Cuadra

The Case of the Cobra Killer Last winter, a notorious Internet porn

producer was brutally murdered. Police say he was the victim of an

industry turf war?killed by rival porn players who wanted to make a

?million-dollar? movie with his biggest star. But this crime sits at

the center of a much broader web of intrigue. An exclusive

investigation uncovers the story. By Michael Joseph Gross A few miles

up the highway from the Luzerne County courthouse in Wilkes-Barre,

Penn., a life-size statue of Christ commands a grassy hillside planted

with, and almost totally obscured by, hundreds of tiny American flags

on tiny wooden flagpoles. Public displays of piety and of patriotism

are common here. They give energy to a landscape marked with

collapsing smokestacks and other industrial ruins from the region?s

coal mining heyday. Since 1959, when the Susquehanna River flooded the

region?s richest anthracite mines, the local population and economy

have steadily declined. Yet coal money did endow some enduring

institutions in the Wyoming Valley, such as the Catholic liberal arts

college Misericordia in Dallas Township, a five-minute walk from the

tree-lined bower of Midland Drive, where a yellow diamond-shaped

traffic sign warns drivers to watch children. This is where, until his

throat was slashed one night last January, 44-year-old Bryan Kocis ran

an online business from his home called Cobra Video, dedicated to

?Capturing the Erotic Essence of Youth? by producing pornographic

movies of young men who looked as if they could be adolescents having

sex without condoms.

Cobra competed in the market niche of low-budget, Barely Legal?style

bareback films. For Kocis, the business was profitable: a Maserati,

Aston Martin, and BMW sat in his garage and driveway. In 2005 the

movies also made a modest yet scandalous name for him, and for his

leading star and sometime lover, Sean Lockhart, in the mainstream gay

porn industry. Lockhart, who met Kocis on the Internet and starred in

films such as Every Poolboy?s Dream and Schoolboy Crush, under the

name Brent Corrigan, informed the FBI that he had been underage when

four of his movies were produced. The movies were recalled, and the

producer and performer squared off in a nasty, public, litigious feud

that wore on until early this year.

On January 24, only a few days after their conflict was settled out of

court, Kocis?s house on Midland Drive was robbed and set aflame.

Inside, firemen found the owner dead: nearly decapitated, torso

stabbed 28 times. His remains were so charred that the county coroner

used dental records to identify the body.

Law enforcement officials from three states and at least three federal

agencies aggressively investigated the crimes, and in May police

arrested Harlow Cuadra, 26, a former Navy enlisted man, and Joseph

Kerekes, 33, a onetime youth pastor who was briefly in the Marines.

From their home in Virginia Beach, Va., the couple?who, like Lockhart

and Kocis, also met on the Internet?ran a gay escort service, which

they say employed active-duty servicemen from military bases in the

area, and they produced and starred in bareback porn on their military-

themed Web site, Boybatter.com.

Pennsylvania?s case against the accused casts Kocis as the victim of a

porn industry turf war. Cuadra and Kerekes, police contend, killed the

producer to liberate Lockhart from contractual obligations to Cobra.

The scenario, teeming with noirish detail, is as neatly plotted as a

potboiler. Police say the Virginians believed a sex video of Cuadra

with Lockhart, 21, would be a porn blockbuster that could yield that

archaic, almost quaint, clich? of fortune: a million dollars.

At first glance, this may look like just a lurid saga on the margins

of a far-flung subculture. But the tabloid headline of the tale may

conceal a larger truth. Kocis, Lockhart, Cuadra, and Kerekes all met

in a virtual world where they hoped to realize their most outrageous

sexual fantasies, where screen names and avatars enable endless

reconstruction of selves: a fluid, identity-less existence that many

millions of people have chosen as their primary mode for seeking sex

and love. In the midst of those searches, it is worth pausing to

consider: Is the world of the Cobra Killer merely a darker reflection

of our own?

I.

Bryan Kocis was many things to many people. A former Cobra Video

performer, now a 21-year-old student at Cornell University, calls him

?just a smart, nice guy. Not the sleazy, overbearing producer. There

was nothing stereotypical about him.?

Amy Withers, a 23-year-old bartender who was Bryan?s next-door

neighbor, says, ?He slept during the day and worked at night. I would

hear car doors at 3 in the morning. I would hear him having sex in the

Jacuzzi on his deck, right by my bedroom window. He always scared the

hell out of me: always wore aviator sunglasses and a baseball hat.

Everything that you would ever think of a creepy porn guy? That would

be him.?

Bryan?s next-door neighbor on the other side says that the Kocis family

?who remained close with Bryan throughout his career; who learned of

his death from the local newspaper; and who are refusing to speak to

reporters until the murder trial is finished?asked her not to talk

about him. She stands behind her screen door, wearing an apron printed

with dozens of overlapping images of the Stars and Stripes. She has

kind eyes, and she says thoughtfully, ?Bryan was complex.?

He was an Eagle Scout who grew up in Luzerne County, graduated from

the Rochester Institute of Technology, worked as a medical

photographer for a local eye doctor, and then made a few unsuccessful

business investments before incorporating Cobra Video in 2001. That

same year, a few months before declaring bankruptcy to settle debts of

more than $200,000, he was arrested on several criminal counts,

including six felony charges, for twice having sex with a 15-year-old

boy. The first time Bryan had sex with the youth, he also videotaped

it, according to police. Eventually all felony charges were dropped

when he was found guilty of the lesser offense of corruption of a

minor. Bryan served one year of probation, but the damage to his local

reputation was done.

He became increasingly reclusive, passing many nights chatting online

with prospective models. One evening, he received an instant message

from a 21-year-old in California who wanted to be in porn. Bryan

didn?t find him attractive, but the young man bragged about his hot

new boyfriend?17, going on 18, he teased?and, showing off, turned a

Webcam on the 5-foot-5, 100-pound prize, who was taking a nap. The

image of a pale, thin, dozing boy appeared on Bryan?s computer screen.

Bryan did not know that he?d been lied to: The boy was actually 16

years old.

The boy, groggy and disoriented, did not know why his boyfriend was

pulling back the sheet, or why the camera was on.

Bryan stared at the streaming video of the naked teen, who, aroused,

gazed into the Webcam?s lens.

Neither of them seemed to have taken real action, much less made a

momentous choice, but this was the moment when their fates, and the

fates of many others, began to change.

Soon the boy, Sean Lockhart, was chatting every day after school with

his new friend in Pennsylvania.

Bryan was funny and understanding. He gave good advice. His online

rapport with Sean was consistent and comforting, which were not words

that Sean could use to describe the behavior of most adults he knew.

Sean, who had never known his biological father, was raised primarily

by his stepfather in Seattle, after his mother left the family when he

was in third grade. He had recently reconciled with her and moved to

be with her in San Diego. The two of them were barely scraping by,

living in a flophouse where Sean didn?t feel safe.

Sean says he needed to make money, and his options, as he saw them,

were to ?whore myself, deal drugs, or do adult work. Adult work seemed

like the least compromising of the choices. That was how the initial

decisions were made.?

With his then-boyfriend, Sean scanned his driver?s license and birth

certificate into Photoshop, changed the dates to make it look like he

was 18, and sent electronic copies to Bryan.

Sean earned $3,500 for his first Cobra videos, Every Poolboy?s Dream

and Casting Couch 4, which were shot in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., in

September 2004. ?When I first met Bryan, I was disappointed. I?d seen

only one picture of him. But after how much we talked, I?d developed

not a crush, but??Sean?s voice, an eager stream of poised, ingenuous-

sounding self-analysis, briefly stumbles. ?He?d become a stable force

for me.?

On his next shoot, for the movies Schoolboy Crush and Bareboned

Twinks, also in Florida, Sean says he chose a new name for himself. ?I

took Brent from Brent Everett, who was the costar, and I found

Corrigan in the phone book. It sounded Irish or Scottish, and I?m

Irish, and I liked that it kept things consistent.?

During that second shoot, Sean says, two other important things

happened. He and Bryan slept together for the first time, and Bryan

first voiced fears that Sean?s IDs were forged.

After Sean returned to San Diego, Bryan started sending him gifts and

money. Whether because he was smitten with the boy, afraid of legal

jeopardy, or both, Bryan invited him to spend the summer of 2005 in

Pennsylvania, ?to be an apprentice and help with the video shoots.?

Sean?s home life in San Diego had deteriorated, and he decided to move

out on his own. He found an apartment on Craigslist, but says he was

evicted when he resisted his landlord?s sexual advances.

A mutual friend introduced Sean to Grant Roy, a beefy, wedge-jawed 40-

year-old Texan who worked for his family?s trucking company. Grant

shared a house in the suburbs with his boyfriend at the time. Sean

rented their spare bedroom for $500 a month?the same amount that Bryan

was sending Sean to help with monthly living expenses.

Grant?s father, with whom he had been close, had just died, which

inclined him to sympathize with Sean?s all-but-orphaned existence.

The boy, Grant says tenderly, ?had nowhere else to go.?

II.

In a few months Grant and his boyfriend parted ways, and Grant?s

protective feeling for Sean turned romantic. From the start, Grant

also saw business potential in the relationship: ?I said ?Look, I

could shop you around to all these other studios and they?ll pay you a

nice chunk of money. But if you really want to do this right, I?ll

help you start a company, and you can do your own thing. That way,

when you?re old and gray, if we do it right, this thing?s still gonna

be paying.??

As their business plans grew serious, so did their romance. When Sean

went to Pennsylvania for the summer, the new couple agreed that ?we?d

be exclusive sexual partners,? Grant says, ?other than the work that

he was doing.?

Sean?s memories of that summer are mostly unhappy ones. Though he and

Bryan sometimes socialized with visiting Cobra models, Sean felt

isolated: ?Bryan didn?t want me to have any friends. I was there

basically to have sex with him.? He considered his relationship with

Bryan to be essentially transactional. It was ?trading the company of

a younger man for the money and experiences that an older man can

give. Lavish restaurants, fine wines, horseback riding lessons, nice

clothes.?

?Looking back,? says Sean, ?it all seems silly and superficial, of

course.?

Bryan, though, probably had higher hopes for their relationship. He

tried to talk the boy into going to college down the street at

Misericordia. One weekend that summer, Bryan also made a rare attempt

to integrate his family life and his gay life. Robert Wagner, a close

friend of Bryan?s who appeared in Cobra videos under the name Aaron

Phelps, says that Bryan rented a limousine to take Sean and his family

to New York together for the Fourth of July. After they all checked

into the Plaza Hotel, Bryan went to see the fireworks with his family,

and Sean went to a party, where, according to Robert, he hooked up

with another man. Bryan spent the night alone in his hotel suite,

wondering where Sean had gone.

The next month, things got worse.

Grant decided to ?start playing with a little bit of publicity? for

the next step in Sean?s career. From their separate bases in

California and Pennsylvania, Grant and Sean participated in a fan

forum on a porn portal site called Juicygoo.com, where they discussed

Sean?s plans to start producing his own videos?even though Sean had

just renewed his contract with Cobra.

Bryan was enraged. Sean says they fought so bitterly that his ?best

friend? at the time?a boy he chatted with online, whom he never met in

person, and whose screen name he says he does not remember?advised him

to flee. In the Volkswagen Jetta that he?d received from Bryan when he

signed the contract, Sean drove across the country to Grant?s house in

San Diego.

Safely in California, Sean called Bryan on August 16, 2005 and

informed him that he?d been a minor when he made his first videos.

Their relationship imploded.

Sean reported his claim to the FBI, and soon his Cobra Video releases

were recalled. Bryan applied to the U.S. Trademark and Patent Office

to trademark the name Brent Corrigan. He filed a federal breach of

contract suit against Sean. And he wrote Sean long, impassioned e-

mails, arias of wounded emotion (?it still amazes me to see how people

who are supposed to be close to me can be so heartless and selfish

enough to take advantage of me the way they do?

I really wanted the best for you?), menacing clich? (?Such a tangled

Web we Weave / When we practice to Deceive??), and an ultimatum.

Bryan offered Sean a choice: Be reconciled or be cast forever out of

his good graces. ?No second chances here,? Bryan warned. ?Your only

decision, to be the Prince,

or the Pauper.?

Soon the feud was tooth for tooth. Juicygoo.com became a battleground

between Bryan, writing under the screen name ?King Cobra,? and Grant,

who called his alter ego ?Cobra Killer.?

The mainstream gay porn industry took note, and the best-known studio,

Falcon, gave Sean the lead in a big-budget movie called The Velvet

Mafia. In a bizarre coincidence, the movie?about a porn industry turf

war over an insolent twink named Fox Ryder?had been written before the

Cobra scandal broke. ?We had to have Brent Corrigan as the star

because he was this character in real life,? says director Chris

Steele.

Before the film?s release, Falcon executives decided not to credit

Sean as Brent Corrigan because Cobra?s lawyer threatened to sue the

studio. Every time Sean tried to work as Brent Corrigan, Bryan?s

lawyers quashed the effort?and Sean?s lawyers sent him another bill.

Sean began a fund-raising drive called ?Brent Aid,? during which he

auctioned off a few of his belongings online. Someone bought his

underwear for $1,000.

Last fall, when Grant and Sean saw that legal negotiations with Cobra

would lead to settlement, the couple started looking for new models so

they could prepare for Sean to film new sex scenes.

The best way to recruit men into porn, Grant says, is to browse gay

cruising sites such as Manhunt.net, Adam4Adam.com, and DudesNude.com?

where it has become the norm for men to post naked pictures of

themselves and, increasingly, pictures of themselves having sex. To

find the youngest men, he also canvasses MySpace, which offers an

argosy of exhibitionist sexuality encompassing various orientations.

?I go to the place where guys are exposing themselves for the whole

world to see,? Grant explains. ?If they?re willing to do that much

online, maybe they?re open to doing porn. It?s not going far to make

that next step.? Grant?s other casting resources include escort sites

such as Men4RentNow.com, where he first came across Harlow Cuadra?s

profile.

Grant?s eyes go big when he recollects the thrill of seeing Harlow?s

pictures and watching his sex videos on Boybatter.com for the first

time. ?Wow,? he remembers thinking. ?This is what we?re looking for..?

III.

?I met Joe on Yahoo in a chat room,? Harlow Cuadra says. ?I think it

was a straight chat room. Probably talking about skateboarding. Joe

spams the room, ?Looking for a hookup,? and I?m like, ?Yeah!??

When they met seven years ago at a mall in Virginia Beach, Joe Kerekes

said that he was in the Marines. At the time, Harlow was in the Navy

and in the closet, and he was spooked by the idea of dating another

military man. He cut the meeting short and told Joe he would call him

the next week, after returning from a wedding where he was to be the

best man.

One week later, to Joe?s surprise, Harlow called. ?He said that when I

told him I was going away for a week, he thought I was lying,? Harlow

laughs. ?I said, ?One thing to know about me: I can?t really lie very

well. It gets me in trouble.??

They hooked up. ?We went to his parents? house and had sex for, like,

four hours, and then we went to Wendy?s at 2 a.m. He said he was an

escort, and I was kind of put off by that, so I backed off, and we

just became friends.

?We kept hanging out, and finally Joe was like, ?Will you go on just

one call for me?? And it was an ex-NFL guy, and I walk in, and he?s

like, ?I just wanna play with your feet.? And I?m like, ?This is

weird.?

?So I would do that like three or four times a week, and I was making

a lot of money for letting this guy play with my feet.

?Then Joe and I started going out, and then eventually??Harlow?s voice

drops low, each word an ember of contentment, remembering the day that

love walked in??Joe said, ?Harlow, I wanna be jealous of you.??

Joe grew up in a Christian family in Virginia Beach. He graduated near

the top of his high school class and for a time worked as a youth

pastor at Bethel Temple, a conservative Assemblies of God megachurch

in Hampton, Va. Joe?s gifts as a minister, especially his preaching,

were so prized by the church that Bethel paid for him to go to a

Christian college.

Joe had trouble controlling his temper, though, and after a few

conspicuous flare-ups, he was asked to leave the church. He went to

Marine boot camp and, his parents say, was discharged after a few

weeks, following an angry confrontation with a drill instructor.

(Government military records for both Joe and Harlow were unavailable

at press time.)

Then Joe started working as a gay escort, hired others to work for

him, and built a business so popular that Internet searches for the

word Norfolk returned his Web site, NorfolkMaleEscorts.com, as a top

hit. The Norfolk city attorney reportedly called Joe?s lawyer to

complain.

As an escort Joe was known as Mark. In Boy Batter videos he called

himself Trent. With Harlow he was plain Joe; and after work was done,

Joe says, he and Harlow ?didn?t have much time for friends,? but they

spent a lot of time with Joe?s family.

His father, Fred, a Navy veteran who worked for the Norfolk water

treatment plant, and his mother, Rosalie, who worked for many years in

a grade school cafeteria, say that Joe never explicitly told them he

is gay, but they gradually came to understand that Joe and Harlow were

a couple. Harlow, who grew up in Florida and South Carolina, was

estranged from his family when he met Joe. Fred and Rosalie, sitting

at their kitchen table, say they accepted Harlow as if he were their

own son.

(Since his arrest, Harlow has been back in touch with his mother,

brother, and sister. All three have MySpace profiles that proclaim

Harlow?s innocence and solicit donations for his legal defense.)

Fred and Rosalie say that as Christians they believe in hating the sin

but loving the sinner. Although they disapproved of the men?s

relationship, they were intimately involved in Joe and Harlow?s lives

on an everyday basis. Rosalie cleaned their house, cooked for them,

and ran their errands. For construction projects like the high fence

around Joe and Harlow?s backyard, Fred lent a hand.

Fred says, ?I found the architect for them for their in-call room,?

pronouncing the final phrase, from the lexicon of prostitution, with

jarring fluency. Fred is tan, hirsute, tall, and strong, with a long

white beard like a biblical patriarch?s that falls almost to his

waist. He wears a purple baseball cap thickly embroidered with the

word Jesus in rainbow-colored letters.

The in-call room, Fred says, ?had a hot tub, leather sofa, mahogany

lockers for their clients, and a huge mosaic tiled shower with jets

coming from every different direction.?

Rosalie, a gentle, steady woman, says, ?It was a super-duper shower.

You could put 10 people in there.?

?They knew how to do things to please their customers. They had a big,

fancy massage table,? Fred says.

?That?s what I thought they did mostly, was massages,? Rosalie says.

?And physical therapy.?

Rosalie says she did not know the details of her son?s professional

life until after he was taken into custody in May after she and Fred

celebrated their 37th wedding anniversary.

Fred says that he had his suspicions. He never voiced his hunch, but

he cites it as the reason that he maintained a somewhat greater

distance than Rosalie did.

?I wanted them to be a part of our lives,? Fred says, ?but I didn?t

want to be a part of their lives.?

?We started raunchy,? Joe says, ?but ended up being high-class.? In

their years together, Joe and Harlow rose from renting a $300-per-

month room in the worst part of Norfolk to purchasing a house worth

about $500,000 in a new development on a cul-de-sac.

?They were eating out every night,? Fred says. ?They would have $500,

$600 meals. Joe had a $6,000 chinchilla coat he bought in Vegas. It

was leather inside?it was reversible. He wore a 3.5-karat diamond stud

in his ear. Harlow?s was 2.5 carats. They always wore Rolexes. They

had five, six Rolexes. They went in and out of four [Dodge] Vipers,?

Fred says, ?the poisonous snake that bites you and you die. The last

one, that got seized by the cops, was yellow.?

They also invested in their bodies, working out almost every day at 5

a.m. at a private gym called Big House. The owner, a straight man

named Lance Treadway, says, ?They lifted heavy weights, but their form

was terrible.?

Fred describes his son as ?very, what?s the word, very chiseled. The

whole V shape. And he went to Phoenix to have liposuction done so that

he would have the?what do you call it?the washboard abs. He went to

Phoenix, where all the movie stars go to have it done, and it cost

$6,000. He stayed in very good shape for his clients.?

When Fred says ?chiseled,? his palms cup an imaginary pair of pecs in

front of his own chest. When he says ?V shape,? he traces the shape on

the sides of his own body. When he says ?washboard abs,? his hand

bumps down an imaginary set of them on his own stomach.

When he speaks of his son?s body, as when he speaks of his son?s big

spending, Fred?s voice is fraught. On the one hand, he is proud of Joe

for living an American dream. On the other, he says, ?They would get

so much credit?loan for this car, loan for that car?I knew they were

out of control.?

By the time Harlow and Joe met Sean and Grant, the Virginians were

almost $1 million in debt.

Communication between the couples began when Grant saw Harlow?s

profile online last fall. After some correspondence and phone

conversations, the four agreed to have dinner in Las Vegas during

January?s Adult Video News convention, the largest annual porn

industry gathering, where Sean and Grant were also meeting Bryan to

finalize their settlement.

During dinner at the Bellagio on January 11, which Grant describes as

?the most expensive meal I ever had in my life,? Grant says Joe

speculated that a video of Harlow and Sean could make a million

dollars. Grant says he explained that they were hamstrung for the

moment by legal problems with Bryan, and ?that?s when Harlow brings up

the question, ?What if Bryan goes to Europe?? ?

Sean, uncomprehending, responded, ?He?ll come back.?

?Harlow said??Grant assumes a coolly insinuating voice??What if he

goes to Canada?? and I grabbed Sean and said, ?No, you guys.? Then Joe

says, ?Harlow has this client that?s in this sort of business who will

do anything for him.? I said, ?If Bryan dies, no matter who does it,

this thing has been so ugly, we?re the first ones they?ll come to.

Don?t even say anything like that.??

Though Grant says Joe and Harlow?s remarks struck him as odd, he

didn?t think they were serious. ?That was, like, three or four minutes

out of a three- or four-hour meal, where we?d all been drinking so

much that we were just gone,? he explains.

The Virginians apparently left Las Vegas the next morning. (Pending

trial, Harlow and Joe would not answer most questions directly

pertaining to the case.) Then Grant and Sean met with Bryan and his

lawyers to finish most of their negotiations and returned to San Diego

for the crossing of the t?s the following week.

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.?

Joe and Harlow seem to have returned from Las Vegas with new

confidence in Harlow?s pornographic possibilities. On January 14,

NorfolkMaleEscorts.com sent an e-mail blast announcing Harlow?s

impending collaboration with ?Porn Twink mega star ?Brent Corrigan.??

More ambitiously, Harlow even applied to be a model for Falcon Studios

on January 18, citing Brent Corrigan as a reference. Then, on January

22, Harlow created the screen name dmbottompa on Yahoo.com, an account

he used almost exclusively for correspondence with Bryan Kocis.

?DM? stood for Danny Moilin, an alter ego whose address was listed as

King of Prussia, Pa. As Danny, Harlow completed a model application

form on the Cobra Video Web site, and he e-mailed Bryan to say that he

?would like to meet you and talk about filming and stuff. don?t have

much experience with this at all. may need to be taught first.?

Police say that Harlow used a Visa card to buy a knife similar to the

weapon found at the murder scene, and also a gun, in Virginia Beach on

January 23; he rented a car; and, using Joe?s driver?s license as

identification, they checked into the Fox Ridge Inn, across the valley

from Dallas Township. E-mails show that Harlow, as Danny, had arranged

to meet Bryan at his house on January 24.

That night, Bryan Kocis was killed. His house was ransacked for

documents relating to the business of Cobra Video, two computer towers

that were the nerve center of the company, two video cameras, and his

monogrammed Rolex watch. By the time a Dallas Township squad of

volunteer firemen arrived at 8:34 p.m., flames had consumed most of

the interior of the house.

In falling snow, newspaper and TV reporters and a straggling mass of

neighbors assembled on the street. Fire blew out Bryan?s picture

window, and cold air from outside rushed into the home that he had

long kept hidden. Later, a friend of the deceased went inside and

noticed something strange. The 65-inch plasma television screen that

had been Bryan?s Christmas present to himself. Melted by the fire,

drooped and curled, like a wilted petal plucked from an immense,

mechanical, imaginary flower.

IV.

A battery of law enforcement officials representing three states (and,

mysteriously, the Drug Enforcement Agency, the FBI, and the Naval

Criminal Investigation Unit, none of which has clear jurisdiction over

any publicly known aspect of this case) coordinated a far-reaching

investigation of the murder, culminating in the electronic

interception of two conversations between Joe, Harlow, Grant, and Sean

on April 27 and 28.

Grant and Sean cooperated with police and wore a wire during two

meetings with the Virginians when they came to San Diego, ostensibly

to finalize plans for Harlow and Sean?s video. Excerpts from the

conversations appear in Pennsylvania?s affidavit of probable cause for

Joe and Harlow?s arrest. The first day, when Grant asked if Bryan

?felt any pain,? Harlow answered, ?Don?t worry, he went quick.? The

next day Harlow said, ?Seeing that fucker going down, actually it?s

sick, but it made me feel better inside. It almost felt like I got

revenge, and I know that sounds fucked-up.?

As damning as these lines appear, it?s impossible to know precisely

how to read them. Strikingly, Harlow?s quoted remarks in the affidavit

sound more like the statements of a man who witnessed a murder than

those of a man who committed one. (Joe, it seems, was mostly

interjecting details as Harlow described meeting Bryan.) Harlow?s

story, as related by this document, is confusing (and perhaps

intentionally presented that way by police; at the time of arrest, it

is common to withhold evidence that will be introduced at trial), but

other details raise the possibility that a third man might have been

present when Bryan was killed. Harlow ?stated that he and another ?did

some recon work?? before his meeting with Bryan. And after he arrived

at Bryan?s house and they drank some wine together, Harlow said that

his ? ?dude? ?came around?, and ?it was crazy.??

Language, however, may be the least reliable form of evidence in this

case. Joe and Harlow?s stories have changed utterly since the saga

began. Upon first being identified as a suspect, Harlow told the

Scranton Times-Tribune that he had never met Bryan and was ? ?freaked

out? that his image was linked to a murder investigation.? At about

the same time, Joe?s escort persona, ?Mark,? told a reporter from the

Wilkes-Barre Times-Leader that Harlow was working in Virginia the

night that Bryan was killed.

Most recently, Joe told the same newspaper that, actually, they did

come to Pennsylvania?so that Harlow could try to win Bryan over to

their plan to work with Sean. But when Harlow arrived at Bryan?s house

?the door was partially open. He looked inside and saw an overturned

table and smelled smoke. He said he saw someone on a couch or chair,

and heard a noise upstairs, like someone was about to come down,? Joe

said. At the time of the interview, Joe did not have legal

representation. His new attorney, Joseph Nocito, says, ?There will be

no more interviews.?

There has been no official mention of forensic evidence in the case.

(Crime lab processing takes longer in life than on CSI.) The strongest

pieces of physical evidence suggesting the suspects may have been at

the crime scene are two video cameras, the same models that were

stolen from Bryan?s house. The cameras, whose serial numbers had been

obliterated, were seized in a police raid of Joe and Harlow?s house on

February 10. Shortly after the murder, Harlow posted a query on an

Internet message board asking how to operate one of the cameras.

In Virginia, Joe and Harlow were arrested as fugitives from justice on

May 15, the same day criminal charges against them were filed in

Pennsylvania. Virginia also put their assets into forfeiture and began

investigating whether to charge them with conspiracy to violate the

Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act [RICO], money

laundering, and conspiracy to receive money from the earnings of a

prostitute.

The seizure was unusual: In RICO cases, assets are typically put into

forfeiture after a criminal hearing, not before. Joe?s lawyer in

Virginia, Jim Brice, believes the holdup was ?being used to deny them

the opportunity to secure proper representation? on criminal charges

in Pennsylvania, where they have been held since their extradition in

July.

Because Joe and Harlow?s credit was overextended, it is unlikely that,

even if they had access to their assets, they would be of much use. So

their friends and family are trying to raise money for their defense.

The Web site FreeHarlowCuadra.com sells products bearing his mug shot,

including a $39.99 wall clock (the big and little hands sprout from

Harlow?s nose) and a $49.99 ?maternity T-shirt.?

Evidence against the two is substantial, and yet it seems impossible

to organize that evidence into a plausible story. A murder as brutal

as this one is almost always a crime of passion, committed by a person

who knows the victim, but there?s no evidence of prior acquaintance

between Bryan and Joe or Harlow. The alleged porn-turf-war motive

makes no rational sense, especially because Sean and Bryan had just

resolved their conflict. Yet Bryan?s business must have had something

to do with his death: Why else would Cobra Video?s documents and

computer towers disappear? Or was there other information stored in

those machines, something that might help explain why federal agencies

are working on this case?

Winding on, the questions form a trail that starts to seem like it?s

all switchbacks. Why, if not to murder Bryan, did Joe and Harlow go to

Pennsylvania? If there was a third man, why don?t they reveal him?

What, if anything, is hiding under the layers of their shifting

stories? And what kind of murderer buys his weapon with a credit card?

V.

In California, Grant Roy says that he has learned a lesson. ?From now

on, if somebody ever mentions something??about killing someone??in

joking or whatever, I don?t care what the circumstances are, I?m

walking away.?

The saga of Bryan?s murder, he believes, ?says a lot about our country

and our culture. It used to be that I watched TV shows like CSI:

Miami, movies with conspiracy or murder plots. It was all fantasy to

me. Now I watch this stuff and I think, That?s based on something that

really happened. All these reality shows that are coming out now,

there?s a fine line between what is not real and what is real. A lot

of that plays into why this happened, why these idiots thought they

could do what they could do. There?s something instilled in our

culture? that, he says, is related to bigger questions such as ?Why do

we think we can go into Iraq and give this country democracy, when

they?ve been clashing ever since Great Britain carved it all up and

called it a country? Empires are built on delusions.?

He and Sean have a new Web site, BrentCorriganInc.com. The day it

launched, on one of Brent?s fan?s blogs, someone named Ernie posted a

flag he designed to represent ?Brent Corrigan?s ?Independence Day.??

Accompanying text explained that the flag ?incorporates the pride

flag? and a blue star like the one tattooed on Brent?s right buttock

?similar to the Texas flag (representing Grant).?

The blogger, who goes by the name Dewayneinsd, continued, ?I believe

the Flag itself stands as a banner of One Young man?s Independence

from Evil, Corrupt and Exploitive men! And while Brent?s battle is

waged for his rights, it is also for the benefit of all young gay men

who choose to ?Do Porn?!?

Confidently, Sean explains why he and other young men make the choice

to have sex on-camera?the choice that permanently entwined his fate

with Bryan?s: ?There are three reasons why boys work in porn. The

first one is money. Trying to support yourself when practically the

only jobs you can get are in retail, it?s nearly impossible. The

second reason is status. The third reason is, some boys are not very

smart. My reason initially was the money. Now it?s about proving to

people that I?m one of a kind. When life gives you lemons, you make

lemonade.?

In Virginia Beach, most of Joe and Harlow?s neighbors say they didn?t

know the men. Their street looks like Wisteria Lane on Desperate

Housewives, with the patriotic ambience of screaming fighter jets

flying drills low in the sky.

At one house, a 17-year-old named Lauren stands among large sculptures

of eagles in flight that decorate her family?s living room and,

leaning forward for emphasis, seems to enjoy reciting this speech: ?I

never knew they were gay. I never knew they were porno stars. I never

knew they were gay male escorts. I never knew they murdered their

rival porn producer. I never knew nothing.?

Lauren?s storytelling pleasure captures the spirit of many people?s

fantasies of the untrammeled id in gay men?s lives, a fantasy that Joe

and Harlow incarnate. The most astonishing thing about them, however,

is that the couple attained all-out hedonism while at the same time

maintaining the appearance of propriety required to sustain intimate

relationships with Joe?s family.

In this part of Virginia, it?s common for gay men to lead double

lives. Even the editor of Norfolk?s gay newspaper, Out & About, works

under a pseudonym: ?Call me ?Harry King,?? he says. ?I try to keep the

identities separate. I have to live with a lot of ?don?t ask don?t

tell? living here in Norfolk. We all do.?

It is rare for a gay man here to be out in a simple sense. Instead, he

exists in an open closet with a strict code of silence. Silence

protects him from the risk of being ostracized if he were truly known.

Silence also degrades him. To be accepted, he must grant that he is

unacceptable.

This self-annihilating mind-set is common among gay men here, but it

is not unique to them. Ego destruction is the first step in a

soldier?s training, and the open closet is practically a mirror image

of fundamentalism, in which no sinner can be saved without affirming

his own worthlessness.

When Fred Kerekes started to suspect his son was gay, he talked to Joe

about sin, hoping to make a point without having to spell it out. ?I

would tell Joe sometimes ?Guilty or innocent in this life is

immaterial. When you die, you will stand before the Father and be

judged.? When he dies, Joe will have to answer for whatever he?s

done.?

Fred?s faith asserts that life has two dimensions and two stories.

Each person has a physical life and a spiritual one. Life on earth

gives way at death to life in heaven or hell. And God alone determines

the person?s fate, regardless of the outcome of the struggle in this

life between powers of good and evil.

Pastor Ron Johnston, who was Joe?s mentor at Bethel Temple, says that

Joe?s struggle between the powers was unusually strong. ?There?s a

dichotomy in Joseph,? he says. ?There?s two Josephs. I would see a

Joseph that on one side was extremely kind and good, and on the other

side he would lose it. I?ve seen this before with people that were

demon-possessed.?

Two years ago, long after Joe?s angry separation from the church,

Pastor Ron was amazed one day when Joe showed up at his office. ?He

started crying. He sat down. He said, ?Pastor, I?m in problems. I?m

doing things I never thought I would do.? He told me about the escort

service, about some of the things he was involved in. Harlow, and

their relationship. ?Joseph,? I said, ?you have the call of God on

your life. It doesn?t matter how far you?ve gone or what you?ve done,

God never takes back what he gives you. God is always there, no matter

what happens or what happened, to forgive and help you. If there?s

anything I can do to help you, I?m here for that.??

But the next time he saw Joe?s face was on a television screen, on the

news the night of Joe?s arrest. ?It broke my heart inside,? he says,

?I thought, Oh, my word. That kind of anger, I?ve seen that kind of

anger in him. And I thought, This is unreal.?

The legion of characters that any one of us could be is always present

in the blooming confusion of our minds. To be an adult is to choose

among them and work to realize a vision of a good life. Yet in our

time, even the act of concentrating begins to seem old-fashioned.

Multitasking ceases to be jargon.

Flawless integrity is for saints?and, in theory, machines. Since the

Victorians drew a hard line between the public and private spheres, we

have all in some way led two lives; yet until recently, only a

clinical sociopath could pull off the feat in full.

Today it is possible, and for growing numbers of people it is

habitual, to simultaneously carry on three, four, five conversations

via instant messages. Everyone, it seems, chats online during

conference calls for work. From there, it is not such a far stretch to

imagine typing softly while talking on the phone with Mom and Dad, e-

mailing naked pictures snapped in a mirror, in hopes of setting up a

hot fuck with a stranger for when the conversation?s done. Radical

dissociation can creep in without noticeable outward change; and,

thanks to our machines? integrity, our own leaches away.

Bryan Kocis, Sean Lockhart, Harlow Cuadra, and Joseph Kerekes

reinvented themselves online. Military patriotism or fundamentalist

faith helped accustom some of them to double lives. But these four

were caught up in a mode of reinvention disconnected from the one that

in literature and life has united American characters as disparate as

Abraham Lincoln, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Horatio Alger, Jay Gatsby, and

Tom Ripley.

Those men all left home to start anew. These men just logged on. They

created alternate identities in parallel worlds, as most of us do now,

imagining that we need not give up anything to do so, believing that

our games exact no unrecoverable cost. The difference between us and

the characters in the case of the Cobra killer is one of scale, not of

kind. Unreal realities, endless flickering between truth and fiction,

an addictive stream of possible connections among possible selves,

converging in the dead end of a life.

Inside the Virginia Beach County jail, a tasteful brick building that

would not disturb the aesthetic of Colonial Williamsburg, the visitor

room contains four rows of small Toshiba screens, each housed in a

brushed aluminum case the size of a microwave oven. Above each screen

is mounted a small video camera, allowing the visitor and inmate to

see one another in half-profile from slightly elevated angles.

When conversation feels especially intimate, either the visitor or the

inmate may choose to look directly into the camera in order to create

for the other an illusion of eye contact. Yet the equipment?s

configuration ensures that any normal feeling of conversational

intimacy will be one-sided. The person who creates the illusion of eye

contact always loses it himself. As a result, the only way for Harlow

to let me see his eyes is for him to play to the camera, requiring him

to look away from me and therefore to perform. And vice versa.

I ask Harlow what it was like to work as an escort and a porn

performer, and be in love with Joe, all at the same time. He grins. He

says, ?It?s like I have a light switch.?

He thinks for a moment: ?I walk in, and I make a force field to my

heart that wraps around me. The way I describe it to new employees is,

?You walk in that room, you?re Scott. You walk out, and you?re Adam

again.? They all have two names. They all are two people. Even Joe.

He?s Mark on calls and Joe with me.

?I go in there, and I?m Harlow. But a different Harlow. What messes me

up is, I?m the same person always. I don?t have a light switch,? he

says.

For a moment I don?t notice the contradiction, because Harlow looks

into the camera, and it feels as if he looks into my eyes.

On Fri, 05 Dec 2008 06:03:56 -0800, freddy wrote:

> Harlow Cuadra, 26, a former Navy enlisted man, and Joseph

> Kerekes, 33, a onetime youth pastor who was briefly in the Marines.

> From their home in Virginia Beach, Va., the couple—who, like Lockhart

> and Kocis, also met on the Internet—ran a gay escort service, which

> they say employed active-duty servicemen from military bases in the

> area, and they produced and starred in bareback porn on their military-

> themed Web site

Wonderful. I bet the Ma-reens were thrilled to hear about this.

<rolls eyes>

--

tinmimus99@hotmail.com

smeeter 11 or maybe 12

mp 10

mhm 29x13

You want a job and a lizard to ride?

< _The Einstein Intersection_

mimus wrote:

> On Fri, 05 Dec 2008 06:03:56 -0800, freddy wrote:

>

>> Harlow Cuadra, 26, a former Navy enlisted man, and Joseph

>> Kerekes, 33, a onetime youth pastor who was briefly in the Marines.

>> From their home in Virginia Beach, Va., the couple—who, like Lockhart

>> and Kocis, also met on the Internet—ran a gay escort service, which

>> they say employed active-duty servicemen from military bases in the

>> area, and they produced and starred in bareback porn on their military-

>> themed Web site

>

> Wonderful. I bet the Ma-reens were thrilled to hear about this.

>

> <rolls eyes>

I've been a little lonley. I'm going to give them a call.

--

Tim Weaver

"Usenet is like a herd of performing elephants with diarrhea - massive,

difficult to redirect, awe-inspiring, entertaining, and a source of mind-

boggling amounts of excrement when you least expect it."

- Gene Spafford, 1992