Couple charged after woman raped and kept captive in cage

An Indiana couple accused of holding a woman captive for two months, often locking her in a small wooden cage, was charged with rape, criminal confinement, kidnapping and other felonies in a case one officer likened to "modernised slavery."

Ricky Roy House Jr, 37, and his girlfriend, Kendra Tooley, 44, were formally charged during a hearing in Posey Circuit Court in Mount Vernon, where a judge appointed public defenders for the pair and entered not guilty pleas on their behalf.

Police arrested the couple at their mobile home in rural southwestern Indiana about six hours after Tooley’s ex-husband, who was visiting the couple, freed the 30-year-old woman, whose relatives had reported her missing on July 12.