Hey there folks! I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! I have some more tea for you this week, how do you like yours? I brought agave, 0 calorie sugar and honey, so pick your poison. Picture this, it’s 1996 (OMG I was born that year) in Maryland and poor Victor Lopatka is reading a letter from his wife Sharon that says, “If my body is never retrieved, don’t worry: know that I’m at peace.”

Wait, I know what you’re thinking, what does she mean? Ladies and gentlemen you just read a sentence written by someone who gave consent to be murdered. Today we will be exploring the death of Sharon Lopakta. 

Before I write anything else, I want to say that I am not judging anyone’s sexual preferences or fetishes. I honestly do not care; this post IS NOT to slam anyone who participates in BDSM. This is just another TRUE crime story that I’m serving to the #MurderMysteryMonday lovers. 

Sharon Lopakta was the first of four daughters. She was born in Baltimore Maryland in 1961. She had strict Jewish – Orthodox parents. Their religion was extremely important to them and because of this when Sharon met and fell in love with Victor, they didn’t approve. Victor was Catholic and her parents were ashamed that she would marry someone outside of their faith. Friends of Sharon stated that this was her way of “breaking free” (in my head I just started singing Breaking free, you know? High school musical? Troy and Gabriella? No? Okay then).

After getting married in 1991, Sharon and Victor moved to Hampstead, Maryland. They lived a quiet life and kept to themselves. Victor worked as a construction worker and he would leave during the day, Sharon had a lot of free time and started to investigate different ways to make extra cash. Now this is where the internet enters the chat (Hey AOL.) Sharon launched her own website in 1995 called “House of Dion.” She would sell home decor guides via mail for seven bucks a pop. She then got a job rewriting advertisements for $50 per ad. (This was good money for a 90’s house wife I assume.) Our girl Sharon was a Jack of all trades, she ran websites that would offer Psychic readings (now whether or not she actually had psychic abilities is unknown.) She even developed her very own hotline… (yes, I mean a steamy one.) Sharon even created an alias – Nancy Carlson, in which she used to market some disturbing pornography. It was videos of women being raped while unconscious, women being chloroformed, hypnotized and etc. But wait there’s more! She sold her worn panties and would create advertisements asking,

“Is there anyone out there interested in buying my worn panties?”

Sharon become more and more invested in her life online and started entering pornographic chat rooms for people with desires that society viewed as abnormal. She visited sites such as fetishfeet.com and sexbondage.com. She interacted with people who were interested in bondage, sadomasochism and necrophilia.  (Again I don’t care about your personal fetishes but ANYONE who takes interest in necrophilia needs help.) 

Over 50 messages of Sharon expressing her desire to be tortured to death were discovered by The News & Observer. They were written under her persona Carlson, a disciplinarian dominatrix / porn actress who weighed 300 pounds. She would also scout for people willing to force feed her until she doubled in size. 

Sharon’s messages of wanting someone to torture her to death alarmed a sex workers’ rights activist named Tanith’s attention. Sharon responded by saying,

“I want the real thing. I did not ask for you preaching to me.” (Sis was adamant about dying OK!) 

In 1996, Sharon’s dream finally came true after meeting Robert “Bobby” Frederick Glass. (I don’t know if it’s because I included his nickname but his name just seems WAY too long.) 

Bob was a computer analyst for the government of Catawba County, North Carolina. He was married for 14 years until May 26th 1996, when his wife Sherri noticed a change in his behavior. (Well ya dodged a bullet Sherri, good for you.) She noticed that her husband was spending a lot of time on his computer and wasn’t giving her any attention. One day she logged into his computer and saw some disturbing emails saved to his hard drive. (Dude… your hard drive? You needed to save those emails that bad huh.) According to Sherri, the messages sent under the pseudonyms “Slowhand” (Whatever the hell that’s supposed to mean) and “Toyman” were  “raw, violent and disturbing.” She realized that she didn’t know him at all and they separated. (While I’m glad she took the kids and left him, I’m a little disturbed that she didn’t report him to the police, you’ll see why I say this in a bit.)

A few months after their separation, Bob met Sharon in August of 1996 (in a porn chat of course.) Sharon then expressed her dream of being tortured to death to Bob, who was willing to fulfill her fantasy. 

Okay so now that you know the details let’s go back to poor Victor.  On October 13th 1996, Sharon told her husband Victor that she was going to be visiting some friends in Georgia. (The lies, the lies, THE LIES) 

The day Sharon drove 45 minutes to Baltimore’s Penn station. From there she took an Amtrak train to Charlotte, North Carolina and arrived at 8:45 pm. (She traveled all day to die.) From there, Bob picked her up in his pickup truck (that sounded like a rap) and they drove 80 miles to his trailer in Lenoir, North Carolina. 

Shortly after her departure, he found her note that she wrote saying she was leaving him and not to track her killer down. He honestly didn’t report Sharon missing until a week after finding the letter. (I know what you’re thinking, but maybe he thought she was joking?) 

The police then found six weeks of conversations between Sharon and Bob and were in disbelief. After staking out his home and obtaining a search warrant, police searched Bobs trailer while he was at work and it was a pigsty! They found some of Sharon’s items in the home and searched his computer finding the emails and child pornography. (Now remember when I said his wife should have notified authorities? This is why!!!! I know she saw the kid porn. Yeah she got her kids away from him but hello? He’s still a pedophile Sherri!) 

They did some digging after noticing a pile of soil mounted 75 feet away from his trailer and found body parts… yeah you guessed it… Sharon’s body parts! Following the discovery Bob was arrested at work. He didn’t put up a fight (because he knew what he did) and was charged with first degree murder. He tried to wiggle his way out of this by saying it was an aCciDeNt (cue the eye rolling) and that while they were having sex he was pulling the rope around her neck tighter and tighter and when she died he panicked and buried her. (Because you know that’s what you do when you kill someone by “mistake.” Come on Bob!) 

This is what he said during a prison interview,

“I don’t know how much I pulled the rope … I never wanted to kill her, but she ended up dead.”

Their email correspondences proved that this definitely wasn’t an accident! However, it did spark the conversation if someone can consent to being murdered. What do you guys think? Bob pleaded guilty to sexual exploitation and voluntary manslaughter charges almost four years later on January 27, 2000. He was only sentenced to 36–53 months in prison. He was also sentenced for second-degree minor exploitation in which he was to serve an additional 27 months. Two weeks before he was to be released from prison, he died of a heart attack in his cell. I bet you didn’t see that coming huh? 

Oh and to top it off, Sharon’s parents disowned her even after death. They were already embarrassed that she got married to a Catholic but to then learn about her secret sex life and that she pretty much orchestrated her own murder? Yeah they denied her. 

I can’t help but wonder how poor Victor felt. I wonder if he ever found love again? 

Thanks for reading everyone, I hope you enjoyed this weeks #MurderMysteryMonday post! I’ll be back next week with more tea. R.I.P  to the deceased and I hope their families have healed and found peace.