A judge warned years ago that the South Carolina man taken into custody after a woman was found chained like a dog on his property was “behaviorally and emotionally dangerous.”
Todd Kohlhepp, a registered sex offender in Arizona, was arrested Thursday after Kala Brown, 30, who went missing with her boyfriend in August, was discovered inside a windowless, 15-foot-wide storage container on his Woodruff property.
Kohlhepp, 45, who was convicted for the 1986 kidnapping and sexual assault of a 14-year-old girl, spent time in prison until November 2001, according to the Maricopa County Sheriff’s Office in Arizona.
Court documents from the time reveal a disturbing portrait of a deeply troubled young man.
“At less than the age of 9, this juvenile was impulsive, explosive, and preoccupied with sexual content. He has not changed. He has been unabatedly aggressive to others and destructive of property since nursery school. He destroys his own clothing, personal possessions and pets apparently on whim,” a judge wrote at the time, according to WFXG.
“He is extremely self-centered with high levels of anti-social personality functioning, and likely continuing aggressive behaviors toward others in the future,” said the judge. “Twenty-five months of the most intensive and expensive professional intervention, short of God’s, will provide no protection for the public and no rehabilitation of this juvenile by any services or facilities presently available to the Juvenile Court.”
The court documents also include a psychiatrist’s report, which said he had “emotional difficulties and poor impulse control,” and that he underwent counseling since he was 8 or 9 years old, in South Carolina and Georgia. The documents note he was admitted to the Georgia Mental Health Institute in 1980 because of behavior problems.
And the report includes comments made by Kohlhepp’s mom, who said her son made several threats to hurt her and kill himself.
“Mrs. Kohlhepp states that Todd has experienced emotional, behavioral problems for as long as she can remember,’ the document reads.
And his father, with who he had little relationship, added: “The only emotion Todd seems capable of showing is anger.”
Meanwhile, a neighbor reacted to the latest allegations against Kohlhepp.
“He’s a monster to me,” Ron Owen told Live 5 News.
Owen said he spoke with Kohlhepp, who works as a real estate agent, just a few days prior to the disturbing revelation about his land.
“He was talking about putting his property on the market, sell it,” said Owen, according to the news channel. “Going out to his 100 acres he’s got and building a house out there.”
Brown told police after she was freed that other people — possibly dead and buried — may be on the property and cops continued to scour the land Friday for more victims.
Even though Brown was held captive for more than two months, Owen said Kohlhepp carried on like everything was fine.
“It seemed like business as usual,” the neighbor said. “He had folks that came and went. They were real estate folks.”
Brown’s boyfriend, Charles Carver, 32, is still missing.