“Although lead after lead fell away, I always had a feeling she was alive. I didn’t want to give up hope.
“The cop put her on the phone and she said ‘I love you Dad, I hope you are not cross with me’. I replied that I was not cross at all. All was forgiven, I just wanted her home safe,” he said.
Sunday Tribune