Sharon Rina Lopatka was an Internet entrepreneur from Hampstead, Maryland who was killed in a case of apparent consensual homicide in 1996.
Background
Sharon Lopatka was born on September 20, 1961, to Orthodox Jewish parents in Baltimore, Maryland. By all accounts, she had a relatively normal upbringing – she was involved in sports and school activities, and was described by classmates as “as normal as you can get”. After graduating high school in 1979, Lopatka married construction worker Victor Lopatka in 1991 and the couple moved to a home in the rural town of Hampstead, Maryland.
In the mid-1990s, Lopatka began running various online businesses from her home, including a website that sold home decor guides and another that offered psychic readings. However, Lopatka also used the internet to explore her darker sexual interests, creating an alter-ego named “Nancy Carlson” who was a dominatrix and producer of violent adult films. Under this persona, Lopatka sold pornographic content depicting unconscious women being sexually assaulted, as well as offering to sell her own used undergarments.
The Fateful Meeting
In August 1996, the 35-year-old Lopatka met 45-year-old computer analyst Robert “Bobby” Frederick Glass in an online chat room dedicated to pornography and fetishes. Over the next six weeks, Lopatka and Glass exchanged nearly 900 emails detailing their shared interests in sadomasochism, bondage, and Lopatka’s desire to be tortured to death.
Lopatka had previously posted messages in various online forums expressing her fascination with being tortured to death, writing at one point: “Want to talk about torturing to death? I hope you all don’t think I’m strange or anything.” Through these messages, Lopatka had connected with multiple people who were willing to help fulfill her macabre fantasy.
On October 13, 1996, Lopatka told her husband she was going to visit friends in Georgia, but instead drove to the train station in Baltimore and took a train to Charlotte, North Carolina, where Glass was waiting for her. The two then drove 80 miles to Glass’s trailer home in Lenoir, North Carolina.
The Tragic Ending
Over the next three days, Lopatka and Glass acted out their violent sexual fantasies, with Glass allegedly torturing and strangling Lopatka to death. In a note Lopatka left for her husband, she wrote that she would not be returning home and told him “not to go after the person that did this to her.” She also wrote, “If my body is never retrieved, don’t worry, know that I’m at peace.”
On October 16, 1996, Lopatka was found dead in a pit beside Glass’s trailer. The preliminary autopsy indicated that she had been strangled. Glass was arrested and charged with first-degree murder, though he claimed Lopatka’s death was an accident that occurred during their violent sexual activities.
The case was a landmark for law enforcement, as it was the first time a murder suspect had been arrested primarily based on evidence gathered from email messages. Investigators were able to recover nearly 900 pages of emails exchanged between Lopatka and Glass, which detailed their plans and Lopatka’s desire to be killed.
Aftermath and Conviction
Despite the overwhelming evidence, Glass’s lawyer argued that Lopatka’s death was an accident that occurred during consensual sadomasochistic activity. Ultimately, Glass pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and was sentenced to 36–53 months in prison. Officers recovered child sexual exploitation material from his home, for this he was given an extra 27 months for federal charges of second-degree minor exploitation, to be served consecutively
The Lopatka case sparked intense media attention and public debate around the concept of “consensual homicide” – the idea that someone can legally consent to being killed. Many were horrified by the notion that Lopatka had willingly agreed to her own murder, while others argued that she should have the right to make that choice.