Right after several years of abuse and extortion, she went to law enforcement. Now this lady hopes to inspire others with her tale


An Edmonton female hopes going public about how she managed to escape a violent and emotionally abusive marriage inspires some others to uncover the power and bravery to do the exact same.

In 2016, Natalie Bak mustered the braveness to file a complaint to Edmonton law enforcement about the yrs of abuse she experienced at the hands of Hewton Murray.

Past thirty day period, Bak properly argued for a court-mandated publication ban on her name to be lifted so she could convey to her story.

“I think it is crucial that other people know that it can be Ok,” she advised CBC Information in an interview. 

“It can get much better.”

Bak was 19 in 2008 when she satisfied Murray at a northern Alberta work camp. She considered he was charismatic.

“I assumed I was in enjoy,” Bak claimed. “Definitely infatuated.”

Not very long right after she moved into an Edmonton basement apartment with Murray, Bak noticed crimson flags.

A woman with short dark hair, wearing sunglasses and a fake moustache, poses with her arm on the shoulder of a man with his eyes closed.
Natalie Bak, in costume, with Hewton Murray in a 2010 photograph. (Submitted by Natalie Bak)

“It was a great deal of psychological abuse. A ton of yelling, screaming,” she claimed in the interview.

Murray would not allow her to make her individual pals or to see anyone socially without the need of him. He slash her off from her loved ones. She failed to want to notify her parents she’d produced a blunder.

“Out of shame and delight, I didn’t want to acknowledge defeat,” Bak mentioned.

By the conclusion of 2011, the few agreed the romance was not doing work. They broke it off but continued to dwell alongside one another.

Which is when the extortion and sexual assaults started. 

Murray built Bak consider that a felony gang had set a bounty on their heads and that she and her mothers and fathers were being in threat. About time, she gave Murray amongst $120,000 and $130,000 to pay out off the gang.

Bak estimates she was sexually assaulted 100 situations more than the subsequent four decades.

Earlier this 12 months Murray, 39, was sentenced to 10½ yrs in jail just after Court docket of King’s Bench Justice Steven Mandziuk located him responsible of assault, uttering threats, sexual assault, forcible confinement, legal harassment and two counts of extortion. 

Mandziuk also ordered Murray to repay Bak $115,000 within 3 decades pursuing his release from jail.

Murray is attractive his conviction and sentence. A Court of Charm judge denied Murray’s launch pending the outcome of his charm.

He remains driving bars in Bowden Establishment.

The north Edmonton house Natalie Bak and Hewton Murray and after lived in. (Jamie McCannel/CBC)

“It just felt like I experienced this endless darkness … and it was absolutely nothing but pure distress,” Bak testified in Edmonton Court of King’s Bench for the duration of the demo.

“I was so alone, and I felt so isolated.”

Bak explained to court that she went to police as a very last vacation resort.

“I figured I didn’t have significantly remaining to drop,” she testified. 

“There was nothing that had happened to my household consequently much, so I figured my family would be secure, and the worst that would materialize is it’s possible — possibly — I would die. 

“But I was inclined to take that threat.”

Yrs of abuse and extortion

The abuse and extortion continued for years right after the marriage finished in 2011.

In 1 occasion, quickly after they broke up, Murray violently attacked Bak following he located her and a man in mattress in their shared property. 

Following threatening the guy with a BB gun, he turned his anger on Bak. 

“He held me up and held my neck against the wall,” Bak recalled in the job interview.

MacEwan College psychology professor and forensic psychologist Sandy Jung. (Trevor Wilson/CBC)

“Inevitably he manufactured it to the entrance door with me and threw me down the stairs and tossed me out.”

The up coming working day, Bak tried using to acquire her belongings. She explained Murray said he would enable her consider her issues, but only if she would have intercourse with him. 

Soon after they had intercourse, Murray adjusted his head and she left humiliated and empty-handed.

The following day she returned with a police escort.

“I recall just the seething seem of rage in Hew’s face,” Bak advised CBC. “The pressure was palpable.” 

She assumed that would be the past time she’d at any time see Hewton Murray.

To be selected, she received an crisis defense get from the court docket. 

$50,000 bounty on every of their heads 

A couple of days afterwards, Murray identified as Bak and said he needed to inform her a thing vital. He showed up exterior her friend’s condominium and demanded she get into his truck. 

Through the travel, Murray advised Bak he’d been contacted by a gang member who was upset simply because she brought law enforcement into his residence. 

“The accused informed [Bak] that the gang experienced put a $50,000 bounty on every single of their heads for the reason that she purportedly understood too substantially,” Mandziuk wrote in his determination.

“The accused advised her that if they did not spend the bounty, [Bak] and the accused would be killed.” 

Murray also suggested Bak’s moms and dads were being in danger. He manufactured a photo of their Ontario farm taken from the road, supposedly by the gang member.

A smiling woman lies across the hood of a pickup truck.
Natalie Bak is on the lookout ahead to the long run. (Submitted by Natalie Bak)

“He said that if I failed to pay, they’d go right after my family,” Bak stated in the job interview.

Again at Murray’s household, she claimed, he handcuffed her to a railing in the basement when he appeared to negotiate a offer with the gang around the phone. 

Then Murray sexually assaulted her.

“It has charge me considerably of my time, my lifetime and my funds, the improved portion of my 20s,” Bak wrote in her sufferer impression statement. 

“There was so considerably ache and anguish, so several tears, and I wouldn’t wish the expertise on anybody.”

‘I just wanted to be free’

Murray stored inventing new sums of money supposedly demanded by the gang. When Bak handed around $5,000 in May 2016, she promised herself it would be the previous time. 

“Hew was likely to occur soon after me for funds by the conclusion of the calendar year and I just needed to transfer on with my daily life,” Bak told CBC.

“I just wished to be cost-free.”

A good friend observed how upset Bak was and encouraged she see a psychic. She went for a session and states that conversation about her future convinced her to go to the law enforcement. 

When she poured her heart out to a constable, he considered her tale.

Forensic psychologist Sandy Jung, a psychology professor and forensic psychologist at MacEwan University, says having a compassionate law enforcement officer is very important for these facing decades of abuse.

“It’s substantial when you have an officer who believes you,” Jung stated.

“Because it was coming from an authority determine, it has a large influence on victims.”

Employees Sgt. Jennifer Scott, performing head of the Edmonton Law enforcement Assistance domestic offender crime segment, said 10 detectives are assigned to the section, alongside with 13 constables on the domestic abuse significant-chance group who are partnered with registered social personnel. 

“It normally takes a ton of courage and it truly is really tricky for men and women to go away or to get assistance in these kinds of scenarios,” Scott mentioned. 

“It can take place to any one.” 

Praise for victim’s bravery

In his sentencing decision, Mandziuk stated Murray showed no regret.

“[Murray] said that this prosecution was based on ‘wild accusations’ that are only half legitimate at most effective,” Mandziuk wrote.

Jung said it’s regular for abusers to lack regret.

“I really don’t question he is accomplished it for so extended, that he’s justified this in his intellect for a prolonged time to make this Okay,” Jung stated.

Jung praised Bak’s braveness for viewing the system via. 

“She’s now prevented a different sufferer who may possibly endure the actual similar matter that she went by.”

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