The questions are valid, and they're also pretty easily answered. Pedophiles -- at least the ones who don't get caught early and often -- are shrewd and manipulative. They have a doctoral-level, instinctive rather than scholarly, understanding of child psychology.
They know how to use terror, sympathy, affection, shame and dependency alternately to beat a child's mind into the shape they want it to be. "Stockholm syndrome" is a start, but it's far too glib, and besides the Stockholm hostages were all adults when their ordeal began. A child's mind is much more malleable. Someone who's a victim long enough forgets that there's anything else -- pain gives way to numbness.
Just to be clear, what follows is speculation. If Shawn was abducted at age 11, and the other boy was also abducted at 11, it seems likely that Devlin has a favored "type." When Shawn got too old for him, he tried to use Shawn to recruit another boy. That is not unusual behavior for pedophiles. It is also not uncommon for a victim to break out of his brainwashing when he's asked to become an accomplice.
I don't know the particular dynamics of what happened to Shawn during his captivity, and I don't want to know. That's for him to discuss with his pshrinks. I hope, though I'm not hugely optimistic, that he can recover -- some of the years when the boy was molded into the man he will be were spent in one of the most f-ed up environments imaginable. Other folks have mentioned Stephen Stayner, whose story illustrates what a hard road it is back from there.
It is tempting to ask why he didn't use the phone, or e-mail, or smoke signals or carrier pigeons to call for help. It's tempting to imagine what you would do in that situation, but it's worth resisting the temptation for one important reason -- you're not eleven.
I'd like to think that if I were captive for a year, or two, three or four, or ten, or twenty, I would never give up on getting word out and getting away. But that's a personality i developed in the loving arms of my family. Shawn's childhood was constructed of a whole 'nother set of building blocks.
You could also ask why many dogs don't leave the yard when they're not on a leash or many horses don't leave the paddock when the gate is open. Devlin and bastards like him don't use dank cells or physical restraints, because they don't have to. They shackle the will first.
You are 100% right on!!!!