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No One Can Hear You Scream on ID is scheduled to revisit the horrifying and traumatic domestic abuse story of, now a mother-of-three, Laura Cowan at the hands of Mansa Musa Muhummed, a polygamous husband and child abuser.
The upcoming episode, titled Sojourn to Hell, airs on Monday, November 21, 2022, at 9:00 pm ET.
The synopsis reads:
"When Laura Cowan falls on hard times, a friend of the family steps in to invite her and her two young children into his home; to her horror, Laura soon discovers that this safe haven is nothing more than a prison."
During the mid-late 90s, Laura Cowan and her children were held captive in a prison-like house of horrors by Muhummed. Sources state that she was forced to live in a dark garage with her son in horrible conditions with limited resources such as thin mattresses and plastic jugs to urinate in.
Cowan and her children were repeatedly abused, deprived of food, and tortured.
It was in 1999 that Laura was finally able to escape the hell she was living in and start over while their abuser was sent to prison after a decade of delayed trials.
Muhummed was found guilty of his crimes in 2009 and sentenced to prison for serving seven consecutive life sentences. By 2011, Cowan was working as a domestic violence advocate and counselor in Cleveland.
This article will further discuss the violence and abuse Laura Cowan and other women and children had to endure at the hands of Mansa Musa Muhummed.
Laura Cowan was manipulated and taken into Mansa Musa Muhummed's house of horrors
Born in Cleveland, Ohio, in 1957, Laura Cowan only relocated to California in 1990 to take a job in Monrovia with an insurance company where she ultimately married Muhammad Shabazz, a member of the Nation of Islam (NOI).
They had two children - a girl named Maryam Shabazz and a boy named Ahmed Ibn Muhammed Mahdi Shabazz - and owned a local bookstore in San Bernardino, California.
However, in 1995, her husband was arrested on allegations of trafficking illegal weapons. Laura sought assistance from a friend from their mosque, Mansa Musa Muhummed. He offered to support her in her time of need by suggesting that Laura and her children, Ahmed, 3, and Maryan, 7 months, move in with his family in a Riverside motel.
According to a 2011 Los Angeles Times report, she said:
"I was totally desperate and afraid, not knowing what was going to become of me and the kids."
Laura Cowan was held captive and physically abused by a polygamist during the mid-late 90s
Laura recalled entering the hotel and finding Marva Barfield, Mansa's wife, and their 14 children "sitting on their knees staring at the wall." She described how she wanted to run but couldn't since she had no other safe choices.
Laura discovered the hard way throughout the course of the next four years that her first intuition was right from the beginning. After only a few months, Mansa proposed to marry her and cut her off from her children.
He gradually started to torture his wives and children for trivial reasons, punishing them for not attending morning prayers, and torturing and starving them. Soon, Laura gave birth to a daughter, and the child was given to his first wife to make sure she wouldn't run away.
The family lived off of welfare and Social Security payments which were approx. $4000 a month and moved around the Inland Empire region. Mansa would frequently threaten Laura with a gun, stab her, hit her, and threatened to kill and bury her in the backyard if she tried to run. He would keep one of her children with him to stop her from doing so. He even made his other children spy on her.
The family later relocated to a remote home in rural Aguanga, where Laura and Ahmad were held captive in a dark garage and the door was nailed shut. It was then that Laura started documenting the abuse and violence, covertly recording the beatings and writing a letter to the police.
She hid the letter in an envelope and had the good fortune to slip it to a post office employee in 1999.
A few days later, the authorities rescued 19 children and three of Mansa's wives, charging him with multiple felonies. In 2009, he was found guilty and given seven consecutive life sentences.
Laura Cowan eventually relocated to Cleveland with the kids and got a job with the housing authority. She was later trained to become a domestic violence counselor and is now an award-winning advocate and activist.
Tune in to ID's No One Can Hear You Scream on Monday to learn more about Laura Cowan's survival story in one of California's most notorious domestic abuse cases.
