Montreal ? Canada’s most notorious female inmate was secretly spirited from prison on Monday after serving 12 years for the rapes, torture and murders of three teenage girls, including her younger sister.

Karla Homolka, 35, received the relatively light sentence in return for her testimony against her ex-husband Paul Bernardo. Homolka told the court and psychiatrists she was a battered wife who took part in the rapes and murders to protect herself and her family.

Months after prosecutors made the deal, however, Bernardo’s attorneys handed over homemade videotapes by the couple that indicated Homolka was a willing participant.

“I don’t want to be hunted down,” Homolka told RDI, the CBC’s French language news network, after her release. “I don’t want people to think I am dangerous and I’m going to do something to their children.”

Homolka, who appeared drawn and tired, said she decided to give the interview after consulting with her lawyer. She plans to live in Quebec.

A salesman watches an interview with Karla Homolka Monday on television station RDI in Montreal. Homolka, the notorious ex-wife of convicted serial rapist and killer Paul Bernardo, was whisked quietly away from the Ste-Anne-des-Plaines prison north of Montreal earlier Monday afternoon after serving 12 years for the rapes, and murders of three teenage girls, including her younger sister.

Homolka became the symbol of evil in Canada in 1993 when she was convicted of manslaughter for her role in the kidnappings, rapes, sexual torture and murders of Ontario teenagers Kristen French and Leslie Mahaffy. She was also convicted in the 1990 death of her 15-year-old sister, Tammy, who died choking on her own vomit on Christmas Eve after Homolka held a drug-soaked cloth over her mouth while both she and her husband raped her.

Tim Danson, the lawyer representing the French and Mahaffy families, told The Associated Press his clients were stunned that Homolka was free.

In return for her relatively light sentence, Homolka testified against Bernardo, a Toronto bookkeeper serving a life term for two counts of first-degree murder.

“People think she’s cheated the system,” said Jack Jadwab, executive director of the Association of Canadian Studies in Montreal.

Ontario prosecutors went back to court last month to successfully obtain restrictions on her movement and activities once she was free.