Kate Gosselin was allegedly “physically aggressive” and “verbally” abused son Collin Gosselin as a child, the 20-year-old recently claimed.
“My mother had a room built in our unfinished section of the storage basement. She had a room put up with cameras in it, a tiny window in the corner and it was bolt-locked from the outside,” Collin alleged in a bombshell interview released by The U.S. Sun on Tuesday, September 10. “It was like a containment room, literally, and it had a mattress on the floor and that’s how I lived.”
Collin claimed that he “was 100 percent treated differently” than his siblings.
Kate, 49, shares 23-year-old twins Mady and Cara, 23, and 20-year-old sextuplets Collin, Hannah, Leah, Joel, Alexis and Aaden, with ex-husband Jon Gosselin. The former couple rose to fame with their children on the reality show Jon & Kate Plus 8, which aired from 2007 to 2017.
“It was rough. I definitely went through it a lot as a kid from my mother’s end. So, it was tough,” Collin told The Sun. “I just remember being isolated from my siblings and constantly taking the fall for her emotions or the tough things going on in her life.”
Collin said he felt like “a scapegoat” within the family. “I was isolated and I was taken away from them and I didn’t eat dinners with my family,” he alleged. (Us Weekly has reached out for comment.)
Kate Gosselin, Collin Gosselin. Amanda Edwards/Getty Images for Discovery; Vice TV
The alleged “containment” started when Collin was about 8 or 9 years old, he claimed.
“I was there, you know, most of the day because I didn’t go to school after a certain point,” he alleged. “So, most of the day I was in that room, and I was away from my siblings, and I never really went outside.”
Collin claimed that he was put in the isolation room “multiple times” and Kate had “zip-tied my hands and feet together and bolt locked the door, turned the lights off and had cameras there just watching me.”
Jon, 47, told The Sun that the room where Kate allegedly held Collin is “still” in the house.
“My friends’ in-laws bought our house and one time they asked me, ‘Why is there a room in the basement with a bed and a lock on the outside?’ It must have been terrifying for him,” Jon said, alleging that the apparent abuse occurred after their split.
Kate and Jon got divorced in 2009 after 10 years of marriage. At the time, she received primary custody of all eight kids and Collin spent several years in a health institution. In 2022, Hannah and Collin decided to live with Jon full-time.
Kate has not publicly responded to the abuse claims. However, her lawyer Richard Puleo told The Sun that he didn’t believe she would do anything to “intentionally harm” Collin, who allegedly showcased “troubled behavior” as a child.
“She did what she did to protect herself and her family,” he added.
If you or someone you know is experiencing child abuse, call or text Child Help Hotline at 1-800-422-4453.
