http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17965555/
They met at a local mall. She was 14. He was a 17-year-old orphan. Her parents gave him a home, and the two began a sexual relationship. But authorities have revealed a shocking truth – the 17-year-old boy was really a 30-year-old woman with a criminal history.
“I have been working in law enforcement for 16 years, and I haven’t seen a case like this at all,” Everett police Sgt. Robert Goetz said. “I haven’t even heard of a case like this.”
Police say the Everett woman successfully passed herself off as a boy for at least a year until she was arrested last weekend, accused of having an abusive sexual relationship with the underage girl.
The woman, Lorelei Corpuz, is accused of beating and raping the girl, who was deceived into believing Corpuz was her “boyfriend,” police said in documents released Wednesday.Corpuz met the girl at Alderwood Mall more than a year ago and said her name was Mark Villanueva, police said. The two talked on the phone over two days and then went on a date, according to court documents.
Eventually, the victim’s parents allowed Corpuz to move into their Everett home.“The suspect did provide them with a story … about how her parents were no longer alive – that her mother died of cancer and her father committed suicide,” Goetz said. “Whether she played on their sympathies, I can’t say.”
Allegedly, Corpuz was able to keep up the appearance of being a teenage boy by never allowing her victim to see her genitals. The girl told police that she had sex with Corpuz for the first time about three months ago, but that the couple had sexual contact before that, according to court documents.While Corpuz was living with the family, the victim’s father went to work temporarily in Alaska. While he was gone, Corpuz hit the girl on a weekly basis and bit her back twice, leaving a scar, court documents state.
But things weren’t always like that, the alleged victim said Wednesday.
“Well, he was really nice, and I didn’t really have anybody to talk to because my mom and dad are always at work,” the girl told KOMO4/TV news before visiting with a Snohomish County prosecutor. “He talked to me.”In cases of child rape, male offenders vastly outnumber female offenders, but Corpuz’s use of a false identity makes the case even less common, Goetz said.
This is the third known case this week of a person concealing their true identity from their romantic partner, and all three cases have ended in violence.
In Corpuz’s case, it wasn’t until an Everett police officer familiar with Corpuz’s real identity spotted the couple at a Chevron station on Sunday that the truth came out. After talking with Corpuz, the officer approached her companion. “The officer asked the girl what her relationship with this woman was,” Goetz said. “She looked at the officer in a curious way and said that was her boyfriend.”
The officer knew about a warrant issued for Corpuz’s arrest because of a Marysville traffic violation, Goetz said. The girl’s parents, who don’t speak English well, were summoned to the scene and later questioned at police headquarters.
