Blinded By Beauty

I want to give praise and thanks to the Almighty God. God, I am so blessed You have showed me that Your love and grace is always given to Your children, even after I gave up on You and gave up on my faith. I know that nothing in life I have accomplished has been of my doing, and I am a mere vessel as Your humble servant.

I dedicate this book to my two children, especially to my daughter. I want both of you to hear my side of the story because just like everything in life there are two sides to every occurrence; unfortunately my story had been silenced and non-existent during my court proceedings thanks to corruption. My children, I love you so much and I can’t express how sorry I am for being absent in your lives. I want you to know this was never my intention and my heart continually aches for you both. I spent many lonely nights crying over the loss of the two most important people in my life—my children. I have and will always love you both unconditionally and you can come to me at any time and be greeted with open arms. I hope neither one of you ever has to experience the absence and the loss of your children when you become parents. It is something I believe I will never be able to get over from and heal.

In addition, I would like to thank my wife, Maren, who has shown me what it means to be truly loved. To my parents, my aunt (Mom’s sister), my maternal grandmother, my children and my friends who have been my motivation. Thank you for all of your support, prayers, money, cards and letters during my incarceration. Had it not been for all of your ongoing support, I would have never found God and received peace and love in my life. I would have succeeded in my suicide attempt while in prison and I would have eternally let down my two children.

*Some of the names in this book have been changed for legal privacy purposes and for my personal safety. While it is important to reveal the truth, I do not want to have a negative image painted upon my children and stepchildren. It is imperative that my children know the corruption and injustice I endured as they become older. I want them to know that I have never stopped loving them.

About Me

I grew up in a town called Oak Forest, up north. When I was a teenager I badly wanted to get out of school (and my house) and pushed myself to graduate high school during my junior year. I immediately went into the United States Marine Corps at 17 years old. I was deeply stubborn and chose to make my own rules rather than taking anyone’s advice on waiting to join the military. Little did I know, but I was in for a rude awakening and culture shock. Prior to joining, I made it my goal to become a sergeant, which is a pay grade of E-5. An enlistment pay grade starts at E-1 and the highest grade of pay is E-9, which rarely becomes accomplished unless you make a career in the military. Also, more than anything, I wanted to wrestle for the Marine Corps wrestling team.

The first couple of years in the Marines were very hard on me mentally and emotionally; I was in great physical shape and the physical requirements never bothered me. Being the youngest in my platoon made me stick out like a sore thumb. I had a Platoon sergeant that always rode my ass about my age and I became very insecure about myself. I was constantly given all of the miserable work details, which included having to work on weekends and nights when others were off of work. I would try to ignore my Platoon sergeant knocking on my door on my off time, but he had a key to my room; for trying to avoid him, he made me pay dearly with mental and physical abuse. Later in life this would haunt me, as I would have ongoing nightmares of my Platoon sergeant hazing me while I was out in the civilian world and no longer in the military. So, if my Platoon sergeant ever reads this book, I don’t hold any ill-will or grudge towards you. I just want to say that you definitely scarred me in a negative way, but the positive is that I learned to never treat others the way you treated me. I could not fathom treating others harshly for no reason. I always believed that earning respect from others was the key to success, rather than demanding respect because of a title or rank.

I remember when tryouts for the Marine Corps wrestling team were being held at a base nearby my base of 29 Palms, California. My Platoon sergeant caught wind of my passion and desire to wrestle in the Marines. He immediately squashed my hopes and dreams by telling me, You joined my Marine Corps to be a machine gunner, not to fucking wrestle. I will never sign off on orders for you to wrestle in my beloved Corps. This was about six months into my enlistment and I knew from that day on I was finished with the Marine Corps. I would not be a lifer, as Marines were called who stayed in the Corps until retirement. I did eventually make sergeant and felt very proud of this, along with earning the Good Conduct Medal for honorable service. I have to go off on a tangent here: on the day I was promoted to sergeant, I was given a choice of who I wanted to pin on my sergeant chevrons. My friend, who was also getting promoted to sergeant, picked our Platoon sergeant because it was considered the loyal thing to do. Being the rebel I was, I did a major no-no, and chose two of my closest friends, who were sergeants from a different platoon. After the promotion ceremony, my friend who was promoted with me was invited out to party with our Platoon sergeant and others. My Platoon sergeant did not congratulate me or speak to me because I had offended and embarrassed him. At times, I did think it was unprofessional of me not giving him the satisfaction of pinning on my rank but I despised this man so much because he caused me so much pain during my enlistment. I was immature and did not make the best decision. After my enlistment, I was honorably discharged and moved back home.

I married my first wife who was a great person. Unfortunately, I was suffering from undiagnosed severe depression, PTSD, anxiety disorder, and OCD, which caused my insecurities to get the best of me. Instead of getting help, I put myself on a pedestal and chose to isolate myself from her. It seemed like each day that went by, I disliked her more and more but the reality was that I did not like myself. I chose to drink heavily the first year after I was discharged because I just wanted to feel numb inside. I was tired of the nightmares that always consisted of me getting called back into the military, but I was only allowed to come back with the rank of Lance Corporal, which was a pay rate of E-3. I was not allowed to go in with my sergeant rank and could not understand why my rank had been stripped from me for no reason. The worst part of the nightmare was being placed back into my platoon with my Platoon sergeant terrorizing me. He would do this because I was now a much lower rank with no pull or authority to draw on. Before I could get the professional help I needed, I found that drinking until I blacked out seemed to be the only way I would not remember my dreams. My wife at the time would come home to me passed out on the floor with an empty bottle of hard liquor lying next to me on many occasions.

My first wife and I eventually grew apart and divorced. As we had become older I’d noticed we no longer had the same interests we did when we were teenagers. She matured and kept to herself, while I seemed to have no clue where my life was going. The only thing I was sure about was the fact that we would not be together anymore. The one thing that will always be memorable and truly a blessing from this marriage was the birth of my son Aaron. He is an amazing child and I love him dearly. It was always hard being a single father who had no idea how to raise an infant child. I know I gave my all to being a father during this time, but I know that it was never good enough because I myself was not stable. My son's mother was very knowledgeable when it came to parenting and I could never compete. I always had this detached persona and disassociated myself from others. It was much easier to do this because it relieved me of being hurt by others. I seemed to let everyone down including myself. I’d always had this insecurity that I was never good enough for anyone including myself and I could not figure out what my problem was. I believe my biggest problem during this time was that I was in denial that I had a problem.

During my first marriage, I became a cop and enlisted in the Air Force Reserves as a fireman. It’s strange because going through the six-month police academy was miserable. The physical part for me was a joke, but the mental aspect of it made me feel like I was still in the Marine Corps. From the first day of the academy I knew things were going to be terrible. One of my friends, who is now deceased, lined up in formation and he had a moustache. I remember one of the police academy instructors sizing up my friend with a cigar in his mouth. The instructor got in my friend's face and said, What the fuck is that growing above your lip? My friend replied, A moustache sir. The instructor replied, Who the fuck gave you permission to wear a moustache? My friend replied, The recruit handbook stated recruits were allowed regulation moustaches sir. The instructor said, Let me see that handbook. My friend handed him the handbook and the instructor lit the handbook on fire with his cigar. The instructor yelled, I don't see any fucking handbook, shave your fucking face. I thought to myself, Ugh, you’ve got to be kidding me, not this Neanderthal bullshit again!

Getting up at 3:00 A.M. every morning to iron my uniform, polish my boots, apply ice to my shins and go over any material I needed to know before the day began was exhausting. Most of the morning routine for the police academy was physical training, also known as PT. I became frustrated because I could not understand why recruits in the academy were not in good physical shape. I was in great shape and could exercise with the greatest of ease. I became irritated and condescending towards others that lacked my physical prowess. I absolutely hated having to do extra PT for others that could not keep up with the required fitness routine. The weather elements made things uncomfortable too, because there was very hot weather and also extremely cold, rainy weather during the six-month course. I could not determine what was worse: being hot and sweaty while exercising on top of fire ant mounds and receiving numerous ant bites, or being drenched from cold rain and seeing your own breath while exercising. For me, being wet no matter what the elements were outside, was very mentally draining.

I constantly told myself that I had been through worse in the Marine Corps. This was my motivation because I was so sick of putting my body through physical, mental, and emotional abuse just to earn a paycheck. I don't like to give up on things in life, but I seriously considered leaving the academy after the first day. I felt like I was entering another militaristic environment again. I let my pride get the best of me and chose to follow through rather than quit. My pride always has been the downfall throughout my life. I found myself as the class clown and didn’t take many things seriously. (This became helpful for me while I was a cop because many cops have to put on this thick skin mentality from all of the crazy goings-on they see during their daily shifts). I remember telling my police academy instructors that the reason I joined the police force was because I loved the movies Super Troopers and Police Academy. While it was only a farce, I was doomed after this comment. I developed the wrong mindset during the police academy. This mindset was that I would not be a career cop and to always keep my options open. Even though I did not want to be a cop permanently, I needed to finish what I started. I ended up policing for almost 10 years and I finished the Air Force Reserves after six years with an honorable discharge.

Being a cop was an extremely difficult and dangerous job. I truly believe cops should be mandated to attend regular counseling sessions with a licensed therapist. Cops see too many negative things in life and every person needs an outlet for the things witnessed while policing. Instead, most cops hold onto what they see internally and it affects them detrimentally. It affects one's ability to have an open-mind when conducting investigations. Many, such as me, got out of the military and went into some type of law enforcement employment. As such, many cops are not able to get our own emotions and feelings in check, while we are expected to restore order and peace with complete strangers. Several years after leaving the police, I knew that I had not only let myself down, but I had let down the people I served. I was not in the right mindset to give my all to others I encountered and be the most helpful. To me, policing ended up being just another way to earn money. I lost the passion for helping others because of the bureaucratic and brainwashed political ideologies that were imposed upon me while trying to perform my job effectively. Policing was always a damned if I do and damned if I don’t type of job and the stress ate me up inside.

I really tried my best to help others rather than arrest everyone. I wanted to be the one cop who truly made a difference, but it was like my old friend told me early in my police career, Kid, you are not going to last long at this job being sympathetic and having a kind heart. Those kinds of cops are a dying breed. Unfortunately, my old friend was absolutely right and I had no business being a cop because I refused to conform to a yes sir lifestyle and be a cop that just followed orders like a robot. Citizens are seeing more and more problems now with police departments all over the United States because too many officers have this robot mentality, as they are only trained to pad their stats with tickets and arrests to make the department receive specified grants by the federal and state governments. I can assure you that many officers are instructed to manipulate reports and dispatch calls by their supervisors. They do this so they can check off a specific task, which may not have been done or performed just to appease the specific government grant they are seeking.

Prologue (August 2011)

I had ended an exhausting three-year relationship with my girlfriend. I was suffering from depression, anxiety disorder, obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD), and recently diagnosed PTSD. On top of my mental illnesses, I suffered from recurring sicknesses such as shingles, ulcers, kidney stones and high blood pressure. I did not cope with stress well and it affected me negatively in many ways, especially my overall health. Part of the ongoing stress I endured was from my own coworkers. Two specific incidents happened to me that brought my character into question and I chose to tell the truth rather than be a team player.

One instance was a carjacking, where a man was driving and crashing into the rear of vehicles on the interstate, around 2:30 A.M. I was the first responder, and had the man exit the vehicle while I pointed my weapon at him. This was a normal procedure, especially for a carjacking because I was not aware if the suspect was armed. The suspect exited the vehicle completely naked and was holding something in his hands. It was very dark out on the interstate and my blue lights reflected off the object in the suspect’s hands. My training and experience led me to believe the suspect had a weapon in his hand. After securing the suspect in handcuffs and placing my weapon back in its holster, I realized the shiny object was a Luther Vandross CD. I had my audio recorder on and my vehicle’s video camera recording during the incident. My supervisor, who I normally got along with, told me to withhold the information that I had pointed my weapon at the suspect. I did not feel comfortable omitting this from my report, especially with the audio and video recordings. I chose to disregard his order and it later went to Internal Affairs. My supervisor tried to save face, but I did the right thing. My supervisor was terminated for giving me a command to lie on my report. I felt horrible, but I would not sacrifice my credibility for anyone. This led to many officers ostracizing me for some time. I was no longer a friend to coworkers and I was regarded as an enemy. This was very difficult for me because I had to respond to calls and handle calls on my own when normally I would have backup on specific high priority calls. Unfortunately, nobody wanted to be around me because they knew I would not have their backs if they did something that was tactically questionable or against company policy.

Another incident occurred when I had to give testimony on an alleged rape case in court. The county prosecutor talked to me prior to me sitting on the witness stand and giving my testimony. She told me that I needed to change my wording when I answered specific questions. I told the prosecutor if I changed the wording she wanted me to testify to then I would be telling a lie on the stand. The prosecutor tried telling me that this was a formality and it was important that I did not divulge the words I used on my report, but I couldn’t adhere to her demands because I did not feel comfortable lying. The defendant was ultimately found not guilty and I know it was because of my testimony, but in my heart I felt it was the right thing to do to tell the truth. This case was important for the department and many looked at me as the person that hurt the prosecution. I looked at it as doing the right thing, because I did not feel comfortable lying. This could have caused the defendant to be wrongly convicted. These two incidents, more than anything, caused me to struggle with depression and anxiety. I didn’t cope well with being pressured by others through means of fear and intimidation. I always chose to side with doing the right and moral thing because I had a moral code.

My insecurities and low self-esteem always made me jump into new relationships solely to feel adequate and not like a loser. I always feared being alone and never had qualms jumping back into the dating scene. I knew being a cop I would have no problem getting any woman I desired. Many women loved a man in uniform and I had this going for me. I should have sought help for this problem and later on in my life I realized I was codependent, which is very unhealthy for a person in any type of relationship, not just an intimate relationship. After breaking up with my girlfriend of three years, I felt like I had wasted a significant amount of my life. I began seeing multiple women to make up for this. I had a minor nervous breakdown, which I dealt with, with the help of doctors, when I turned 30 in May 2011 and I wanted to settle down and marry.

At the time, seeing multiple women seemed to be the most plausible way to accomplish this desire of becoming domesticated. My disenchanted mind figured that I would be able to pick the most suitable woman for me. I was going to school full-time during the day, working as a cop at night, and dating women with the little free time I had. To put it modestly, I burned my candle at both ends. (Note: I always considered myself a cop and not a police officer. In my eyes there were too many police officers [robots] and not enough cops [down-to-earth, empathetic people who cared about the people they protected]). I spent a lot of my time at work. When I wasn’t answering 911 calls, I was either finishing homework and numerous research papers, or catching up on sleep in a dark, vacant parking lot. Surprisingly, this is more prevalent with many cops who work the evening shift. I was still a jokester and I bragged to my co-workers that I was able to get more sleep at work when it was slow than I did at home. I lived this reckless lifestyle for several years until it caught up with me and my world came crashing down on January 11, 2014.

I lived in sin and felt as if I was on top of the world. I made great money, had all the materialistic things I wanted, and most importantly my son idolized me. (When I married in February 2012 my step-kids idolized me also; I felt like I was Batman). I did not believe in God and I chastised others for trying to instill their own ideologies and beliefs on me. I thought, I make great money, look good in uniform, have everything I want, and my son loves me. What more can I ask for and why would I waste my time on God since I’m doing this on my own? I was filled with arrogance and my ego and pride ended up being my destruction. I laughed at others who preached to me about God and considered them weak-minded. I chastised believers of God and told them that I had a first class ticket to Hell and I was proud of it.

I decided to join many online dating sites in order to play the field and continue to boost my hugely inflated ego while attempting to find my next wife. I lived wildly and dangerously without any morals in the bedroom. In my mind, I justified playing the honest, good cop by day, but by night I was more like a wild rock star. I showed no emotion to important women that would have been a great wife and instead chose to engage with wild women that only looked great physically and could be freaks in bed. In retrospect, I was only lying to myself by acting this way and I was emotionally unavailable to amazing women who truly cared about me. I needed to be knocked down off my pedestal because I was breaking women’s hearts on these dating sites. The women that I should have kept were never good enough for me in my eyes. I knew nothing about the wild and seductive women, only that they were pleasing on the eyes and wild in the bedroom. I repeatedly told myself, Bad things will never happen to me because I’m a cop and I have a knack for exposing and stopping bad people.

I suffered from having an egotistical, self-centered, shallow and prideful mindset. I reflect now and realize I was not a compassionate person at that time. I remember telling women that I couldn’t be with them after being intimate with them. The story I would tell the woman is that I had received a phone call from an ex that she was pregnant with my child. This story always worked because the women never wanted to stay after that, except for this one woman who insisted on staying to support me. This woman was a true sweetheart and she would have been the one to keep, but I was immature and inconsiderate. Another bittersweet irony for me was that I was always amused when I had to respond to a dispatched 911 call regarding a person who had been duped by a girl or guy from online dating sites. Many of these online dating hopefuls had given their entire savings to these online predators. It made me think, How can these people be so dumb?

Unbeknownst to me, this karmic circle worked against me and cast a dark shadow on my life the day I received a message from Jezebel on a dating website called e-Harmony around October 2011. While there were clear red flags and forewarnings that should have made me flee, I ignored all of these indicators and thought I always had control of the situation. This was the beginning of the trials and tribulations bestowed upon me with God and the devil playing significant roles in changing my life for good. I had to make a decision known as making the Devil’s choice. Did I want to live a life behind steel bars or did I want to be a free man?

Communicating With Jezebel

In October 2011 I received an interesting message from Jezebel on eHarmony. One of the things I noticed about her profile was she owned her own business. For so long I had wanted to find a woman that was self-sufficient and independent. I’d dated a lot of women where I had to be the sugar daddy, and this type of mentality gets old and boring after a while. Especially when you play sugar daddy and you don't spend enough on this holiday or that birthday and the woman is resentful towards you. It can become nerve-wrecking and mind-boggling. Jezebel never mentioned anything about having children or being married. I would learn these things as time progressed. Jezebel and I exchanged messages back and forth and she gave me answers that led me to become very interested in her. Jezebel and I eventually exchanged numbers and we talked for a few days. Jezebel kept asking me, When are we going to meet? She was persistent so we decided to go to Starbucks late one night in November and meet for coffee, although neither one of us drank coffee that night—I don't like the taste of coffee.

We were both nervous while communicating. I would learn later on in our relationship that Jezebel was a caffeine fiend along with many other types of addictions. We both drank water and exchanged pleasantries and stories. Jezebel stated she had an in-home daycare and had run it for eight years. Jezebel told me she had four children, even though it stated on her profile that she didn't have children. In my mind I thought, Okay no problem; I really want a big family. Jezebel insisted that she wanted to stop at three, but her husband and she wanted a boy. Jezebel said that her fourth child was a boy. Jezebel kept doing this nervous thing of continually pulling up her long, leather boots. It gave me the impression that she was interested in me and she appeared to be a down-to-earth girl. Jezebel kept telling me over the period of our hour-long conversation that she was drama free and she wanted no drama in her life. To me, this was a challenge I was ready to partake. Jezebel said, I don't need a man. Men need me. For some reason, I liked her demeanor. She said she wanted to go out again, but with her children. Jezebel said she would only bring two children with her because she did not want to overwhelm me with all four. Jezebel said all four of her children together were a handful.

The following week, Jezebel and I decided we would go to my college because they had an amazing Christmas celebration called the Lights of Life every year. There were carnival rides, many different Christmas decorations, an animal farm, pictures with Santa, and other types of games and concessions for the children. I brought Aaron with us and Jezebel brought her son Jackson and her youngest daughter Maria. Maria was seven, a year older than Aaron, and Jackson was two. I picked up the three of them at Jezebel's mother's house. There I met Jezebel's mother, Jean, and her older daughters Ann (oldest) and Rosa (middle). All of us had a great time together. Maria was a character; she had no filter and said whatever was on her mind. I gave her the nickname Mouth. The children played at the animal farm and Mouth yelled out, Mommy look at this pig, it has titties. I was dying of laughter. All of us had our picture taken with Santa and it was a great picture because I was still in good physical shape. I was allowed to carry Jackson around because he was cold and tired. It took some time for Jackson to warm up to anyone but his mother.

The night couldn't have gone better; the children were happy and I envisioned my life with a big family. This is what I wanted and I had no complaints. While at the festival, I ran into some of my friends from school and introduced them. We drove back to Jezebel's mother's home where I told Jezebel that I had a great time and would love to have the other children come along if she wanted to go out again. Mouth overheard what I said and she stated, My mommy is always busy because she has too many boyfriends. Jezebel gave a nervous laugh and scolded Mouth. Jezebel told me that Mouth had a wild imagination and I should not pay any attention to her. Jezebel said she would love to hang out again. We hugged and called it a night. Aaron told me that he had a great time and wanted to know if we could hang out with Jezebel and her children again. I replied, Yes, we will.

Jezebel and I continued to speak on the phone. She made it clear that she couldn't have people over at her house during business hours. I respected this and paid no mind to any alternate reasons why I couldn't come by during working hours. In the short time of knowing Jezebel, I realized she was a needy person and always asked for minor things. I didn’t mind this because I felt this was my way to demonstrate my value to her. For instance, Jezebel stated she had a headlight out on her vehicle, but she did not have time during the week to have it repaired. Jezebel complained that her friend Jenny always dropped off her children, but never came to retrieve her children during closing hours. Jenny would show up at all hours of the night to retrieve her children. Jezebel would not confront Jenny over the issue because Jenny was her best friend. This interfered with our plans to hang out during the week because she could not verify what time she would be off of work. Jezebel asked me if I could change her headlight bulb during working hours. Jezebel told me as long as I didn't step foot in her house, she would not be in violation of the state's in-home daycare rules. I obliged because I really liked Jezebel and wanted things to work with us.

I had several friends that I spoke to about Jezebel and her children. One of my friends, Diana, was someone I always confided in. Diana was about 12 years older than