This is a fairly old story, chances are you've heard about it. I hadn't, so thought I would share. It is Talhotblond, a documentary about a toxic internet love triangle gone wrong. It was released on DVD yesterday, so it's in the headlines again today. I just stumbled upon it and was sick-to-my-stomach speechless.Here's the review I found on IMDb:
Anybody who loves lurid, real-life homicide cases with mind boggling revelations will crave this skillfully made documentary about a cyberspace femme fatale who turned two grown men against one another. These two guys participated in Internet chat room sessions with an 18-year old hottie. Forty-seven year old factory worker Thomas Montgomery, currently serving a 20-year stretch in Attica Correctional Facility in New York, was an unhappily married man with two daughters aged 12 and 14-years old. Montgomery was suffering from impotence when he met Jessi in an Internet chat room purely by accident. Montgomery masqueraded as an 18-year old battle scarred Marine sniper named Tommy when he learned that Jessi was a West Virginia high school senior. He fooled the poor teenager into believing that he had deep feelings of love for her.
Jessi reciprocated similar feelings of affection. The web-based romance began in May 2005. Jessi sent him photos of herself in a bathing suit, videos of herself set to a ballad, red-lace panties, and a sterling silver "key to my heart" chain. Their chat sessions degenerated into pornographic prattle. Meanwhile, Montgomery's suspicious wife Cindy discovered her husband's perfidy and contacted Jessi with the truth about Montgomery. Before long Jessi hooked up with a college student named Brian.
Eventually, this twisted relationship incorporated all three and Montgomery learned that Brian worked part-time at the same factory, the tool plant, Dynabrade in Clarence, New York, where he had been working for 12 years. One evening while 22-year old Brian sat in his truck in the factory parking lot, Montgomery approached the vehicle without warning and fired three shots from a .30-caliber gun into the driver's side door, killing Brian. The jealous older man was stunned when he learned the truth about sexy young Jessi and how she had lead him on in a bizarre love triangle.
This is a chilling cautionary tale of what can occur when you chat with the wrong folks in cyberspace. First-time writer & director Barbara Schroeder does a splendid job of assembling the facts in a piecemeal fashion with the actual participants, including candid, on-camera interviews with convicted killer Thomas Montgomery, clinical psychologist and attorney Dr. Rex Julian Beaber, Erie County prosecutor Ken Case, Erie County Sheriff Ron Kenyon, Oak Hill, West Virginia Sgt. Lee Kirk, Tim Shieler, and the father of the Internet teen vixen. The revelations here will curl your toe-nails and make you think twice about entering an Internet chat room. Indeed, truth is again stranger than fiction! "Talhotblond" received the Best Documentary award at the 2009 Seattle International Film Festival. Incidentally, the title refers to the screen name that Jessi used in Internet chat rooms.
***Spoiler Alert*** Don't read further if you think you may actually watch this terrifying, it-really-happened film.
Imagine, that when police showed up at Jessi's house to investigate following Brian's murder, they discovered that 'Jessi' was in fact the real-life Jessi's 46-yr-old mom, who had used photos/videos of her own daughter to lure Tommy the stud-muffin, who was actually a fat and forty-six Montgomery, into her cyber-arms. Bleh!!! It's so not my cup'o'tea, this sordid stuff, but it's so disturbing, I think I might just have to watch it.
What in the world is going on out there? Safe to say, if we are hearing about this crazy story that ended so tragically, how many 'ordinary' people are involved in the same scenerio of kooky internet relationships built on lie upon twisted lie that we never hear about? Freakish doesn't even begin to describe it. Pathetic, maybe? How do human beings get to such a point of desperation? What in God's name could possibly make you fantasize about being someone else to the point that you create a fictional internet 'you'? I know, it happens all the time, in most cases where the fictional character is a predator, but these two nutjobs were actually carrying on a relationship. Did I mention...BLEH!!! Get some help already.
If nothing else, word to you(r) mother(s), don't let your teenagers get ANYWHERE near chat rooms, even on fricking Club Penguin. Contributor Larry Getlen blogged about Talhotblond on The Daily Beast yesterday. Here's the link: http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-03-23/webs-killer-love-triangle/.
That, folks is a whole lotta WACKO. Bleh!!!
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