Caitlan Coleman accused Joshua Boyle of physically and emotionally abusing her while they were held by Taliban-linked militants

This article is more than 1 year old

This article is more than 1 year old

The American woman who was kidnapped in Afghanistan and held hostage for five years – giving birth to three children while in captivity – has accused her husband of physically and emotionally abusing her while the family was being held by Taliban-linked militants.

The allegations levied by Caitlan Coleman against her Canadian husband Joshua Boyle are contained in newly unsealed court documents obtained by the Ottawa Citizen.

Canadian American family rescued after five years as captives in Afghanistan Read more

In the documents, filed earlier this year as part of a family court application aimed at allowing Coleman to leave Canada and return to the US with the couple’s children, Coleman accused her husband of exacerbating the nightmarish ordeal.

“JB (Joshua Boyle) regularly threatened to kill me by setting me on fire,” Coleman – who is expecting the couple’s fourth child – said in an affidavit. Her husband, she claimed, “had uncontrolled rage, instituted corporal punishment of me, and struck me in a fit of rage”.

None of the allegations contained in the affidavit have been proven in court.

Boyle, 34, denied the allegations, and in his own 23-page affidavit, he accused Coleman of assaulting him and of having untreated mental health issues that he claimed caused her to neglect the couple’s children.

Boyle, Coleman and their three young children were rescued in Pakistan in late 2017. The couple had been abducted five years earlier while backpacking through Afghanistan. Coleman was five months pregnant at the time.

Shortly after the family landed on Canadian soil, Boyle told reporters that his wife had been raped and one of their children was killed during their time in captivity. The allegations were later denied by the Taliban.

After a short stay with Boyle’s parents the family attempted to build a normal life in Ottawa, renting an apartment and giving their children their first-ever taste of freedom.

Months later, the couple was locked in a custody battle in an Ontario court. The Ottawa judge who considered the case said she had not seen anything to suggest that Coleman suffers a mental health issue that would affect her ability to parent.

“The court does have evidence, on the other hand, that CC (Caitlan Coleman) is healthily and protectively parenting the children,” the judge noted as she granted Coleman temporary custody of the children.

“To say that the circumstances of this case are tragic in the extreme would be an understatement,” the judge added. “Under the exceptional circumstances of this case, requiring CC and the children to remain in Ottawa would be akin to once again holding them hostage.”

Children born in Afghanistan captivity fear new lives in Canada won't last Read more

Coleman, 32, is reportedly now living in her home state of Pennsylvania with the children.

The judge also issued an order preventing Boyle from contacting or approaching Coleman and the children.

According to court documents, the pair met in 2002. Four years later, Coleman, a manager at a Quiznos sandwich restaurant, and Boyle, an aspiring journalist, struck up a turbulent, on-off again relationship.

Their shared interests kept them together, according to Boyle’s affidavit. “We both wanted to travel by way of backpacking, and we both wanted to see the world.”

The couple married in 2011 while traveling in Central America. After Coleman launched divorce proceedings in 2012, Boyle travelled to Pennsylvania and the couple were reconciled, according to the Ottawa Citizen.

They agreed to travel Central Asia, pushing forward with their plans even after discovering Coleman was pregnant, according to Boyle’s affidavit. He said he was open about his desire to travel to Afghanistan, hoping to make contacts and gain experience that would help him land a job in journalism.

In court documents filed by Coleman, she said she reluctantly agreed to embark on the trip after Boyle promised Afghanistan would not be on the itinerary. Boyle only revealed his plans to travel to the country after they had landed in the region, she claimed, “so that I would not back out”.

The pair was abducted after leaving a Kabul guesthouse in a taxi, and held by the Taliban-linked Haqqani network.

The documents presented in family court, however offer contrasting takes on how the couple handled life in captivity, with both claiming to have been primary caregivers to the children.

Coleman accused Boyle of increasingly erratic and irrational behaviour as the years dragged on, saying that he was fixated on “depicting me as an enemy in his life”.

The guards would often separate them, after which Boyle would accuse her of betraying him by “accepting niceties from the guards and not asking for him more often”, she claimed.

The abuse by Boyle escalated over the years, she alleged. He would confine her to a small shower stall for weeks at a time, she claimed, and alleged that after a disagreement in 2017, Boyle “hit me in the face hard enough to break my cheekbone”.

Boyle repeatedly told her that she was “one of the worst people in the world”, Coleman claimed, alleging that her husband suggested at one point that a “husband who kills his wife is justified”.

In his affidavit, Boyle alleged Coleman neglected the children while in captivity, leaving him in the role of primary caregiver. He said that he often went without food in order to ensure his pregnant wife and children had enough to eat and spent hours crafting toys and gifts out of anything he could find.

In a second affidavit provided to the court, Coleman alleged that she did not share her husband’s interest in extremism, pointing to Boyle’s earlier marriage to Zaynab Khadr – the eldest daughter of a now-deceased member of Osama bin Laden’s inner circle – as an example.

In his affidavit, Boyle described the trauma of readjusting to life in Canada. “While captivity was the worst thing that ever happened to me,” he said, “the adjustment to coming home was a very close second”.

Two months after the family returned to Canada, Boyle was arrested on more than a dozen charges including sexual assault, misleading police and making death threats. He was released on bail in June. The Ontario Court has banned the identification of Boyle’s alleged victims.</s>Caitlan Coleman says her husband, Joshua Boyle, deepened the nightmare of her captivity during their five years as hostages in Central Asia.

In unsealed court documents, Coleman alleges she was physically and emotionally abused by Boyle while they were being held by the Taliban-linked Haqqani network.

“J.B. (Joshua Boyle) regularly threatened to kill me by setting me on fire,” Coleman says in an affidavit filed in June as part of a family court application to gain sole custody of the couple’s children

The specific allegations contained in the affidavits have not been proven in court.

Coleman, Boyle and their three children, all of whom were born in captivity, were rescued in October 2017 by Pakistani security forces after living as prisoners for five years in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The U.S.-born Coleman, 32, is now in Pennsylvania with the children after being granted temporary sole custody of them by an Ottawa family court judge on July 23.

Ontario Superior Court Justice Tracy Engelking also issued an order restraining Boyle from contacting or coming near Coleman and their children.
• Joshua Boyle’s wife, Caitlan Coleman, returns to U.S. with children

“To say that the circumstances of this case are tragic in the extreme would be an understatement,” Engelking said in her custody ruling.

The judge was presented with wildly different stories by Boyle and Coleman, but ultimately decided that it was in the best interests of the children to allow them to return to Pennsylvania with their mother. “Under the exceptional circumstances of this case, requiring C.C. (Caitlan Coleman) and the children to remain in Ottawa would be akin to once again holding them hostage.”

Boyle, 34, vigorously denied Coleman’s allegations, and levelled his own allegations of abuse in documents filed as part of a failed cross-motion to block his wife from leaving the country with their children.

In his 23-page affidavit, Boyle alleges his wife assaulted him and neglected their children because of untreated mental health issues.

He also alleges Coleman tried to push him in front of a Toronto Transit Commission subway car years before they were married.

Justice Engelking, however, said she received no evidence to support the contention that Coleman suffers from a mental health issue that could affect her suitability as a parent.

“The court does have evidence, on the other hand, that C.C. is healthily and protectively parenting the children,” Engelking noted before concluding: “Based on all of the evidence before me, I can find little to suggest C.C. would not be a suitable temporary custodian of the children.”

Obtained by this newspaper after a court application, the documents in the case offer a window into the couple’s deeply troubled relationship and provide new details about their hellish, five-year hostage ordeal.

Boyle, an aspiring journalist, met Coleman, a Quiznos restaurant manager, online in 2002. They became romantically involved four years later, but theirs was a turbulent, on-again, off-again relationship.

Boyle says their shared interests sustained them. “We both enjoyed BDSM (bondage),” Boyle says in his affidavit. “We both wanted to travel by way of backpacking, and we both wanted to see the world.”

They married during a trip through Central America in July 2011, but soon separated. Coleman began divorce proceedings in March 2012.

One month later, Boyle visited Coleman at her home in Pennsylvania where they reconciled. They agreed to go backpacking through Central Asia, he says, and decided to leave on the trip even after finding out that Coleman was pregnant with their first child. They departed in July 2012.

In her affidavit, Coleman insists that she reluctantly agreed to the trip only after Boyle promised not to go to Afghanistan. Boyle disclosed his true intentions after they landed in Central Asia, she says, “so that I would not back out.”

Boyle insists Coleman knew he intended to go to Afghanistan — a trip designed to further his journalistic ambitions.

“We crossed into Afghanistan for a short while in hopes that I could meet people who could give me a story I could write about,” he says in his affidavit. “I had hoped that personal experience in Afghanistan might help me to land more permanent journalism work.”

Boyle has previously suggested that they travelled to Afghanistan to do humanitarian work.

They were taken hostage on Oct. 10, 2012, after leaving a Kabul guest house in a taxi. Coleman was five months pregnant at the time.

Boyle says their captors inflicted severe physical and psychological damage on them for the next five years, during which they were moved to 19 hideouts in both Afghanistan and Pakistan.

In their affidavits, Boyle and Coleman offer completely different accounts of their relationship during captivity.

Coleman says Boyle became increasingly erratic and irrational during their ordeal, and fixated on “depicting me as an enemy in his life.”

“The guards would separate us for a few days, weeks or months at a time,” she says. “When we were returned together, J.B. would accuse me of betraying him by accepting niceties from the guards and not asking for him more often.”

After three years in captivity, he became increasingly abusive, she says: “J.B. had uncontrolled rage, instituted corporal punishment of me, and struck me in a fit of rage.”

He repeatedly told her that she was “one of the worst people in the world,” Coleman says, and suggested that “a husband who kills his wife is justified.”

After a disagreement in February 2017, she alleges, Boyle “hit me in the face hard enough to break my cheekbone.”

Coleman alleges Boyle later confined her to a small shower stall for weeks at a time.

ALSO: Boyles vs. World: Twitter account offers puzzling window on family

In his affidavit, Boyle alleges that Coleman neglected their children while in captivity, leaving him as the primary caregiver. “Multiple captors would reference me as the ‘wife and mother, husband and father’ in the family, noting that all nurturing of the children was entirely upon me,” he says.

Boyle says he slapped his wife once while in captivity as she attempted suicide by trying to overdose on stockpiled medication.

He often went without food, Boyle says, to give more to his children or pregnant wife, and spent hours whittling toys and gifts for them with a spoon.

He built a small garden beside the family’s squat toilet, he says, and planted okra, bean and mango seeds so that his children could appreciate gardening. He captured mice for the children to keep as pets, and sewed them clothes from blankets and scraps. He wrote them songs, taught them sign language, made up stories to entertain them, and helped them memorize selections of the Bible and Qur’an, according to his affidavit.

Boyle says he also taught them about their Canadian and Irish heritage.

“Their knowledge of Canada was exhaustive enough to being able to identify northern islands such as Devon, Banks and Victoria on hand-drawn maps, a desire to move to the Magdalene Islands due to a Stompin’ Tom Connors song they knew, bedtime stories often drawn from Road to Avonlea, and pretending to be Emily Carr when using mud to finger paint pictures of Salish homes (that always looked suspiciously like our cell, unsurprisingly).”

READ: From Nazi women and Khadrs to Star Wars and torture: A look at Joshua Boyle’s vast Wikipedia edits

Coleman, meanwhile, told court that she was the primary caregiver, and was responsible for home-schooling the children during the family’s captivity.

What’s more, in a second affidavit filed in response to Boyle’s, Coleman alleges she did not share her husband’s interest in Central Asia or the extremist ideologies it harboured.

“I would like to stress, most strongly, that for more than a decade, the respondent (Boyle) has had an interest in extremist ideologies and in the complete subservience of women. I have never shared that interest.”

She pointed to his previous marriage to Zaynab Khadr as evidence of his interest in extremism. Khadr is the eldest daughter of Ahmed Said Khadr, a member of Osama bin Laden’s inner circle who died in a firefight with Pakistani forces in October 2003; she outraged many Canadians with her comments in a 2004 documentary in which she suggested that the Sept. 11 terror attacks were justified.

The Boyle family was rescued last October in a dramatic shootout that made international headlines. Weeks after returning home, the Boyle family met Justin Trudeau in the Prime Minister’s Office.

Blatchford: Charges or no, it was odd for Trudeau to meet with Boyle family

In his affidavit, Boyle says that readjusting to life in Canada has been a traumatic experience. “While captivity was the worst thing that ever happened to me,” he says, “the adjustment to coming home was a very close second.”

Coleman is due to give birth to the couple’s fourth child this month.</s>The American woman who was held captive with her husband by a Taliban-linked militant group claims her husband routinely physically and emotionally abused her while they were in captivity.

In new documents unsealed this week, Caitlan Coleman, 32, alleges that her husband Joshua Boyle regularly threatened to kill her by setting her on fire during their five-year ordeal as hostages by the Haqqani network.

The Ottawa Citizen reported that Coleman is seeking to gain sole custody of their three children – who were all born in captivity.

Coleman claims that throughout their time as hostages, her husband became increasingly erratic and irrational, “depicting me as an enemy of his life.”

FORMER TALIBAN HOSTAGE CAITLAN COLEMAN SPEAKS OUT FOLLOWING RESCUE

“[He] had uncontrolled rage, instituted corporal punishment of me, and struck me in a fit of rage,” she said.

Coleman also accused her husband of having extremist ideologies that included “the complete subservience of women.” As evidence, she cited his previous marriage to Zaynab Khadr, the eldest daughter of Ahmed Said Khadr, a member of Usama bin Laden’s inner circle.

In his own 23-page affidavit, Boyle, a native of Canada, denied the allegations of abuse against him and instead accused her of neglecting their children because of mental health issues.

The couple, who met online and married in July 2011, were taken hostage on October 2012 after they went on an overseas trip to Afghanistan.

They were rescued in October 2017 by Pakistani security forces.

FORMER TALIBAN HOSTAGE JOSHUA BOYLE ACCUSED OF USING ROPE DURING SEXUAL ASSAULT

In January 2018, Boyle was charged with numerous crimes including sexual assault and was released on bail.

In July, an Ontario judge granted Coleman temporary sole custody of their children and issued a restraining order prohibiting Boyle from contacting or coming near his wife and the children.

Coleman currently lives in Pennsylvania with the kids. She is due to give birth to the couple’s fourth child this month, the Ottawa Citizen reported.</s>Newly unsealed court documents are giving a window into a custody battle between a Canadian man and his American wife who were kidnapped and held hostage in Afghanistan for five years.

The family court documents detailing the dispute between Joshua Boyle and Caitlan Coleman over their three children, all of whom were born in captivity, were previously covered by a publication ban.

READ MORE: Joshua Boyle’s family shocked, thrilled after he was rescued from Taliban-linked group

Coleman, who was kidnapped with Boyle while the two were backpacking in Afghanistan in 2012, sought the court’s permission to leave Canada and return to the U.S. with the couple’s children.

Boyle tried to prevent his wife, who is expecting a fourth child this month, from relocating and asked that his parents and sisters have access to the children.

WATCH BELOW: Joshua Boyle, wife and 3 kids now in Canada

Engelking gave Coleman temporary sole custody and allowed her to relocate the children to Pennsylvania, where her parents live, pending the results of the custody battle.</s>Boyle and Coleman in captivity with two of their children. Taliban media via Twitter. A woman held hostage by the Taliban for five years says that her husband, also a hostage, abused her while the two were held captive.For five years, Joshua Boyle and Caitlan Coleman were held …Read more via Vice – https://ift.tt/2wIjtMb Get more World News</s>The rescued American Taliban hostage who was held in captivity with her Canadian husband and their children has accused her estranged spouse of abusing her and threatening to kill her while in captivity.

Pennsylvania native Caitlan Coleman made the accusations in court documents where she asked for sole custody of her three children with Joshua Boyle.

She is pregnant with their fourth baby and is due to give birth later this month.

Coleman, 31, described in the documents how Boyle, 34, who she says tricked her into going to Afghanistan in 2012 where they were kidnapped by the Taliban, piled onto her suffering during the five years they were held against their will.

The pair were rescued in October 2017 by Pakistani troops.

'J.B. (Joshua Boyle) regularly threatened to kill me by setting me on fire,' she said in a newly unsealed affidavit that was obtained by Ottawa Citizen.

Coleman added that her husband, who was arrested for sexual assault within days of returning to Canada, had been obsessed with extremist Islam for years.

'I would like to stress, most strongly, that for more than a decade, the respondent (Boyle) has had an interest in extremist ideologies and in the complete subservience of women.

'I have never shared that interest,' she said.

Coleman claimed he tricked her into going to Afghanistan in 2012 by first taking her to Central Asia, when she was five months pregnant, and then telling her they would enter the Taliban stronghold for him to pursue a story as an aspiring journalist.

Once in captivity, she said he sometimes beat her and confined her to a small shower stall for weeks at a time.

The pair married in 2011 during a different trip in Central Asia. Before setting off when she was pregnant, they split up briefly.

Boyle, who denies abusing her and says she was neglectful of their children and him in captivity, explained in his own court submissions how they met online.

They both, he said, had an interest in BDSM and travel.

'We both enjoyed BDSM. We both wanted to travel by way of backpacking, and we both wanted to see the world,' he said.

He contended that Coleman knew about his plans to travel to Afghanistan and that she did nothing to look after the children in captivity.

He even claimed their captors referred to him as the children's mother and father because Coleman apparently did so little.

He told the judge that despite being held captive, he was able to catch mice for the children to keep as pets and plant a garden of mango seeds for them to nurture.

The judge denied his request for shared custody and refuted his allegation that Coleman suffered untreated mental illness.

She granted Coleman full custody and allowed her to take the two boys and baby girl back to Pennsylvania with her.

Before marrying Coleman, Boyle was married to the sister of Guantanamo Bay detainee Omar Khadr and the daughter of a senior al-Qaida financier who had contacts with Osama bin Laden.

The family was arrested in October 2017 by Pakistani troops who were supported by US forces.

Boyle initially refused to board a US military plane, claiming he would only leave if it went straight to Canada.

Coleman's family were disgusted that he took her to Afghanistan when she was pregnant.

Her father described the decision as 'unconscionable' last year after their release.

Before they were freed, the couple appeared in hostage videos with the three babies they had in captivity.

In January, Boyle was charged with 15 counts of sexual assault.

Because the victims of sexual assault are never identified unless they expressly wish to be, it is not known if the alleged victim in those instances was his wife or someone else.

The alleged attacks took place between his release and December 30. According to prosecutors in Canada, he used a broom stick and rope in at least one.</s>OTTAWA, CANADA — A York County native who spent five years as a Taliban hostage in Afghanistan with her famiy says she was physically and emotionally abused by her husband during their period of captivity, according to a lawsuit filed in Canadian court.

Caitlan Coleman, originally of Stewartstown, claims her husband, Joshua Boyle, “regularly threatened to kill me by setting me on fire,” according to an affidavit filed in June. The Ottawa Citizen reports that Coleman is suing Boyle in family court to gain sole custody of the couple’s children.

Coleman, Boyle and their three children were rescued in October 2017 by Pakistani security forces after living as prisoners for five years in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Coleman, 32, has returned to Pennsylvania after being granted temporary sole custody of the children by an Ottawa court ruling in July.

Ontario Superior Court Justice Tracy Engelking also issued an order restraining Boyle from contacting or coming near Coleman and their children, the Ottawa Citizen reports.

Boyle, 34, has denied Coleman’s allegations, and accused her of abuse in a failed motion to prevent her from leaving Canada with their children. He says Coleman assaulted him and neglected the children, citing untreated mental health issues.

He also accused her of trying to push him in front of a subway in Toronto years before they married, the Citizen reports.

The Ottawa Citizen obtained the case documents through a court application, and reports the affidavits offer a look at the couple’s troubled relationship and details their years in captivity.

The couple met online in 2002, the Citizen reports, and became romantically involved in 2006. They married during a trip through Central America in July 2011, but soon separated.

Coleman began divorce proceedings in March 2012, the Citizen says.

One month later, Boyle visited Coleman at her home in York County, where they reconciled, and agreed to go backpacking through Central Asia.

In her affidavit, Coleman insists that she reluctantly agreed to the trip only after Boyle promised not to go to Afghanistan, the Citizen says.

Boyle disclosed his true intentions after they landed in Central Asia, she says, “so that I would not back out.”

In his countersuit, Boyle insisted that Coleman knew he intended to go to Afghanistan.

The couple was taken hostage on Oct. 10, 2012. Coleman was five months pregnant at the time.

Over the next five years, the couple was moved through 19 hideouts in Afghanistan and Pakistan and underwent severe physical and psychological abuse from their captors, according to the affidavit filed by Boyle.

The Citizen reports the couple offers differing accounts of their relationship while they were held hostage. Coleman reports Boyle became erratic and irrational, and fixated on depicting her as an enemy. He began to get more and more abusive after three years in captivity, the Citizen says.

After a disagreement in February 2017, Coleman says, Boyle “hit me in the face hard enough to break my cheekbone.”

In his affidavit, Boyle alleges that Coleman neglected their children while in captivity, leaving him as the primary caregiver. He says he slapped his wife once while in captivity as she attempted suicide by trying to overdose on stockpiled medication.

He often went without food, Boyle says, to give more to his children or pregnant wife, and spent hours whittling toys and gifts for them with a spoon.

He built a small garden beside the family’s squat toilet, he says, and planted okra, bean and mango seeds so that his children could appreciate gardening. He captured mice for the children to keep as pets, and sewed them clothes from blankets and scraps. He wrote them songs, taught them sign language, made up stories to entertain them, and helped them memorize selections of the Bible and Qur’an, according to his affidavit.

Coleman told court that she was the primary caregiver, and was responsible for home-schooling the children during the family’s captivity.

In a second affidavit filed in response to Boyle’s, Coleman alleges she did not share her husband’s interest in Central Asia or the extremist ideologies it harbored, the Citizen reports.

Coleman pointed to his previous marriage to Zaynab Khadr as evidence of his interest in extremism. Khadr is the eldest daughter of Ahmed Said Khadr, a member of Osama bin Laden’s inner circle who died in a firefight with Pakistani forces in October 2003; she outraged many Canadians with her comments in a 2004 documentary in which she suggested that the Sept. 11 terror attacks were justified.

The Boyle family was rescued last October in a dramatic shootout that made international headlines. Weeks after returning home, the Boyle family met Justin Trudeau in the Prime Minister’s Office.

In his affidavit, Boyle says that readjusting to life in Canada has been a traumatic experience. “While captivity was the worst thing that ever happened to me,” he says, “the adjustment to coming home was a very close second.”

Coleman is due to give birth to the couple’s fourth child this month, the Citizen reports.</s>OTTAWA -- Newly unsealed court documents are giving a window into a custody battle between a Canadian man and his American wife who were kidnapped and held hostage in Afghanistan for five years.

The family court documents detailing the dispute between Joshua Boyle and Caitlan Coleman over their three children, all of whom were born in captivity, were previously covered by a publication ban.

Coleman, who was kidnapped with Boyle while the two were backpacking in Afghanistan in 2012, sought the court's permission to leave Canada and return to the U.S. with the couple's children.

Boyle tried to prevent his wife, who is expecting a fourth child this month, from relocating and asked that his parents and sisters have access to the children.

Engelking gave Coleman temporary sole custody and allowed her to relocate the children to Pennsylvania, where her parents live, pending the results of the custody battle.

Boyle is currently free on bail awaiting a separate criminal trial over charges of assault allegedly perpetrated after the family was rescued in Pakistan and returned to Canada last October.

Boyle denies any wrongdoing and the charges have not been tested in court.</s>Unsealed court documents are revealing new information about the relationship between a York County native and her husband while being held captive by a group linked to the Taliban for five years, according to a published report.

The Ottawa Citizen received the court documents after filing a court application.

The newspaper reports that Caitlan Coleman said her time in captivity was only made worse by her husband Joshua Boyle who threatened to kill her by setting her on fire.

Coleman said she never knew her husband wanted to go Afghanistan. He only told her about his plans after they landed in Central Asia. She was five months pregnant.

The court documents are related to the custody of the couple's children.

The newspaper said in the documents Boyle describes himself as an aspiring journalist hoping to find a story in the region. He has previously said he was in area for humanitarian work.

Coleman said during their time in captivity Boyle became more erratic and abusive.

Boyle said Coleman was actually the abusive one. He claims she assaulted him and neglected their children.

The family was rescued in October 2017 by Pakistani security forces.

Months later several charges including sexual assault of a woman and physical assault of a child were filed in Canada against Boyle. The names of the victims were not released.

A judge granted Coleman custody of their children back in July. She is back in Pennsylvania but it is not clear if she is living with her parents who live in York County.

She is pregnant and expected to deliver her fourth child with Boyle this month.</s>"J.B. [Joshua Boyle] regularly threatened to kill me by setting me on fire," Coleman said in an affidavit filed in June as part of a family court application to obtain custody of her children with Boyle.

Boyle and his wife were kidnapped during a hiking trip in Afghanistan in 2012, then held by the Haqqani terrorist group, which is linked to the Taliban. The couple was released in October 2017 along with their three children, who had been born in captivity, after Pakistani security forces killed the kidnappers in a shootout.

Two months after his release, Boyle was charged with a slew of offenses ranging from sexual assault and forcible confinement to making death threats. His case includes charges regarding 19 offenses, among them death threats, sexual assault and providing incorrect information to police. He allegedly committed these offenses between October 2017, when he returned to Canada after being held hostage, and December, when he was detained. He will stand trial in Ottawa next spring for these charges.

The allegations made by Coleman in the affidavits have also not yet been proven in court. Coleman currently lives in Pennsylvania with her children. She was allowed temporary sole custody of them by an Ottawa, Canada, court on July 23. Ontario Superior Court Justice Tracy Engelking also issued a restraining order keeping Boyle from his wife and children.

"To say that the circumstances of this case are tragic in the extreme would be an understatement," Engelking said in the July 23 custody ruling, the Ottawa Citizen reported Tuesday.

Boyle has denied Coleman's allegations, claiming, rather, that he was the one abused by Coleman. In his 23-page affidavit, Boyle states that Coleman assaulted him and neglected their children as a result of mental health issues. In addition, he alleges that she tried to push him in front of a Toronto Transit Commission subway before they were married.

Engelking says there is no evidence that Coleman suffers from mental health issues that could impair her parenting abilities.

"The court does have evidence, on the other hand, that C.C. [Coleman] is healthily and protectively parenting the children. Based on all of the evidence before me, I can find little to suggest C.C. would not be a suitable temporary custodian of the children," the judge said in court.

Court documents obtained by the Ottawa Citizen also provide more insight into the couple's relationship.

"We both enjoyed BDSM [bondage]," Boyle, a journalist, said in his affidavit. "We both wanted to travel by way of backpacking, and we both wanted to see the world."

The two got married in July 2011, but soon separated. In March 2012, Coleman began divorce proceedings. However, one month later, the two reconciled and agreed to go backpacking through Central Asia, even after finding out that Coleman was pregnant with their first child. Coleman claims that she agreed to go on the trip as long as Boyle promised not to go to Afghanistan. Boyle revealed his true intentions to backpack through Afghanistan after they had already landed in the country so she would not "back out," Coleman alleges.

"We crossed into Afghanistan for a short while in hopes that I could meet people who could give me a story I could write about," Boyle said in his affidavit. "I had hoped that personal experience in Afghanistan might help me to land more permanent journalism work."

After they were taken hostage, Coleman claims that Boyle started to see her "as an enemy in his life."

"The guards would separate us for a few days, weeks or months at a time," she said.

"When we were returned together, J.B. [Boyle] would accuse me of betraying him by accepting niceties from the guards and not asking for him more often."

"J.B. had uncontrolled rage, instituted corporal punishment of me, and struck me in a fit of rage," repeatedly telling her that she was "one of the worst people in the world" and that "a husband who kills his wife is justified," Coleman claims.

In addition, she alleges that he hit her in the face "hard enough to break [her] cheekbone" after a disagreement in February 2017 and that he sometimes trapped her in a small shower stall for weeks at a time.

Boyle, on the other hand, claims that Coleman neglected their children.

"Multiple captors would reference me as the ‘wife and mother, husband and father' in the family, noting that all nurturing of the children was entirely upon me," he said in the affidavit, the Ottawa Citizen reported.

He admits to slapping his wife once in captivity when she tried to commit suicide by overdosing on stockpiled medication. He also claims that he often went days without food so that his children and wife had more to eat.

Boyle further says that he had taught his children about their Canadian and Irish heritage.

"Their knowledge of Canada was exhaustive enough to being able to identify northern islands such as Devon, Banks and Victoria on hand-drawn maps, a desire to move to the Magdalene Islands due to a Stompin' Tom Connors song they knew, bedtime stories often drawn from Road to Avonlea, and pretending to be Emily Carr when using mud to finger paint pictures of Salish homes (that always looked suspiciously like our cell, unsurprisingly)."
Caitlan Coleman, an American woman kidnapped and held hostage for five years in Afghanistan, accused her husband Joshua Boyle physically and emotionally abusing her while the family was being held by Taliban-linked militants.