Three people who kept an epileptic man prisoner in a garden shed for four months have been given lengthy jail sentences.
Kevin Davies, 29, was repeatedly beaten, burnt and humiliated by the trio, who held the handyman hostage over a minor debt they claimed he owed them.
He was found dead by paramedics at a house in Bream, Gloucestershire, on September 26 last year, where he had been locked away in David Lehane and Amanda Baggus' shed since May 27.
She had kept a diary, in which she recorded the punishments they had meted out to the vulnerable victim and scornfully noted his cries for help.
They also filmed the terrified captive in the shed, in which he was bullied into saying he was there voluntarily and was being treated well.
The couple, along with a second man, Scott Andrews, were charged with murder but the charge was dropped after experts were unable to rule out that epilepsy could have contributed to his death.
Lehane, 35, and Baggus, 26, both from Badgers Way, and Andrews, 27, of Hathaway Close, Gloucester, all pleaded guilty in May to false imprisonment and assault occasioning actual bodily harm.
Mr Justice Gray sentenced Lehane and Baggus to 10 years each and Andrews to nine years at Bristol Crown Court on Monday.
Ian Pringle, prosecuting, told the court that Mr Davies had been treated like an animal by the trio.
"What emerged from the investigation into Kevin Davies' death was that he had effectively been held captive at the home of the defendants for a period of nearly four months. That he had been abused for that period of time. He had been assaulted, he had been beaten and he had effectively been kept like a dog in a locked garden shed at night. In short, the last few months of this man's life must have been utterly miserable and inhumane."
