The State - News from Sept. 27, 1985

The sex-slave trial of a Red Bluff lumber mill worker opened with a statement by the prosecutor that the defendant once made his victim place a pistol barrel in her mouth and pull the trigger in an “obedience test.” Deputy Tehama County Dist. Atty. Christine McGuire made the accusation at the San Mateo County Superior Court trial of Cameron Hooker, 31, on 16 counts of kidnaping, rape and false imprisonment. The prosecutor said that, after kidnaping the 20-year-old woman, Hooker at times placed her in a coffin-like box under his bed or kept her in a hole beneath a shed at his home, and forced her to engage in sex acts. Defense lawyer Rolland Papendick said in his opening statement that Hooker admitted to the kidnaping, but only because the statute of limitations had run out on the crime. He added he would show that the victim fell in love with Hooker and stayed with him of her own free will.