HELPING EACH OTHER SAFE HARBOR RAISES FUNDS TO AID BATTERED WOMEN.

Byline: DANA BARTHOLOMEW Staff Writer

SHERMAN OAKS -- Two weeks after immigrating to Los Angeles County at age 16, Maria Suarez was bought as a sex slave for $200.

After five years under the sway of a self-proclaimed witch doctor, she ultimately served 22 years in prison for being an accessory to his murder.

Now, after a rare parole by the state, Suarez will be honored today for her work in quelling domestic abuse.

``She has overcome all respects of domestic violence by achieving a new life in helping others,'' said Trish Steele, founder of Safe Passage, a Sherman Oaks-based agency that has offered cosmetic makeovers and other services to hundreds of abused women.

``She has turned it around to work it for good.''

They've been threatened. Raped. Beaten. Disfigured. And made to feel like dirt.

Thousands seek aid

Thousands of such women have sought the aid of such agencies as Safe Passage, founded six years ago by Steele to provide guidance, makeovers, shelter and job assistance to survivors of domestic abuse willing to abandon abusive partners and to reclaim their lives.

This week, Suarez held the hand of Steele, an ordained minister and former victim of domestic violence, while she recounted her years of abuse.

How two weeks after her family moved from Mexico to Sierra Madre, a woman approached her offering a job cleaning houses.

How she was driven to the Azusa home of 68-year-old Anselmo Covarrubias, a self-professed brujo, or witch doctor, and sold for $200.

How she was raped and tortured over the next five years. If she ran, he told her, he would kill her family.

She believed him. He had once cut her hair to fashion a voodoo doll that would ensure the death of her and her family if she escaped. She once was ordered to dig her own grave.

He ``terrorized (Suarez) into staying with him by manipulating and brainwashing her into believing ... (he) derived his powers from the devil,'' according to reports from the prison board.

In 1981, Suarez awoke to the screams of her captor in the backyard. She found him bludgeoned to death by a tenant living in his garage apartment.

She aided the killer, washing the table leg used as a weapon and tossing it beneath the house. For that, she was convicted of being an accessory and sentenced to 25 years to life in prison.

In 2003, then-Gov. Gray Davis granted her a rare parole, citing inconsistencies in her case and her exemplary behavior as a prisoner.

Since then, the Altadena woman has counseled abusers at About Face in downtown Los Angeles.

``My message through all of this is there is hope,'' said Suarez, 46, a stately woman with jet-black hair who speaks with calm assurance. ``When you feel almost in the grave, there is hope. When the tunnel is long, there is hope. ``When you are in prison, there is hope.

``I chose to be a better person in prison -- to learn how to help others. When I counsel these (abusive) men, I actually confront them. I make them know that what they do is wrong, ... (that) the violence has to stop.''

Steele -- a former Miss California, model, makeup artist, hair and wardrobe stylist, and TV talk show host -- said it's vital for women to feel good about themselves. Safe Passage, which has aided about 300 battered women, finds doctors and dentists to repair lost teeth and the scars inflicted by their batterers.

It also plans to open its own shelter.

``I would create an outside that would match a new inside, for a whole new look,'' said Steele, 55, ``because every woman has their own image of beauty, and I just want to enhance that beauty from the inside out.''

Benefit fundraiser

Today, she will host a benefit fundraiser in Sherman Oaks that will also honor TV talk show host Greg Behrendt, makeup artist Maurice Stein and hairstylists Riccardo and Tony Altieri for their work with battered women.

Tina Marie Wilson was 18 when, desperate for love, she married the ``bad boy'' boyfriend she'd known throughout high school. Then came drugs and alcohol.

And emotional and physical abuse.

``He did everything from holding scissors to my neck,'' said Wilson, 37, of Glendale, now a clean and sober mother of two. ``I've been thrown down stairs, tossed through windows ... I've been black and blue, beaten, thrown to the ground and repeatedly kicked and punched.

``It's the whole dance -- the honeymoon period, the flowers, the `I'm sorrys,' the `It won't happen agains.' It's a whole cycle.''

Wilson, married three years, divorced her husband after he was sent to prison for assault and other charges.

She met Steele six years ago at a Bible study at the San Fernando Valley home of soul singer Smokey Robinson. Since then, she said, Safe Passage has given her tools for a productive life.

``It was Trish who showed me that someone can truly care,'' Wilson said. ``I do feel safe. I have the strength to stand up for myself. I do hold my head high most of the time.''

dana.bartholomew(at)dailynews.com

[phone]

IF YOU GO:

Safe Passage will host a fundraising gala, 12:30-4:30 p.m. today at a private estate in Studio City. Tickets are $100. For information, call [phone], or see www.safepassagehome.org.

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Photo:

Secretary/treasurer Bonnie Corwin, founder and CEO Trish Steele and counselor Maria Suarez, from left, operate Safe Passage, an organization that aids victims of domestic violence.

Evan Yee/Staff Photographer

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IF YOU GO (see text)