Update 28: I know we are going slowly through Chapter 9, but it is such a gold mine of new information that practically everything in it is comment-worthy. Take the next section on "The hunt for trace evidence". It's one of the many reasons why any serious student of this case has to buy the book. Tucked at the end is yet another fascinating "Melnick interview with AES" tidbit. Stop and let the implications of this all wash over you. There was a garbage bag. In this garbage bag was stuffed the Kocis-blood-splattered clothes of the murderer of Bryan Kocis. We know this bag actually exists because some California hotel (this one perhaps, where I ate a BLT 4 years ago?) actually has a record of it. Now stop and ponder the further implications of this. Who's clothes are in this bag? Could they be Joe's? Unlikely! Joe was the one who told the investigators about it! The same investigators he was trying to sell the story of him being at the Fox Ridge Inn the whole time. If the bag contained Joe's clothes splattered with Kocis' blood, Joe would have N-E-V-E-R tipped them off to it. So, by process of elimination, whose blood-splatted clothes MUST BE in this garbage bag, currently moldering in some landfill in San Diego? Mmmm hm. Uh huh. Mmmm hm. Update 27: The sections 'Cuadra details "the plan" for acquittal' and "Answering those nagging questions" both deal with a topic recently brought up in the comments, that being Harlow's obsession with winning the battle for public opinion.
Here we see the 'Free Harlow' t-shirts in court idea that never got off the ground, along with a wealth of other image management tips in a letter to Renee Martin. "Image matters a lot" sayeth Harlow.
Also interesting are his directives to Renee on cleaning up Joe's image, and improving his blog. Yes, commands from Harlow, micromanaging the affairs of Joe. So here we get a clear indication who really wears the pants in this relationship.
Lastly, more of Harlow's personality gets revealed in his prison blog post, a Brent-bashing tour de force where he got an opportunity to call him "pretentious", "bitchy", "bratty" and such a nonentity in the industry that Harlow had actually never heard of him until recently. All within a few short sentences! The book doesn't go into this, but I can tell you the effect his had on the blogs: Harlow's popularity soared to an all time high among BB and all the other Brent-bashers (who were more numerous back then, and vocal even beyond their numbers). They came out and cackled amongst themselves in the comment sections for days in the aftermath of this. It seems to me, this was a calculated ploy by Harlow to curry their favor.
So, why did Harlow think that "image mattered" and was critical to "the plan" for acquittal? I can think of three possible reasons:
1) He may have thought a widespread belief in his innocence in the blogs and in the media would trickle down to the jury pool in northeastern Pennsylvania (this one is, admittedly, far fetched in reality...but who knows what Harlow was thinking?);
2) He may have also needed a good public image for legal defense fundraising purposes (this one is more realistic...these donors are people who would be reading the relevant blogs); and/or
3) He may have been (wishfully) thinking ahead to his life after acquittal. He didn't want just a jury to think that he was innocent, he wanted the world to think he was innocent. In other words, he did not want to become the OJ Simpson of gay porn.
So, it could have been one, some or all of these reasons. I'm guessing probably a bit of all. Update 26: The three-way calls. Two suspects in custody, recorded talking to themselves coordinating the fake alibis they intend to use. You know, if this were the only evidence offered to a jury, this ALONE would be enough, most likely, to get a conviction.
One other thing I'd point out is, since the nature of the relationship between Harlow and Joe has become such a hot topic in the comments as of late, these three-way calls are a marvelous sources for getting at the truth of that relationship.
The book only gives a few snippets of their interaction.; I've read more detailed accounts in the past, and I can tell you this much: Harlow and Joe bickered during those three way calls on occasion. And here's the thing: Whenever Joe snapped at Harlow, Harlow DID NOT HESITATE to snap right back.
The part quoted in the book, where Harlow is saying "I know, I know, I know...I,I,I know, I know Joe", if you read that part it's full context, Harlow is basically telling Joe to kindly STFU.
Which of course is not the kind of thing you'd expect a dominated wallflower to be saying. Update 25: After detailing Harlow's failed alibi attempts, PC systematically eviscerates Joe's alibi (of sorts) that he was at the Fox Ridge Inn the whole time. There is simply no doubt Joe was at the murder scene with Harlow (Joe's constant denials, to this day, notwithstanding).
Then we get to Joe's prison buddies. After re-reading this section, I've come to a BIG conclusion: I've decided that the Riggs account is actually the true and accurate account of exactly what happened, of who was where and of who did what on the day of the murder.
Here's the Riggs account of what Joe told him. Pay close attention class, because THIS is undoubtedly how it all really happened:
1) Harlow went into Kocis' home for the appointment, alone
2) Joe waited in the car in the driveway
3) Harlow killed Kocis, alone
4) Harlow came out and got Joe
5) Together they moved Kocis' body to the couch, ransacked the house, and set it on fire. Then fled.
As the book notes, Riggs had only a paltry 7 months left on a sentence for a minor parole violation, so, he had little incentive to elaborately make all this stuff up. In addition, everything he says is in 100% accord with the evidence as we know it...everything fits to a tee. And third, he knew details even the police hadn't found out yet.
And as for Joe, everything he's saying to Riggs is prejudicial to himself, including the admission, that Joe has always DESPERATELY and falsely denied to this day, that he was at the murder scene. So, there is no motive for Joe to by lying to Riggs about this.
This is it folks. Final version, end of story, mystery solved, case closed. Update 24: Harlow's hunt for an alibi section brings up the mysterious Mitch Hal(l)ford. Re-reading all this brings up two questions in my mind:
1) How many l's are really in his name? The book has it down with one l, but then there's counter-indications such as this. It's been spelled both ways in the Kocisphere in the past, IIRC.
2) Does anyone else find it odd...nay, unbelievable...that a person would be approached to give a fake alibi for someone, thus almost certainly indicating that that someone is as guilty as sin...and then turn around and give that person $70,000 to defend themselves in court? In other words, to donate that much money to a legal defense fund, shouldn't you actually believe that someone to be innocent?
I find it very hard to believe anyone could think someone is innocent after being asked to lie to the police about an alibi for them, and I also find it hard to believe someone would spend $70,000 on someone they had CLEAR SIGNS was indeed guilty. Update 23: Now we move on to Chapter 9. This is the first of the trial (and pre-trial) parts of the book, which actually takes up about 40% of it.
First up the lawyer roulette section. The moral of the story here is, if you're going to commit a crime in a small rural county, where every lawyer has been in every other lawyer's law firm and/or worked for the same client at one time or the other, make SURE you commit the crime by yourself, with no co-conspirator. Otherwise you're looking for trouble!
The Fannick controversy is covered here in detail, in which it was claimed attorney Demetrius Fannick met with Joe eight times in prison and except for talking about fees, never once discussed the case with him. You can view my dramatic recreation of those conversations here.
And the book has an interesting new revelation about the incident, duly footnoted as "Kerekes interview with AES, 7-2-09":
"Kerekes would later contradict himself again, admitting in a state prison interview that he lied in court, and that his discussions with Fannick went far beyond the fee structure."
Update 22: Finishing up Chapter 8, what sticks in my mind most, thanks to recent commentary here, is the info on what exactly got impounded due to RICO.
In "Paying for a defense" we have Harlow on his blog opining that "The dollar amount to defend a capital case is over $250,000 combined" which I take to mean $125,000 for each Harlow and Joe. Which sounds about right, and I'm sure Harlow was well and truly informed by his legal team at the time as to that estimate.
Fred Kerekes, OTOH, puts the figure he needed to raise at "$150,000 for my son and Harlow (Cuadra)." So, we can put the total somewhere in that $150,000 to $250,000 range and be on pretty safe ground here.
So, in an alternate universe where RICO didn't exist, would H&J's legal funding problems been equally nonexistent? Turns out not quite.
As we know, VA didn't even bother with the house, it was so underwater it might as well have been nicknamed Jacques Cousteau. The cars they seized initially but ended up "sent back to the lenders" because they too had no equity. That leaves a bunch of personal belongings of undetermined value (computers, video cameras, a stereo, an iPod, some jewelry, a Louis Vuitton back, racing tire rims and and accessories) and $26,585.25 in cash.
I don't know what all the RICOed personal stuff was worth (based on this blog's namesake event, the auction of the infamous Chinchilla coat, I'd have to imagine it would not have been a very significant amount ... lets say, $5000 or so?) which leaves the only real RICO loss being that wad of cash, $26,585.25. In other words, barely 10% to 15% of what they needed for a paid defense.
In this alternate universe, Barry Taylor would have been in position and first in line to suck up this $32,000 or so. There are indications in the book he was owed quite a lot of money at the time of the arrest, so much of it would not have gone to any future capital defense by him, but rather, to pay off the billable hours already racked up.
(By the way, in a slightly earlier section "Trashing the evidence" can you guess who's one of the biggest whiners about the RICO seizures? Yep, Barry Taylor)
Bottom line, it can't be said RICO was this vast conspiracy to deny H&J they money to mount a paid defense. Because, even without RICO, they would not have had the cash to mount a paid defense. Not even close. Update 21: The rest of Chapter 8, about the period they were "on the run" sure brought back memories.
Let me tell you what was going on in the Kocisphere back then. Back then, as you know, I was practically the lone voice in the wilderness pointing out the Harlow and Joe MUST have been involved in committing the murder. Practically everyone else wanted to point the finger and speculate at Sean and Grant, and didn't want to listen to logic that pointed in a different direction.
Also keep in mind, neither the SWAT raid nor the fact that Harlow and Joe had gone into hiding was public knowledge at this point. No news stories reported the SWAT raid right after it happened, so, no one knew that the police had basically eliminated Sean and Grant as suspects and were now focusing like a laser beam on Harlow and Joe. Which was great for all the Brent-did-it conspiracists.
At some point, I think, Sean got tired of all the excess suspicion on him. Police had kept he and Grant informed to some degree about the course of the investigation, so, he KNEW they were in reality they were cowering and hiding somewhere, after the SWAT raid.
So, Sean goes to his journalist friend Jody Wheeler and does an "interview" that was really not supposed to be one. It's a little fuzzy on whether what he told Wheeler was supposed to be off the record or not, but IMO the most likely scenario was that Sean wanted to leak truthful information to the Kocisphere about the VERY REAL investigation of Harlow and Joe, and this was the way he went about it.
The article "Two Pair" by Wheeler came out, and naturally it blew up the Kocisphere. Especially with it's quote of Sean saying that Harlow and Joe were currently "on the run."
And it was at this point that Joe began posting on the Kocisphere, under his "Mark" persona, in order to counter the TRUTH that they were indeed "on the run."
In particular:
"sanfransam said... anyone else see harlow @ the gay awards?
i did :)
He looked cute, and did not look like he was too worried about anything. Harlow did have on a sweet pair of nike dunks with his suit. maybe the sneakers where in case he had to make a run for it?
February 25, 8:37 AM
---Anonymous said... Hi this is Mark again from www.boisrus.com here just confirming I sent a studly entorage to san fran (Harlow and Calvin) for gayvn just to mingle and to set alarms silent. Harlow isnt on the run and actually has been filming in va beach for my new update to boybatter today with he and mason. :-)Trent & Harlow have been escorting here ever since that night in question and before.Im sorry I cant respond to any questions regarding investigations, my long time litigation lawyer says NObut thanks for your warm welcome to this blog..that was suprising as I DO realize porn & escorting are two very different worlds.Mark
February 25, 2007 9:00 AM"
And that folks, is ALL IT TOOK. INSTANTLY, this Harlow-was-at-the-GAYVNs story was adopted by the majority of folks in the Kocisphere AS THE GOSPEL TRUTH. That's all it took! A fake "sanfransam" Yahoo email account, and a statement by "Mark."
And STILL TODAY, there was that idiot who posted a comment on the Sword a few months back about how Harlow was at the GAYVNs after the murder! That shows how amazingly effective those two posts above were. My brain still explodes thinking about this today! It's incredible how gullible people can be when they want to be!
And what happened to Sean at this point, you may wonder? Sean, who took a risk and provided the Kocishere with the first REAL information about the course of the murder investigation?
Oh. My. God. He was CRUCIFIED. "That lying TOXIC TWINK, Harlow and Joe are NOT on the run, LOL! They were at the GAYVNs, see? Someone even noticed his nice shoes! OBVIOUSLY, this LIE proves BRENT is a MURDERER!" Etc etc etc.
Oh, you should have seen the comments. Sean was literally crucified. And for what? Giving us all what we so desperately craved: real and truthful information about what was going on in the murder investigation.
To this day, I'm still in amazement about how when the Kocisphere was presented with both the truth and a lie, the degree to which the lie was eagerly cherished and adopted, and the truth was villified and denigrated...I am just astounded. To this day!
This is stuff I kinda wish was in the book. There are life lessons here, about the capacity of people to be completely blind to the nature of truth and lies in order comport them to one's own preconceived world views, that are IMO of immense value and should be put on record here.
Update 20: "[Harlow and Joe, while they were hiding out in Miami after the SWAT raid but before the arrest] also conducted an on-camera interview with TV producers from MTV's Real Life program to tell their side of the story, but the segment never aired."
Will it ever air? Has anyone outside MTV actually seen this? Was it involved in the trial in any way?
Were both of them interviewed, together?
Seems to me some valuable insight into the power dynamic between the two would be revealed in this video, and how they responded to the interviewer.
Any chance it will ever been seen by the public? It keeps coming up from time to time (I think Joe mentioned it in one of his letters) and it's like this mysterious thing that gets mentioned but no one has ever really seen or heard it. Update 19: On to Chapter 8. "In the short time they did spend together, Higgins came away unimpressed with Cuadra. "He is a male prostitute, and he comes across as soft, by the way he speaks and his mannerisms, but I can see right through that," Higgins said. ... "He acts like that to get people to do what he wants, to manipulate people."
The footnote indicates the source of this observation is "Higgins interview with AES" making this a new fact revealed in the book, and a quite interesting one coming from someone who's entire professional career is based on making these sorts of profiling character observations. Update 18: Chapter 7: "...Kocis approached his friend Samuel Hall, a Milwalkee-based entertainment lawyer who had befriended Kocis earlier in 2005."
What's interesting to me about this is that this I think the first time I've heard of this guy (or maybe I did, but can't remember?).
In any case, what we get in this section is some very interesting details from Mr. Hall about the Cobra settlement. And not just the terms of the settlement, but the state of mind of the parties before, during and right after the settlement talks in Vegas.
I notice the source for all this is the Cuadra Trial Transcript, so, I gather Hall was called as a witness, and was asked about all this by either the prosecution or the defense.
The Le Cirque dinner is covered at the end of the chapter as well. The only detail I think should have been included was the phone conversation between Joe and Grant, after Vegas but before the murder, with Joe once again nagging to begin filming, and Grant telling them they still weren't ready yet due to the recently signed settlement.
I'm trying to remember the exact details of this call, and what date it took place (it's probably written on my blog here, but it'll take a while to dig up), but as I recall it was triggered in part due to the premature announcement on Boybatter of a new partnership with Brent Corrigan , etc etc etc. which Grant was not pleased with.
It is my belief that it was this phone call that was the final trigger in the decision by Harlow and Joe to murder Bryan Kocis.
"On the morning of Tuesday, January 16, Joe and Harlow called Sean, angry that Sean had not posted an announcement of their plans on his blog. Grant was furious at their impatience. “I’m in the middle of the settlement, and I had gone to great lengths to explain our situation, and they’re all pissed off because we don’t have a blog post on? Who the fuck do they think they are? I called them and said, ‘We’ve got a lot to do. You’re calling Sean and harassing him.’ Joe starts getting angry with me, saying wild things, threatening me that if we don’t ‘put up a post,’ the deal is off. I said, ‘If you don’t understand us, leave us the fuck alone.’ And I told Sean, ‘Screw those guys. Don’t talk to them anymore.’ That was it.”"]
Update 17: I just finished up Chapter 6, which is an *excellent* synopsis of what went down at the Crab Catcher and on Black's Beach. A really fine job in describing how Harlow and Joe for all intents and purposes confessed to murder on tape, the audience at this point now knows the police investigation has run it's course, and it's only a matter of time before the jaws of the trap snap shut...and they swoop in for the arrest! The anticipation is palpable, how will it go down? This missed them once during the SWAT raid, will Harlow and Joe manage to wriggle away again? Will there be violence or bloodshed? The reader eagerly turns the page to Chapter 7...
...And begins to read more of the past history of Sean Lockhart.
This is, I think, the biggest problem with the book, one that Will has remarked on already, and many book reviewers have noted as well, and that is the unfortunate over-tendency to of the book to tell the story in a non-chronological fashion. With this transition from Chapter 6 to 7 being the most jarring example of this. In fact, 7 goes on to simply repeat much of what's already been covered in Chapter 3 (although in greater detail).
Now, I don't know if any plans are in the works for a 2nd edition, but if there are, I think an untangling of the various sections and chapters would be a worthwhile endeavor. I have had some months to ponder this problem, and for it's worth, I throw my ideas out for fixing here. They are suggestions, obviously, so take from them what you will (if anything):
Chapter 1: The murder scene, unchanged from the book.
Chapter 2: Life of Kocis, which would be the current Chapter 2, plus much of current Chapter 3 dealing with the history of Cobra Video all the way until Bryan sees Sean on webcam for the very first time, then STOP.
Chapter 3: Life of Sean, childhood through meeting Kocis (where Ch 2 stopped), then continuing on with much of what's in Chapters 3 and 7 (the Cobra Wars), all the way to the climactic settlement signing in Vegas, then STOP. "But there was another fateful meeting Sean and Grant had scheduled during that weekend in Las Vegas, at the world famous Le Cirque in the Bellagio Hotel..."
Chapter 4: Life of Harlow and Joe, the rise and fall of their empire, all the way to the Le Cirque dinner, then STOP. We are now caught up to where we left off in 3, AND we have now introduced all the main characters, so, no more backtracking! It's all forward narrative from this chapter and onwards!
Chapter 5: Harlow and Joe do the murder (ie, current Chapter 5).
Chapter 6: Shock and Awe in San Diego (current Chapter 6) etc etc etc, except now we can dispense entirely with the current Chapter 7 (which was merged into 3 and 4). So, the current Chapter 8 becomes 7, and so on and so forth!
So, FWIW, that's my fix suggestion. We only time-shift 3 times (in the first three chapters), and that out of necessity when each new major character groups are introduced. From Chapter 4 and onwards we are full speed ahead.
Update 16: On to Chapter 6! The first paragraph reads as follows: "To be clear, suspicion about who killed Bryan Kocis did not immediately settle on Harlow Cuadra and Joseph Kerekes. Speculation online and among porn insiders almost immediately centered instead on Sean Lockhart and Grant Roy because of their well-known and public feud with Kocis." FWIW, this paragraph is accurate. However, the main point about it I want to make is this: To the best of my recollection (and please I correct me if I'm wrong), this paragraph is the exhaustive entirety of everything the book has to say about the vast network of blogs, bloggers, commenteers and lurkers which we know of today as the "Kocisphere." At no point does the book even vaguely allude to the Kocisphere, except this one vaguely alluding paragraph. Discuss. Update 15: And here's the "revelation" absolutely no one is surprised to see, once it became known Joe was being interviewed for this book: "...to kill Bryan Kocis, a task we had prepared two weeks to perform since the idea's inception between Sean Lockhart and Harlow at that business meal at Le Cirque in Vegas at the Bellagio." Then etc etc etc for two more paragraphs after that.
So, who here is shocked at this attempt by imprisoned-for-life Joe to finger Sean (and at a later quote in the book, Grant) as full-fledged co-conspirators in the murder plot? Who of us here NEVER saw this comin'?
Update 14: As 'Joe and Harlow go to Pennsylvania': "...At 6:35 P.M., another call from the pre-paid Verizon wireless cell phone is recorded making it's last phone call, this one bouncing off a cell tower on County Club Road in Dallas, Pennsylvania--just 500 yards and within view of Kocis' home. Cuadra was apparently near Kocis' home but was too early for his appointment."
I've said this before on this blog, but I think it bears repeating: I believe Harlow entered the house right after this 6:35pm phone call (which was probably Harlow telling Kocis he was early and standing at the door). In other words, not after the last call by Macias at 7:50pm, as is commonly believed.
Reason being is what Harlow said on the BBTs. He clearly related to Sean and Grant a phone call he overheard between Kocis and Lee Bergeron (frustratingly obfuscated in this book as "business partner"). Those calls from Lee, as you can see, came in right on schedule at 7:23 and 7:34pm.
There was no way on earth Harlow could have known about those calls UNLESS he was sitting right there listening to Kocis talk on his end. At the time the BBT sting was underway, the Kocis phone call info was NOT yet public info, in news accounts or on blogs.
And not only did he know of the calls, he clearly knew the gist of what was being said. Harlow mentioned on the BBTs Kocis setting up Brent in his own apartment, as part of the new business relationship. Brent exclaimed that this was indeed discussed. Harlow replied with words to the effect: See I told you so, how else would I know that.
Now, I know what some of you are going to say now, that Macias testified that Bryan told him minutes after 7:50pm that he had to end the call as "Danny" aka Harlow was at the door.
My explanation for this seeming discrepancy is a simple one: Harlow had been in Bryan's house, patiently (or impatiently) waiting since about 6:36pm. Kocis had been harried by business call almost that entire time, which we can clearly see thanks to the timeline in this section. When Macias made that last call at 7:50pm, Bryan probably decided enough was enough. He was going to refuse to talk any more to his attorney (or anyone else), and as a polite way of immediately terminating the conversation, made up a little white lie of having to get up and get the door (which is more mannerly than saying "the twink sitting next to me right now is more important than talking to you, so, hang up and go away.").
So, it was a polite little fib from Kocis to Macias, quite understandable under the circumstances. And as you can see, it reconciles with what Harlow said on the BBTs; as Harlow himself said, there is no other way he could have known about that phone call unless he was sitting there as it happened.
I think this whole point is interesting, because if I'm right (and I don't how I couldn't be) then Harlow was with Bryan alone for up to an hour and twenty minutes before he killed him, and not the mere ten or so minutes as has been commonly thought. Was it the constant phone calls that kept Harlow from killing Bryan for so long? Seems likely, you don't want to kill someone on the phone, as that would likely give it away ("talk talk talk talk talk ARRRGHaaack...").
Or possibly, was Harlow also trying to build his courage up during this time period?
On the BBTs, Harlow's account of that last conversation between Bryan Kocis and Lee Bergeron, just before Bryan was murdered, was that they were using the settlement to screw Sean and Grant over (the so-called "back door deal"), and that disparaging things were said about Sean in that conversation. The point Harlow was trying to make being, that Bryan was a bad man, and therefore, Sean and Grant should stop feeling bad about what had been done.
And one get's the impression, by implication, that that overheard phone conversation Between Lee and Bryan most likely also played a role in fortifying Harlow's resolve as well. Update 13: On to Chapter 5...
"Despite acknowledging the need for a substantial daily and weekly income just to keep their heads above water, Kerekes insists ..."We needed no ... help whatsoever" to meet their financial obligations."
:-O
What... the... ?????
OK, some background here. In the very early days of the Kocisphere, before Harlow and Joe were even arrested, and even for a while afterwards, the main argument for their innocence was that they were stinking rich. They lived in a mansion! They drove a fleet of super expensive cars! They wore Rolexes and chinchilla fur coats! They traveled the world! Etc. They were the Warren Buffet and and Bill Gates of the homo hooker world. And THEREFORE, had NO MOTIVE to commit such a crime. They MUST have been framed! This was cited as innumerable times as settled fact on Elm blog and elsewhere (Elm actually titled a blog post 'Who Framed Harlow and Joe?' or words to that effect), despite the only source for these claims of affluence being Harlow and Joe themselves.
And indeed, they did have a big house, cars, etc. that everyone could see...but were they telling the whole story? Nearly everyone in the Kocisphere back then accepted in blind faith that they were.
Then came the bombshell: PC published their credit reports on his blog.
O.M.G. WHAT a game changer. Turns out all that wealth was borrowed on credit cards, the house double-mortgaged upside-down to the hilt. A hypothetical homeless person with nothing but a ball of lint in his pocket had a higher net worth than Harlow and Joe, since a ball of lint has a value of $0 and Harlow and Joe were clearly in negative numbers.
At that point, FINALLY, public opinion began to shift. Especially when you looked at the reports closely; you could actually see the missed payments getting worse and worse, throughout the period when they were desperately negotiating with Brent and Grant, and combined with rejected requests for credit extensions, all the way up to the day of the murder. It was utterly damning.
The die hard Harlowites were, quite naturally, furious at PC. One of the Harlow relatives (his sister, IIRC?) threatened PC with a lawsuit over the publishing of the credit report.
Elm and others, initially shocked themselves, went into damage control mode. The new party line was "Oh they had some debts (who doesn't) but they were manageable! You, see, because they had lots of income coming in!"
To this I would reply using math. At one point I figured out what they would need to make minimum monthly payments on their debts, divided it by Harlow's hourly rate, and calculated the number of hours Harlow would have to spend per month with his legs in the air. I can't recall the exact figure, but I believe it did not give him enough time to get eight hours sleep at night.
But Elm and others were impervious to math. They went on with the "they were too rich to have a motive" theory until the very end, totally dismissing that pesky little problem with creditors that were about to repossess everything they owned and loved. Elm and I literally went back and forth over this, in numerous and lengthy blog posts, for YEARS.
So, fast forward to today. Joe is in prison for life. He has nothing to lose by finally telling the truth now, the same truth he told Grant on the Blacks Beach tapes: that they were in financial desperation during this period.
So, Stoner I guess writes Joe a letter (because according to the footnote on this para it comes from a "Kerekes letter to AES") and I suppose he quite naturally asks "so Joe, why'd you do it?" and Joe replies as above, that "financial obligations" had nothing to do with it.
Aaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrgggggggggghhhhhhhhhh!
Holy crap, they have NOT given up on this now pointless point. You have GOT to be f'ing kidding me. I am frankly astounded. They are STILL refusing to admit finances were the motive.
Why? Why keep this lie going? I completely do not understand this. At this point I have to wonder whether Elm and Joe got together recently, and decided Joe should tell Stoner this...simply to piss me off. They knew I would read this when the book came out...and blow my stack. Yes, I realize this is a far-fetched theory, but I can currently come up with no other explanation!
And it worked too. I almost threw my book out the window (which would have been a big problem because it's a Kindle edition).
Sigh. Well, OK then Joe, if not for money problems, why DID you commit the murder?
And Joe says: "We simply saw something we wanted...so we took it."
Wow. I mean, wow. So, that's the motive, according to Joe, huh? That you and Harlow did it because you both are psychopaths.
Um, yeah. BIG improvement over having a financial motive Joe! Yeah that really makes you guys look good! Thanks for sharing.
Sigh.
Now you all see why I said earlier that interviewing Joe for this book was a fools errand. While I appreciate the efforts of Stoner and PC in reaching out to Joe, I have to say nothing he says now in this book, or later, can really be taken seriously, for anything. And this whole paragraph is a prime example of exactly why.
Update 12: "Eliminating competitors was also nothing new for Cuadra and Kerekes..."
I am so glad this prior throat slitting incident got covered in detail in this book. Kudos to PC and Stoner for tracking down investigator Childress and getting the 411 on this, as best we can know it.
I think one of the problems the people who thought Harlow was innocent had, back in the early days of the Kocisphere, was a sense that Harlow and Joe were not predisposed to commit such a violent crime as the Kocis murder. Brent and Grant had the very public and very ugly online fight, which made a crime of passion on their part relatively believable, but Harlow and Joe? What a cute couple! And look at that Harlow, he's sooooo adorable! Wouldn't hurt a fly!
Well, later information begins to trickle out, and we find out about bullet holes in the walls, Joe's other violent acts...and then Jon Ross.
Now, we don't know for sure who slit Ross' throat, but I think we can all make a pretty good assumption here and narrow it down to one of two people. Think about this: Ross is standing in the way of a business opportunity for Harlow and Joe. Harlow and Joe resort to violence to remove the obstacle, and cut his throat. Harlow and Joe not only get what they want, but manage to get away scot free.
Harlow and Joe learn what they believe is a lesson from this: Sometimes you can get what you want in life by a well planned throat-cutting act of violence.
This prior life lesson will be VERY much on their minds years later, when they face a similar business obstacle. Update 11: LOL: "Joe had Harlow's last name tattooed on his buttock."
(A new innovation, I shall post Updates to the top from here on out)
Happy Victory Day 2013! Yes, it's that time of the year again, the anniversary of the guilty verdict against Harlow Cuadra. A day when hard-working prosecutors and twelve ordinary citizens of Pennsylvania brought about a victory of truth over misinformation.
And a day set aside not only for celebration and/or reflection, but also as a reunion; a day for all us keyboard warriors here at SOTC, be they bloggers, commenteers or even just lurkers, to pop back for a bit and say "hi!". And to reflect back on those heady days when we followed a mystery, and then an arrest, and then a legal case, with no small amount of passion and intensity.
And I think how I'm going to do this is...I am going to read the book.
Or to be more specific, re-read it. Naturally, I devoured this eagerly awaited tome the instant I was able to, and as you might imagine, I had reactions to it. Reactions at various points in it like "huh, VERY interesting" or "hmmm..." or "this wasn't covered?" or "LOL!" Things like that.
And the thing is, it's been months since I've had these various first impressions, and in the course of time, those impressions have not surprisingly become jumbled and hazy. So, what I shall do is begin re-reading the book, from Page One. Then I shall live blog my second impressions, as I have them, here as updates to this post. Then comments and discussion can flow from those updates as they occur. I am very keen to know other's opinions on these matters (especially PC's, if he would care to make them!).
I expect this will take a while. So, this reunion post will stay active for a while (a month or so, maybe?).
So, welcome back all! And feel free to start commenting, on any book-related subject you like. Let Victory Day (or Month, or Months) begin!
Update: You know, a fun fact I just remembered...this is actually not the first time I've live blogged something. As some of you may recall, I live-blogged this event. If this new one is even half as successful and entertaining as that one was, I think we'll all have reason to be quite satisfied!
Update 2: Might as well lead off with this one. Chapter 1: "He [Kocis] thought he was nearing the end of a protracted and bitter fight that had brought him scorn and to the brink of arrest on federal child endangerment laws."
As many of you may recall, this is in the very beginning of the book, and was part of the "free sample" we all got to read before the book came out. And it raised eyebrows at the time because of the "brink of arrest" bit. No one had ever suggested before that Kocis was on the "brink of arrest" over the BC underage scandal.
The reason this was so eyebrow raising was because this whole subject was the subject of a great debate back in the day, versus the "underage denial" theorists. Without getting into excessive detail (I don't want to recount here the whole history of the underage denialist movement), but suffice to say they believed, for a variety of reasons, that Brent was really 18, and not 17 (and hence not underage) when he shot his first videos for Cobra. (Yes,looking back in hindsight it is amazing people actually thought this...but for those of you weren't there, trust me! This was a huge debate, and what the denialists lacked in numbers they made up for in persistance).
A highly debated point in this clash of world views was the claim by Brent and Grant that they went to the FBI about the underage work, and reported it...and that the FBI declined to pursue the matter. The underage denialists vigorously disputed this story. They claimed BC and GR were lying about this, and that they never would have gone to the FBI, because then Brent's age fraud (ie, really being a year older) would have been exposed. The denialists repeated over and over and over the claim that the FBI would have never let a 2257 violation go unprosecuted...therefore, BC and GR were lying. Therefore, Brent was of age the whole time. Therefore, it was OK for them to finally retrieve their copies of Every Poolboy's Dream from their secret hiding places behind the refrigerator, and put it back conveniently on the shelf next the TV.
Hmm. It does appear I promised waaaay above not to get into an extended dissertation on the underage denailist controversy. And look what I just did. Crap.
OK, to wind this up ... you can see how the revelation Kocis was on the "brink of arrest" raised eyebrows. It implies that the FBI DID take a real interest in this...and that we never know about it before. Which is interesting.
Unfortunately, as I read into the book I could find nothing to back this up (unless I missed it?). And that's the point it's taken me 5 paragraphs to get to. Was Kocis really on the brink of arrest?
In the final analysis, however, I have to say it really doesn't matter all that much. The underage denialists are actually no more. Their spiritual leader, the blogger Julian, himself admitted Brent was indeed 17 at the time after all (after contacting the San Diego Police Department directly, and got confirmation that Brent was arrested for underage drinking at his 18th birthday party). Which was, BTW, a RARE example of someone in the Kocisphere actually admitting a online view he once held was actually now contrary to the evidence and hence wrong, for which he deserves an infinite amount of commendation, IMO.
So, forget I even mentioned this! Reading on...
Update 3: I just finished Chapter One. A solid chapter overall; in particular, the lurid details of what the detectives saw when they entered the house very well written, IMO.
One oddity though:
"Detective Higgins confirmed through Bryan Kocis' father that he was involved in a tumultuous lawsuit with Sean Lockhart, Grant Roy, and their business partner in California but Kocis kin never implicated any of the men as possible suspects"
Who is this unnamed "business partner"? Police are looking at this guy early on as a possible suspect due to his lawsuit involvement, right? And this is a true crime book, so...one would think you would mention this guy's name in the book at this point, right?
Oh well, maybe I'm overreacting. Maybe this "business partner" will show up later in the book in some other context (or contexts). And then surely we will find out what his name is! After all, it would be EXTREMELY unusual if this guy kept popping up in this book, over and over again, and was only described throughout as the "business partner"...
Update 4: One last note on Chapter One:
"After meeting with [Grant Roy] Higgins eliminated Roy and Lockhart as potential suspects."
It's interesting that police made this determination so early, at Roy's first meeting with the police. My assumption, and that of many others, has always been that it was the Black's Beach escapade is what finally "cleared" them in the eyes of the police. So, good to know.
On to Chapter 2...
Update 5: Chapter 1 set up the crime scene. Chapters 2 and 3 take the next logical step in a crime drama book, and describe the victim.
Chapter 2 is all about Kocis' early life, much much attention being focused on the 2001 arrest due to his involvement with the 15 year old. Stoner even interviewed the detective on this old case, which is a lot of effort to get details about an episode that, IMO, does not really have that much to do with the murder drama per se. I suppose it was determined to portray the victim accurately here, warts and all, and this was something couldn't be just glossed over.
And there are a lot of warts. Besides the 15 year old, there are character references, including an extensive quote from Kevin Clarke (jeez Kevin, don't hold back, tell us how you really feel!). On the positive side are testimonials by his family.
You can see the problem here. If Cobra wasn't founded and named until 2002, what was this ongoing porn operation of his in 2001? Some sort of proto-Cobra? Or did he just not bother to register the name until 2002?
If it's the latter explanation, then that's somewhat interesting. The same sort of lack of attention to legal and administrative details is exactly what would get him into trouble in 2004...
Update 6: Chapter 3 gets into the history of Bryan and Cobra Video. Some of the examples given are excellent in depicting just how creepy this all was, ie, a film description by Kocis: "I had to get three forms of ID on little Jonathan as this nineteen-year-old guy looks much younger than his years." Oh, if only that'd really been his standard practice ...
Then we get to one of the most important parts of the book...if not THE most important part. The section "Enter Sean Lockhart as "Brent Corrigan."" Now, here's the part where Bryan sees Brent on webcam for the very first time, and afterwards, Brent is convinced to do underage porn. This is where it all began.
So, it's important IMO to get this exactly right. And the book here...CAME SO CLOSE...but not quite. It fell short, I would say, by one sentence.
The book covers all the salient details, namely: 1) "Lockhart attributes pressure from both his boyfriend and Kocis for deciding to go ahead with the deception." and 2) "Believing a lie about his actual age was "no big deal" and that "nobody would get in trouble and that it was common that boys worked underage in the industry," (Number 2 could have been a bit better written, however: "His boyfriend convinced him that believing a lie ... etc." would have been much better. Make it clear to the audience where the blame for this misperception lies).
But the big thing that is missing here, is any sort of explanation of WHY the boyfriend acted as he did. Siren's Tale and Brent's interview with Jason Sechrest covered Christian Henriquez' (the boyfriend in question) motive very clearly: He was previously rejected as a Cobra model (didn't have the looks), but found a way to weasel back in by offering himself and Brent as a package deal. And so, he convinced Brent to lie about his age, and convinced him it was "no big deal."
The boyfriend's motive here for instigating this deception is very important, IMO. Without it, an uninitiated reader is tempted to be overly skeptical of Brent's account. "Why would this boyfriend do this? What's in it for him?" I can imagine the uninitiated reader thinking.
Now, as you all know, I healthy respect for skepticism. But skepticism needs to be well founded and well informed. And by not mentioning WHY the boyfriend did what he did in this case, conditions exist for an unwarranted level of skepticism to breed here.
And this is a pet peeve of mine, I will admit. To this day I still see comments about Brent, to the effect that he "knowingly lied about his age", without mentioning the two highly important details 1) he was coerced into it by his boyfriend at the time and 2) his boyfriend deceived him as to what the consequences would be. Those additional details need to enter the conversation.
So ONE MORE SENTENCE as to Henriquez' motive for doing what he did would have been invaluable here. One more crucial sentence wouldn't have made the book too long, and would have greatly aided clarity and comprehension of this critical moment.
And for extra credit "style" points, one more sentence could have gone in, to the effect that the boyfriend did get into his Cobra porn, for one scene...and then was immediately discarded by Kocis as if he were a used diaper. Not that this was crucial event in the whole saga, but it is an amusing detail which would have given the reader a mild chuckle at this point.
Update 7: The rest of Chapter 3 is generally outstanding, and I'm very glad the book opted to cover it in detail. I've always said you can't really fully understand the murder, unless you know the drama that preceded it, and the state of mind that existed both in the participants and in the public at large.
Some final random thoughts on Chapter 3:
1) "Signs of strain surface". This is a critical section which seems to have a large gap in it, namely how the final working relationship between Brent and Bryan went south so fast. Which BTW is not the authors' fault; the only available source for this period, Brent's Siren's Tale, tantalizingly cuts off at this point. All we can do is speculate, while the authors, who don't really have that luxury, did the best they could with what they had to work with.
I do wish, however, that the "I am the BOSS" email excerpt had been quoted in the book, verbatim. It's provenance is unquestioned (BB made an extensive effort to explain it away at one point, arguing that it had to be understood that Kocis was "angry" when he wrote it, etc...) and nothing does a better job, IMO, of giving the audience a window into the mind of both participants at this critical juncture. All we get is "After several angry phone calls, e-mails, and texts between the two ..." which IMO doesn't quite have the attention grabbing effect of an actual one of those emails.
2) "In initial postings, [Jason Sechrest] seemed to take Kocis' position, but incidents to follow seemed to push Sechrest and others in the "gay porn establishment" towards Lockhart's position.", then goes on to describes Kocis sending the hired goons to Micky's in West Hollywood. I never thought before how the hired goons was a turning point, but reflecting on it now I can see how this must indeed have been the case. In fact, it was this incident which first made me aware of the existence of the whole drama (when Jody Wheeler wrote about it). So, it's fair to say it was a turning point for those outside the establishment as well.
3) "Does Cobra Video live on?" and following sections. Good sections, but why here? Seems like the back of the book would be a better spot, along with the rest of the where-are-they-now reminiscing. Not a big deal really, but just seems odd. Update 8: Chapter 4 moves into Harlow and Joe territory. And it's not to far into the chapter when we encounter a hum-dinger of a fact: "It reflected the huge investment the couple put into marketing...more than $120,000 annually in advertisements placed in gay publications in Baltimore, Richmond and Washington, DC."
$120 grand a year in advertising? In three local gay media markets? OK, I'm no expert on what advertising costs these days, but I'm having trouble believing this.
So naturally, I go to the footnotes. Let's see here, this is Chapter 4, footnote 1 on this little factoid, checking it out I see: "Kerekes letter to AES, 5-4-09"
Oh lord. Well, all I can say is...that explains it!
I'll have more to say on the value of these interviews with and letters from Joe as time goes by...but for now, lets just say that my initially very low expectations have been non-exceeded.
Update 9: Wow: "The dichotomy of Joe Kerekes is one that goes all the way to his sexual identity as well...."I still do not call myself gay. I just love Harlow.""
Plus: "Kerekes says his feelings for Cuadra remain strong..."We are still hot and heavy. I have hundreds of letters that I have received since our arrest (from Harlow)..."
All of these quotes comes from the post-trial "Kerekes letter to AES".
Now, stop and think about this for a minute. Lets say these "hundreds" of love letters from Harlow to Joe exist, and some if not many (I'm assuming) also date post trial. The same trial where Harlow called Joe a controlling monster who forced him into a murder plot.
That's some Stockholm Syndrome!
Then let's say (and I know this is a pipe dream, but still) Harlow's effort to get a new trial succeeds. What defense is he going to use now, at this new trial? I presume these love letters have been reviewed by prison authorities and very likely photocopied. And are FULLY subpoenable.
Good luck with that "I did it because Joe is evil" defense!
Update 10: "[Hensley's] claim that a U.S. Senator was among the clients for BoisRUs was never confirmed."
A pity. This gets back to all the Harlow "mystery client" conspiracy theories of old, such as the volume of the BBTs being turned down at a certain point while played in the court proceedings, as observed by Quickysrt.
I suspect if the mystery were ever solved, we'd also find out who is currently paying Fannick.
Well that's fine! I think we have a few items to chat about on this sacred anniversary in the meantime. Starting with, the eagerly awaited revelation of our "Mystery Guest!"
Meet Rick Altman
Ladies and gentlemen, our Mystery Guest is none other than Rick Altman (or Altmann...the spelling seems to be somewhat flexible here), the puppetmaster behind the whole Brat Boy School/Ethan Reynolds collapse.
For a refresher course in that whole affaire, just click these links here, here, here, here and here.
Now as you may recall, one bit of unfinished business was, that despite our best efforts, we were never able to procure a photograph and unmask the elusive and camera-shy Mr. Altman. Like all good con artists, Altman had always made a habit of ducking away from the camera lens, according to those who knew him.
Well I am happy to finally announce...we got 'em. Or I should say, one of his victims did. The following new (and largely unnoticed) blog got brought to my attention via a comment thread I accidentally left open: STOP RICK ALTMANN!
I think this blog is fairly self-explanatory, so I'll just add a couple of points. One, despite being around since January of 2010, and despite the blockbuster revelation of the long awaited Altman photo back in July of 2011, it does not seem to have gotten a lot of attention. I hope this post changes that.
And two, lets take a quick look at what Ethan Reynolds has been up to lately. He's trying to make a comeback, it would seem! He has a underdeveloped web site out there, but really catches my eye are his much more active Facebook and Twitter accounts. Now...I want everyone here to check those. Click on those links, and take a good hard look at them, keeping in mind that the actual personality of the real Ethan "JR" Reynolds is that of a "shy, non-talkative" individual who has difficulty stringing two sentences together. In the words of the SRA blogger:
"I was shocked to find that real life "JR" was NOTHING at all like the JR I'd come to know online (because he wasn't the guy I'd been chatting with! It was Rick). Online, "JR" was very intelligent, funny and charismatic, while real life JR (Ethan) Reynolds was shy, non-talkative, very immature and certainly didn't come across as being all that intelligent."
And by the way, I've had verifications of this from other sources as well...in person, the real Ethan "JR" Reynolds is about as colorful and witty as a fence post.
I'm going to cut to the chase here, guys: I believe the old Brat Boy fraud is back. I believe "Ethan Reynolds" is, once again, a Milli Vanilli act, with Rick Altman being, once again, the true author of all his Facebook and Twitter posts. And I believe the ultimate objective behind this deception is the desire to commit fraud. And therefore, I am sounding the alarm.
You know, this has been a Kocisphere related blog for the most part, but we have deviated on occasion. This Ethangate scandal was one such instance, Mason Wyler and his fake rape claim was another. If I had to say what was the one theme that united all these stories, it would be this: the exposure of fraud and chicanery in the gay community. It doesn't matter if it was Mark@boisrus.com or Rick Altmann or Mason Wyler trying to pull the wool over the your eyes, this blog ALWAYS stood for ripping that wool off.
So, that's why I make this the lead item of the 2012 Reunion. If I'm right, and the old Brat Boy con is on again, then I think it's this blog's duty to raise the hue and cry. And now we have a photo to use as well...nothing scatters the cockroaches like shining a flashlight RIGHT upon them. If at least one future "Ethan fan" has his life savings preserved thanks to this post, well, then it has served it's purpose.
Now, on to other items of note...
S-P-L dot com
Well, a whole year has gone by, which can mean only one thing: Brent has a new website! Or I should say Sean does. As The Sword somewhat exagerratingly puts it, Sean Paul Lockhart aka Brent Corrigan is now on his 7 millionth web site, with the latest one being Sean-Paul-Lockhart.com.
One point I have to make at the outset: Wow, we have now come FULL circle. This whole megadrama began because Brent...oooops, no, wait, now it's Sean...felt he HAD to be able use the name Brent Corrigan. He couldn't just do porn as Sean Lockhart, or Fox Ryder, or Trent Horrigan, or Ethil the Frog, OR ANYTHING OTHER than Brent Corrigan. Costly lawsuits must be risked, so surrender, no retreat! Don't call me Sean, for I am BRENT, dammit! Hear me roar.
Fast forward to today. Sean's current attitude towards the disputed name, which in days of yore led to a nasty lawsuit, a controversial settlement, ruined business partnerships, and oh, incidentally, a murder, can be summed up in a recent Advocate interview he did:
Have any filmmakers asked you to use the name Brent Corrigan in order to capitalize on your adult following?
I realize this transition won’t happen over night. Right now my aim is to be credited as Sean Paul Lockhart, which is my birth name. But if for promotional reasons, filmmakers need to do the a.k.a. thing, I’m completely on board with that...
So he'll only use Brent as an "a.k.a." and only if "they" insist. Otherwise, he could almost care less now about the precious name. How times have changed.
The new site come with a new bio, which I always find interesting as a view into his current mindset. Plenty of fodder for reunion discussion contained herein, methinks...such as a forthcoming memoir ("Incorrigible") having been already optioned into a movie deal. Hmmmm...
Harlow's Cell Phone, Part Deux (Yes, I'm Beating This Dead Horse Again)
Last year during our Reunion, I posited the theory that Harlow was using an illegal-for-him-to-have smartphone with an internet connection, which he had used to monitor (and even post things to) blogs and message boards such as this one. This theory was roundly poo poo-ed by you all.
NOW, TRY to tell me with a straight face that I'm crazy on this. Go on, just TRY!
I'm telling you folks, he HAS a phone! That funeral posting by him a couple years ago WERE from him, I am certain of it. And he's probably reading this post right now AS WE SPEAK.
Prison slackness over this issue is a national disgrace. The effort to put an end to it must start somewhere, however, and I say it should begin with PA state prisoner Harlow Cuadra! So, write your Congressmen...tell 'em you demand an immediate cavity search of Harlow and the confiscation of his illegal phone NOW.
Chapter One
Lastly, let end this year's reunion with a perusal of the tantalizing opening lines of Chapter One of PC's Cobra Killer, due out May 22:
Chapter One
During third week of January 2007, Bryan Kocis boarded an airplane in San Diego for a long flight back home to Pennsylvania. He was filled with excitement and hope. It was a trip he had taken many times before over the last several years as his home-based gay pornography business began to grow. He’d found financial success in producing gay porn in the most unlikely of all places – tiny Dallas Township, Pennsylvania – and his company soon rivaled anything being produced in the porn capital of the world: the San Fernando Valley of California.
He carried with him on this return flight to Pennsylvania a signed copy of a legal settlement that he thought ended an issue that had nagged him for more than a year. He thought he was nearing the end of a protracted and bitter fight that had brought him scorn and to the brink of arrest on federal child endangerment laws.
The settlement settled a lot. But it ended nothing.
Five days later, Kocis, 44, was dead, his head nearly severed from his body, his body curled into a fetal position and pierced with 28 separate knife wounds to the abdomen and chest. His body was charred with second and third degree burns that would render him unrecognizable. Police retrieved dental records to identify him. His life had ended on the leather sofa in his living room as his home was reduced to a smoking hull of burned up dreams.
Bryan Kocis was dead and the hunt for what had brought such unparalleled violence to Dallas Township, Pennsylvania, was just beginning.
The violence that took Kocis’ life would send shockwaves across the community, and ultimately across the country. His murder would reveal more about Kocis than most people ever knew, and even more about an unexpected enterprise operating from a base in stoic, conservative northeast Pennsylvania.
As details emerged, first neighbors, then the community and ultimately everyone would know that Bryan Kocis had built a successful gay pornography business from his modest home – an undertaking that may have contributed to his death. His secrets would unfurl for all to see, revealing a complicated conspiracy.
There was never any question the investigation into the murder of Bryan Kocis would be a joint effort. Dozens of officers from local, state and federal agencies would be involved, led by the Pennsylvania State Police Major Case Investigation.
“Right from the outset we worked with the police and this investigation rested with the state police, as it should have,” assistant district attorney Michael Melnick said.Pennsylvania State Trooper Michael Boone, a 15-year veteran, was one of the first to arrive at the murder scene, a simple one-and-a-half story home at 60 Midland Drive at about 9:45 p.m. on Wednesday, January 24, 2007. Snow flurries had began to fall. His job: Process any evidence that could be collected from the scene.
Boone, a member of the state police’s Forensic Services Unit, took measurements, made diagrams, and captured the scene in photographs and videotape. His first photographs included exterior views that showed intense burning to the front porch and entry to the home, burning so intense the ceiling and roof of the small porch began to collapse before firefighters could extinguish the flames. Outside, two small snow shovels were leaned against Kocis’ BMW parked next to the house. The intense fire had damaged the car, even melting headlamp casings.
On the porch itself, a charred wooden bench and the remnants of what appeared to be melted plastic one-gallon gas tank. (2) The front door was burned and charred; the exterior “storm door” melted in place. Neither of the doors showed signs of forced entry. Inside the blackened living room, a portion of the ceiling had collapsed and heavy melting damage had occurred to a giant big-screen TV and entertainment center Kocis had just purchased a few weeks prior as a Christmas present to himself. The room’s picture window was blown out, the metal bar separating the panes dumped onto the sofa below. It was just part of the fire debris that fell upon the sofa, and Kocis’ lifeless body, as the fire raged.
“(Kocis is) still lying on the couch,” Boone said in describing the scene. “He’s found lying on his back. This debris would have come down on top of him.”
Boone’s photographs showed that most of the sofa’s cushion and stuffing had burned away, the frame being all that remained of the couch. “Mr. Kocis’ body (was) lying here,” he reported.
Close-up photos of Kocis’ body showed his severely slashed throat, his skull almost severed from his body, as well as knife wounds to his left chest and abdomen. After Deputy Luzerne County Coroner William Lisman removed the body, and a large pool of blood and other biological fluids remained.
As snow showers continued until after 1 a.m. and a slight accumulation began to show, investigators decided to place plastic tarps over exposed areas of the house to preserve all the evidence they could. One long, cold night of investigating was coming to a close, but days of hard work in the Pennsylvania winter lie ahead.
Melnick, the assistant DA, got his first look at the scene in the morning light of Thursday, January 25. “It was bitterly cold that day,” Melnick said, recalling that as he stepped under a yellow police line tape surrounding the Kocis home, he was greeted with a stern ‘welcome’ from State Police Detective Steve Polishan who didn’t know Melnick from Adam.
Melnick recalls Polishan telling him, “Very nice to meet you. We’ll meet you back at the Dallas Township Police Department.” Melnick took the hint to back off and waited to meet the detectives later in the tiny squad room of the Dallas Township Police Department, just a mile east of the murder scene.
It would be two more days before investigators from the District Attorney’s office were allowed in the scene. State fire marshal and homicide investigators spent those two days painstakingly combing the burned rubble of the Kocis home, some detectives down on their hands and knees sifting for clues.
Among the pieces of evidence collected by Trooper Boone was “a small little razor blade knife” found underneath the burned love seat. Behind the front door, on a small half-circle table, police recovered Kocis’ untouched wallet, a money clip with $60 cash in it, sunglasses, a pocket knife, and keys to his prized BMW. Police also found loaded handguns stashed throughout drawers in cabinets and end tables in the home. Kocis’ family members would later recover $1,800 in cash left in a kitchen drawer. In the kitchen sink, two long stem wine glasses and a broken wine bottle (damaged in the fire) and cocktail shaker were found.
Investigators did not find any fingerprints on any of the items collected. It was no surprise. “Heat is very bad for a latent print,” Boone said. “The latent print is going to be as a result of secretions from the body and the pores of the fingertips.”
Boone said the heat destroyed any remaining sweat or oil needed to leave a print from anyone who was in the room before the fire...
The most eyebrow raising part of this intro, IMO is this: "He thought he was nearing the end of a protracted and bitter fight that had brought him scorn and to the brink of arrest on federal child endangerment laws."
Huh. Well I don't know about you guys, but that last bit about the "brink of arrest" is news to me. We know that Grant and Br...Sean went to the FBI, but we've always been led to believe nothing ever came of this. Are we to infer from this that, in reality, these efforts brought Bryan to the "brink of arrest?"
Perhaps PC can clarify...if not, well, I guess we'll all find out on May 22! That, and many other interesting hitherto unknown details as well, hopefully. Can't wait!!!
Well, no book yet, darn it. But we'll re-une anyways! In fact, let's start things off with a preliminary contest of sorts...
To your right is a photo of someone who will be the lead topic of the the upcoming 2012 SOTC Reunion post. Now I am curious...does anyone here know who this fellow is? Comment if you know, or have a good guess. And if you don't know, well that's fine too! It makes the decision to have him be this year's lead-off hitter all the more justified.
I'll give you but one hint: He IS someone we've talked about on this blog before.
See you all on Monday!
Update: Well Geoff's just given me a great idea. Let's make this more of a What's My Line competition; you can ask a yes/no question about our Mystery Guest; yes allows you to keep asking, no means you have to pass to the next commenter. For example:
I guess I'll go ahead and comment on some of that, as well as provide some of my famed "musings" on other matters that have come up this past year as well. And then we'll see which way the reunion discussion drifts from there.
Victory Day 2011: The Blurb Symposium
As some of you may recall from the last comment I made last year, today was supposed to our "Book Symposium." We were supposed to have all read PC's book by today, and perhaps the autobiographical account Brent Corrigan has been promising as well. Well, neither of those books materialized, as yet.
I can't say I'm that surprised Brent hasn't gotten around to writing his. Talented though he is in certain respects, it's perhaps expecting a bit much for a 20-something to discipline his time sufficiently to crank out a serious book. From his most recent blog post mentioning it, he's currently commenced concurrent composition on some sort of new literary frivolity:
"What else?! Well, I’m working on two books at the moment. The second, latest project is a lot easier for me. This book isn’t so introspective or heavy. It’s something that cums naturally to this three time award winner of a particular sexual position . . . a less serious project, something I had not realized I was such an authority on until a new friend came to me on advice on how to become a better bitch, er, I mean, bottom."
And PC's book was delayed by reasons completely outside his control (more on that later). But he has a new publisher now, and they've composed a good-sized blurb:
"Cobra Killer presses the “play ” button to uncover the real world of online pornography--an industry that generates billions in revenue and makes ordinary people overnight-stars and millionaires.
For the first time, authors Conway and Stoner tell in full detail the twisted story of a pair of young, aspiring gay adult film producers whose quest for fame at any cost leads to the gruesome murder of the man who stands in their way, gay porn entrepreneur Brian Kocis. News of the killing of the 44-year-old (stabbed 28 times, his throat slashed to near decapitation of his head) in his suburban home sends shock waves through the bucolic Pennsylvania town. Neighbors are horrified to hear about the murder but equally astonished to learn that Kocis ran a small but thriving online porn operation from his home, sometimes employing underage young men as models.
The murder investigation leads police and prosecutors to the far reaches of the country, from Virginia to New York City, to Las Vegas, and to a nude beach in San Diego where investigators facilitate an incredible clandestine suspect surveillance. The manhunt nets a former U.S. Navy veteran and a former Marine, turned male models, turned hustlers, turned porn producers, who ultimately land at the bottom of a delusional conspiracy. Twenty-six-year-old Harlow Cuadra and his 35-year-old partner and lover Joseph Kerekes are implicated and eventually convicted in the brutal January 2007 murder of Kocis. Their motive? An ill-conceived attempt to lure a rising gay porn star named Brent Corrigan away from the grips of Kocis and into their crumbling, self-built porn empire.
Cobra Killer takes readers into the sometimes alluring, sometimes dangerous and often surprising world of gay porn and the deceit, schemes, and ultimate betrayals lying underneath the fantasy."
And so, instead of a book symposium, we'll have to settle for a blurb symposium this year. So, discuss!
The Regent Media Scandal
I actually knew about PC's book deal with Alyson Books being in jeopardy back in August, when I read this Queerty post about Michael Musto's troubles with the same company. "Oh no, PC's book..." I thought.
So why did Alyson Books, a wholly-owned subsidiary of gay media conglomerate Regent Media (also owners of "Out, The Advocate, here! TV, Gay.com, and a slew of porn properties") collapse into a rinky-dink e-book publisher? Well, THATS an interesting story. The blog Queerty broke the details, which I'll bet you won't find written about in Out or The Advocate.
Basically, Regent Media is a scam. Instead of making money from the legitimate profits from their companies, the owners of Regent subsisted off the proceeds of a fraudulent loans in the amount of $90 million dollars. They apparantly lived the high life in West Hollywood until the funds ran dry. Then they tried to sell assets like Alyson Books; when that failed, they simply allowed them to wither.
What's most interesting to me is the means by which they conned Bank of America and Merrill Lynch out of that $90 million dollars:
"In order to score $90 million in loans from Bank of America and Merrill Lynch, Regent allegedly created fake movie licensing and distribution deals and passed them off to the banks as legitimate contractual relationships that would drive future revenue."
Italics mine.
These fake movie deals were between Regent and some shell companies secretly created and controlled by Regent. And what was it about about these films, that Regent needed to create puppet entities to make fake distribution deals with?
"Defendants knew that these marketing and release strategies and distribution budgets would never be adhered to or executed and that they were inappropriate for the scope of the, more often than not, low-quality straight to DVD film titles, but submitted them to Plaintiffs anyway,..."
Hyperlink mine.
So anyways, we now know the answer to a question that's had us puzzled for a while: How and why a pile of poop like John Roeker's EYWTKAGPS*bwata got made in the first place. Answer: It was all part and parcel of $90 million bank swindle. Here TV needed dreck like that in their inventory, so that they could execute fake deals between shell companies to fraudulently turn it into overinflated collateral.
So there you have it! Yet one more mystery of this murder saga, solved in the due course of time.
At first I thought this was some imposter's sick attempt at a joke. I could see prison officials letting Joe get a brief moment of supervised computer access to post an appropriate farewell (which he did), but Harlow? No way in hell. Prisoners obviously don't have unfettered access to surf the web and leave comments (I think some prisons may grant access to closed law-related networks like Lexis for legal research, but that's about the extent of it). General internet access for inmates is a BIG NO-NO, for so many obvious reasons I'm sure I don't need to expound on them.
And you notice how "joe" above is not capitalized? Exactly the sort of shortcut one tends to makes when typing out a message on a smartphone.
I think we all see what's going on here. Obviously, Pennslyvania prisons officials need to confiscate Harlow's contraband phone immediately. He needs to have his cell raided and every square inch of it gone over with a fine tooth comb; he needs to be frogmarched to the nearest inspection room, stripped, and forcibly cavity searched; whatever it takes until this phone is found.
And once it's found, Harlow should be given the Bradley Manning treatment for at least a month in solitary, as punishment for this flagrant violation.
I realize from that article and others that cell phone smuggling is rampant in prisons nationwide, but you have to start combating the problem somewhere. So, lets start by making an example of Harlow. It's ridiculous IMO that he could be reading this very blog right now, with impunity. So, lets take away the impunity by calling attention to it, shall we? Somebody here must know somebody who knows somebody in the PA Department of Corrections, so lets bring this matter to their attention by forwarding them this link.
The Cult of Harlow
And on the subject of Harlow's fans, well, what can I say except: LOL! It's a shame that blog and those videos are no more, as they were indeed entertaining.
But I did manage to run across this. As you may note, it's a closed Facebook group; no one can get in without permission. So who's in there, and what they are saying???
As my previous musing indicates...Harlow could very well be a participant. If's he's using an illegal cell phone, then there's nothing stopping him for creating a Facebook profile. And this would explain why the group is a closed one.
If that's the case, then they could all be plotting a prison break in there, for all we know. All the more reason, I say, for this illegal phone to be confiscated by prison authorities post haste.
And by a curious coincidence, the case was just wrapped up a couple of days ago. It appears Ryan Paul Martinez got a plea-bargained sentence of 4 years and 4 months, as tweeted by Grant Roy, with barely restrained glee:
I gather Grant and Ryan Paul were not exactly chummy.
As a matter of fact, you can pretty much follow the entire criminal case by just scrolling down Grant's Twitter feed for the past 150 days or so. It's kind of a mini version of PC's blog, with each post under 140 characters long.
I guess I have three observations to make:
1) Chris Henriquez. Bryan Kocis. Grant Roy. And now Ryan Paul Martinez. Does anyone else see the pattern here?
Like I said above, Brent is certainly a man of many talents, but I think it's fair to say at this point mate selection does not seem to be one of them. All of the above, in my opinion seem to...well how should I put this? Have a few rough edges?
2) It would appear that I was a bit ungenerous to Michael Lucas when I downplayed the danger he was in (see folks, when I think I'm wrong, I'll fess up to it); and
3) I must say, besides this small Porn Truth site, I'm surprised this story did not get picked up by any of the other reputable gay porn web sites and blogs. You could argue, I suppose, that Brent's boyfriend was a non-porn star, and hence off-limits. But OTOH, he wasn't exactly a "civilian" (in the Godfather Part I sense of the word) either, as evidenced by that incident between he and Lucas at the GAYVNs.
Maybe all the other reputable gay porn sites collectively came to the conclusion that Brent had suffered enough the past few years, and needed to be cut some slack on this one? Who knows. Personally I think it was foolish for Brent to try to sweep the matter under the table on his blog, pretending his "Papi" wasn't behind bars. He would have been better off just being honest with his fans from the get go (which is a lesson Mason Wyler seems to have learned, based on what I've read about him and his latest escapades).
And one question: Will Brent really wait 4 years and 4 months for this guy to get out of the slammer? Or will he move/has he moved on?
Oh well, those are my musings for this year, folks. This blog is now open until Easter, so let the Victory Day reunion comments commence!
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