A hospital worker kidnapped and tortured by a transgender activist who told a cheering crowd at a rally to ‘punch TERFs in the face’ today branded her a ‘dangerous, violent individual’.
Darren Sheridan, 52, spoke publicly for the first time of how he feared he would die after being savagely beaten and tormented during 24 hours held captive by Sarah Jane Baker and her brother.
Now he has hit out at the zealot over her inflammatory comments against feminists critical of trans ideology.
Baker sparked outrage after telling a cheering crowd at a trans pride rally: ‘I was gonna come here and be really fluffy and be really nice and say yeah be really lovely and queer and gay… Nah, if you see a TERF, punch them in the f****** face.’
Darren, who still bears the scars from his ordeal as a teenager, said: ‘I think it is extreme to have those kind of views. I know she has anger issues but there’s still no right to say ‘punch somebody in the face’.
‘I think if people disagree with other people about issues it’s much better to have a debate about it then threaten people. By telling the crowd to punch a TERF, she clearly still has anger issues and is a dangerous, violent person.’
Darren knows only too well the level of violence Baker is capable of.
After he was kidnapped Darren was subjected to appalling beatings and forced to carry out humiliating sex acts before being trussed up in a cupboard and left to die.
Recalling harrowing details for the first time he told MailOnline how Baker and her brother showed no remorse after admitting their appalling crimes.
He said: ‘I thought I was going to die but in the court case they said that the only thing they regretted about it was that they couldn’t break me.’
The brothers were jailed for seven years by a judge who described the ordeal as ‘an exercise in sadism and cruelty which may well have led to his death’.
Baker, now 53, ended up spending 30 years in jail after she was convicted of attempted murder for breaking into a prisoner’s cell and trying to strangle him to death.
Darren was just 19 when he was unwittingly caught up in a family feud after his sister Donna married Baker’s father.
Baker, who was born Alan, and his brother George were sent out to bring her back and Darren’s life changed forever when there was a knock on the door at the family home in Thornton Heath, Surrey.
He was punched in the face after being confronted by the brothers and another man.
Darren said: ‘I had three knives pointed at me – two either side of my body and one at my neck.
‘They told me ‘You’re coming with us’. I had no choice.
‘I was forcibly taken at knifepoint to a van and bundled into the back.
‘I couldn’t see what was going on as I was face down and there were no windows. I was beaten in the van. I think there were two of them doing it.’
Darren was taken to a squat in London. When the brothers appeared at Maidstone Crown Court in 1989 it emerged he had 39 identifiable injuries including some inflicted with a knife.
Darren told MailOnline: ‘I had no idea where I was going. They took me to a flat and led me inside where I was beaten and tortured for 12 hours.
‘They were punching me and burning me with cigarettes. They were stubbing them out on my neck and I still have the scars from that to this day.
‘I was forced to perform oral sex on them at knifepoint.
‘One of them said their dad wanted me dead and they were thinking of ways that they were going to kill me.
‘They said they were going to get a gun and shoot me.
‘They said they were going to give me a smiley face – where they slit the sides of your mouth. They said they were going to get a razor to scar my face.
‘I was made to eat cigarette butts and curry powder.
‘Towards the end I was tied up. They tied me to the back of one chair then put another chair opposite.
‘My legs were stretched out and were tied to the back of it.
‘One of them got up and stepped on my legs – he was trying to get my kneecaps to break.
‘It was such a sustained attack I became numb to the pain.
‘The last thing I remember was being tied up with electricity wire and dumped in an airing cupboard.
‘They carried me in and just left me there. It was dark and silent. I couldn’t hear anything.
‘The wire was tied around my feet, my hands and my neck in such a way that if I moved it tightened around my neck.
‘At first I tried to free myself but that’s when I realised the wire around my neck was getting tighter and I feared I would strangle myself so I stopped.
‘I was helpless and I blacked out.’
Darren was saved after somebody else living in the squat raised the alarm and police and paramedics raced to the scene.
Darren said: ‘The first thing I remember after that was being in a hospital bed.
‘I was told that it took six hours before I was able to come out with my name and address because I was drifting in and out of consciousness.
‘I was told that if I had been left an hour longer I would have been dead.’
Describing the aftermath of his ordeal Darren said: ‘It messed up my mental health. I didn’t leave the house for a year after that.
‘I was too afraid to go out. The first year was awful.
‘For a few good years it was really hard to talk about it without getting emotional, without crying.
‘It had a massive impact on my life. It took away a lot of confidence.
‘I have a distrust of people, especially people who are so called family after they did that to me.
‘I had therapy. It took me a couple of years to come to terms with it. Most of it I buried away.’
Darren, who now works as a healthcare assistant in a hospital’s A&E department, said he never had any further dealings with Baker.
But he heard from family members that Baker had attempted to murder another prisoner and had gone on to change gender.
After hearing of Baker’s latest incident: ‘I’m surprised that he is doing so much for the trans community. I’m surprised that he would put other people before him.’
Asked of his views on the transgender issue he said: ‘I don’t get much involved in politics and stuff like that. I try to keep away from it.’
* Article From: The Daily Mail
