In 1948, 11-year-old Sally Horner was kidnapped and subsequently held captive by a pedophile for 21 months.
WikipediaA photo of Sally Horner, taken sometime during her abduction.
Vladimir Nabokov’s 1955 novel Lolita is controversial to say the least. Since its release, the pedophilia at the center of the book’s plot, as well as its manipulative main character and unreliable narrator Humbert Humbert, has been the focus of debates surrounding the historymaking piece of 20th century literature.
But the unavoidable truth is that pedophilia plotline in the 1955 novel was not an original concept. Unfortunately, the disturbing actions of the book’s protagonist are based, at least partly, on true events.
Nabokov may have based the events in his book on the 1948 kidnapping case of the “real” Lolita: Sally Horner. Some school friends convinced the 11-year-old girl to steal a notebook (worth about a nickel at the time) from the local Woolworth’s in her town of Camden, N.J. The chain of events that followed is more harrowing than the work of fiction – because they are fact.
Before The Kidnapping That May Have Inspired Lolita
The Panaro Family/CBCSally Horner back home after she was kidnapped.
Sally Horner was born in Trenton, New Jersey on April 18, 1937. She spent her early years in the unincorporated town of Roebling alongside her parents and half-sister.
However, things took a turn when Horner’s father began to develop a drinking problem and became physically abusive towards her mother. That’s when Sally Horner, her mother, and her half-sister moved to Camden, New Jersey.
Not long after the three moved, Horner’s father lost his job and moved back in with his parents. Tragically, he would commit suicide just three weeks before his daughter’s sixth birthday.
Despite the unfortunate fate of her parents’ relationship, Horner did well in school. By the time she was in fifth grade at Northeast Elementary School, she was an honors student and the president of the Junior Red Cross.
It was during that time that Sally Horner’s life would take a dark and disturbing turn. In March 1948, some of her school friends dared the young girl to steal a notebook, worth about five cents, from a local store.
A middle-aged man caught her taking the notebook, and claiming to be an FBI agent, told her she had committed a crime and was in trouble. But this man was definitely not a federal agent. His real name was Frank La Salle, and he was already a convicted rapist by the time he met Sally Horner.
Frank La Salle, Sally’s kidnapper and rapist.
It’s unclear where exactly La Salle was originally from. He had multiple different aliases, which all had different birth years and cities of origin.
La Salle had previously tangled with the law on numerous occasions. In 1937, he was arrested in New Jersey on statutory rape and kidnapping charges, but was ultimately not convicted.
One year later, he was suspected of sex trafficking in St. Louis, Missouri, but once again no charges stuck. La Salle had moved back to New Jersey by 1940.
In 1942, multiple girls under the age of 18 in Camden accused La Salle of rape. The five girls, all between the ages of 12 and 15, gave descriptions of La Salle and the location of his workplace to the police.
He was apprehended not long after, and was put on trial. He initially pled not guilty, but changed to no contest and was sentenced to two and a half years in Trenton State Prison. He served 14 months of that sentence before he was released in 1944 on parole and became a registered sex offender.
He was later convicted of fraud and served another 23 months in prison before being released once again on parole in 1948. That’s when he crossed paths with Sally Horner.
Sally Horner’s Kidnapping
Wikimedia Commons
After successfully convincing the young girl he was really an FBI agent, he told Horner he was letting her go for now. The naive girl had no reason to doubt his supposed authority, and agreed to periodically report to him to avoid any consequences for her taking the notebook.
But while the girl thought she’d caught a break, La Salle was slyly investigating which school she attended. He was waiting for her outside the building June 15, 1948. There had been a change of plans.
Sally must accompany him to Atlantic City, on orders of the government. She must tell her parents that he’s the father of a school friend and that he’s invited her to accompany their family on a beach vacation. What Horner’s mother couldn’t have known was that she was sending her daughter on “vacation” with a 50-year-old mechanic with a rampant pedophilia problem.
Thus began the two-year long kidnapping and serial molestation of 11-year-old Sally Horner. La Salle took her across the country, even enrolling her into school while telling the staff that she was his daughter.
While the two were living in Dallas, Texas, Sally Horner began to become closer with a neighbor, Ruth Janisch. Janisch had become suspicious of La Salle and wanted to keep a close eye on the girl, noticing something was “off” about their relationship.
In March 1950, Janisch moved to San Jose, California with her husband and convinced La Salle and Horner to do the same. She kept them close, letting them stay in the motor home they were moving to. Not long after the group moved, La Salle would finally be caught.
The Law Finally Catches Up To La Salle
The Panaro Family/CBCSally Horner in 1952.
On March 22, 1950, while La Salle was out job hunting, Sally Horner told her story to Janisch, who let her use the phone to call her half-sister. Reaching the sister’s husband, Horner implored him to send the FBI.
When La Salle returned from his errands, he was immediately taken into custody by authorities. Horner gave testimony that he held her captive and forced her to have sex with him.
La Salle was arrested and charged under the Mann Act of 1910; a law against human trafficking. During the trial, he was still maintaining that he was Horner’s father. The girl had to provide a statement to the contrary.
She stated that though her real father died when she was six, she still remembered him – and he was not this man. La Salle was found guilty and sentenced to 30 to 35 years at Trenton State Prison in New Jersey.
Rocco Palese, the judge in the case, said at the sentencing, “Mothers throughout the country will give a sigh of relief to know that a man of this type is safely in prison.”
Sally Horner returned to Camden and began attending Woodrow Wilson High School. Unfortunately, Horner’s life would be cut short.
She died on August 18, 1952 at just 15 years old, two years after escaping La Salle. Horner was riding in a car driven by her boyfriend when the car hit the rear of a parked truck. An entire childhood, stolen away – first by evil, then a cruel twist of fate.
After reading about the kidnapping of Sally Horner that helped inspire Lolita, read about the true story of the John Paul Getty III kidnapping. Then see what it’s like growing up inside the KKK.
