The in-depth look at the shocking sex cult has gripped viewers. Things you buy through our links may earn Vox Media a commission. Pollok will have to serve a term of three years supervised release after she gets out of prison. "Ray groomed Isabella, at first by listening and paying attention to her," Polloks attorneys wrote. Ray coerced his acolytes into falsely confessing these crimes, which he compulsively recorded in audio and video tapes, evidence showed. . Roberta tells [what] happened at Larry Ray's co-conspirator Isabella Pollok's sentencing hearing." According to reports, Isabella once forced a brother-sister duo to wear diapers around her partners Manhattan apartment, and she further had a hand in inflicting other forms of torture on different victims. Ray, 62, drew the group of young adults into a cult-like family after moving into his daughters Sarah Lawrence dorm room in 2010. In federal court, people awaiting sentencing commonly write emotional pleas to the presiding judge seeking leniency, but Polloks overture stands apart: She addressed two separate letters to the judge and prosecutors. Now that Isabella is getting ready to face the music, Cynthia has pledged to stand by her side. Distractify is a registered trademark. Alleged @SarahLawrence College sex manipulator, extortionist Larry Ray had a co-conspirator. Emailus. Stolen Youth: Inside the Cult at Sarah Lawrence examines the crimes of Larry Ray and the emotional, physical and sexual abuse he carried out on his daughter Talia's friends at the elite liberal arts college in New York from 2010. Attorneys Danielle Sassoon, Mollie Bracewell, and Lindsey Keenan are in charge of the prosecution. In April 2022 he was found guilty on all counts, and on January 20, 2023 he was sentenced to 60 years in prison for racketeering conspiracy, violent crime in aid of racketeering, extortion, sex trafficking, forced labor, tax evasion and money laundering offenses. Isabell Pollok, 31, pleaded guilty in September to a single count of participating in a money laundering scheme by forcing one of his victims into prostitution. As damning as Polloks participation in Rays horrific abuse was, the sentencing hearing hardly provided the sense of clear moral victory felt after Rays sentence was announced. If Lawrence were here in front of me right now, I would tell him how sorry I am that hes going through this and that hes being put through this. Emily Kohrs didnt do anything wrong, and the medias harsh treatment of the Fulton County foreperson was a gift to Trumps lawyers. Read More: Where Is Larry Rays Cult Survivor Claudia Drury Now? She did not comment as she left court Wednesday. Larry Rays trusted cult member Isabella Pollok pleaded guilty on Wednesday. While the situation seemed odd at first to . In an interview, Polloks mother told The Daily Beast she believed her daughter had been truly brainwashed. What is happening on TikTok on March 3rd 2023? When I started at Sarah Lawrence College in 2009, I saw it as opportunity to escape all the hardships in my life, Pollok wrote to the three Assistant U.S. She does not deserve jail time.. For Americas wage laborers, a 32-hour workweek is less of a beautiful dream than an oppressive reality. Federal prosecutors have now charged Isabella Pollok with helping Ray psychologically and sexually exploit victims for financial gain, according to a superseding indictment. Offers may be subject to change without notice. Assistant U.S. Attorney Lindsey Keenan found such a sentence warranted. Drury testified that she made $2.5 million through four years of coerced sex work and gave all of her earnings to Ray. Isabella Pollok, 31, must report to federal prison in 60 days, prosecutors said. : Who are Sally McNeils kids John and Shantina in Killer Sally documentary? I believed and supported someone who controlled me in ways I could not understand, Pollok tearfully said, struggling to get the words out. In 2010, Ray allegedly recruited Pollok to help operate a campus sex cult after moving into his daughters dormitory at Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, New York. Per the New York Post, on Sept. 7, 2022, Isabella pled guilty to one conspiracy count, which looks like the result of a plea deal. So now, if you wish to learn more about the one individual to have undeniably helped him manipulate and control victims throughout his lieutenant, Isabella Pollok weve got you covered. 2023 Cinemaholic Inc. All rights reserved. Despite the hype about Ron DeSantis surging past Donald Trump, both Republicans look unusually strong at this early stage of the presidential race. Jamie Reeds shocking account of a clinic mistreating children went viral. to a single count of conspiracy in September. But he said that, but for Pollok, this scheme would not have succeeded the way that it did.. Pollok's lawyers wrote a letter to the case's judge where they said that she was also a victim of Ray's "cult." It has been said that she could face up to five years in jail as well as a fine of $250,000. Please remember that Isabellas role in Larrys crimes, and her willingness to play that role, were not the consequences but the goal of the way in which he abused her.. Shellow disagreed, calling her client Rays fungible and convenient tool. And a linguist named Emily M. Bender is very worried what will happen when we forget this. The former VP has an extremely narrow path to viability in 2024. This follows Isabella's original charges of racketeering, extortion, and sex trafficking conspiracies. Nowhere is the lab-leak debate more personal than among the experts investigating the origins of COVID. Pollok told Judge Lewis Liman that as part of the conspiracy, she took part in financial transactions generated by illegal activity in the hopes of hiding the source and ownership of the cash. Victim and accomplice. Larry Ray has been held in a Brooklyn jail since his arrest. Thats very different from saying, I will.'. Pollok, 31, who graduated from the Westchester County school where Ray met most of his victims, faced up to five years in prison. And now there is the Isabella who is before Your Honor prepared to be sentenced. "The Government does not dispute that the defendant also suffered at Ray's hands," prosecutors said in a separate letter to a federal judge. Or to keep it anonymous, click here. The three-part series, premiering on February 9, gives Ray's victims a platform to speak out about Ray's decade of abuse. He began to counsel Isabella Pollok, Talia's best friend and, now, a co-defendant in the case. It also includes interviews with family members and others involved in the case. Attending Sarah Lawrence was my way of trying to run away from traumas that I experienced in my childhood.. Totally his fault., Isabella Pollok leaving a NYC courthouse with her attorney. This story has been shared 135,794 times. Larry Ray promised answers, peddling a credo of sexual liberation and the quest for potential. He also dazzled his young acolytes through his elaborate backstory boasting of connections to elite figures in politics, the U.S. military, and the intelligence community. Prosecutors had previously painted Pollok as someone who held a "privileged position within the Ray Family, acting as Ray's lieutenant, with respect to his extortionate demands for financial payments, physical labor, and prostitution, and in laundering the criminal proceeds of extortion and sex trafficking through bank accounts and GoDaddy," per. A recording of the night of terror was played to the jury at Rays trial. After all, shed not just lived with Larry in several areas around New York, New Jersey, and North Carolina but had also assisted him in his schemes of sexual and psychological abuse. Pollok exercised agency, Keenan argued. It took my breath away, and I had a connection to Sarah Lawrence that made it that much more difficult because my sister graduated from Sarah Lawrence and I spent a year there.. She sounded a similar note to U.S. District Judge Lewis Liman, who will sentence her on Feb. 22. Ray turned a guru for the young students and soon persuaded them to believe they had committed crimes against them. As of February 2023, she hasn't been sentenced, but she did write a letter to the judge in which she stated that she, too, is a victim of conman Larry Ray. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google, Biden Chooses Crime Messaging Over D.C. Home Rule. MANHATTAN, NEWYORK CITY: Isabella Pollok, an ex-student of Sarah Lawrence College has admitted to aiding the father of a former classmate in laundering funds earned from extortion and pimping out young women he met after moving into their college dorm. Liman worried about what effect a non-jail sentence would send. That night, at the Gregory Hotel in Manhattan in October 2018, Ray ordered Drury to strip naked, tied her to a chair, put a bag over her head, choked her with a leash, smothered her with a pillow, and poured water over her, according to her testimony. Isabella Pollok, the former best friend of daughter Talia Ray, was a young student when Larry Ray started living in her communal dorm Slonim Woods 9 and sleeping in her room. He is twice her age, Cynthia told The Daily Beast in September 2022. He began having "therapy" sessions with individuals in order to learn intimate details about them. His reporting on the trial of Ghislaine Maxwell was featured on the Starz and Channel 4 documentary "Who Is Ghislaine Maxwell?" "Witness interviews and evidence recovered during the investigation show parallels between the defendant's experience and that of the victims in this case.". His co-counsel Jill R. Shellow struck a similar note. And tell him that no matter what happens or doesnt happen, in no way am I straying from the truth.. He mentally and physically tortured the group of young people for nearly a decade and extorted huge sums of money from them, prosecutors showed at his Manhattan federal trial. Parents and patients are now refuting her key claims. [Larry's] hold over me changed who I was and it continues to be a healing process. Both Pollok and her mother maintain the student was one of Rays many victims through manipulation. Daughter Talia Ray had introduced Pollok and her other roommates to him after his release from prison on unrelated child custody charges. Right-wing board to clamp down on woke ideology in cartoons. Ray also made Felicia Rosario whom he didnt marry but called his wife another lover, and routinely blurred sexual boundaries with his followers. Check out never-before-seen content, free digital evidence kits, and much more! Lawrences hold over me changed who I was and it continues to be a healing process. Cynthia Pollok hasn't seen her daughter Isabella in a decade. Sign up forOxygen Insiderfor all the best true crime content. "While collecting money from her abused and trafficked college friends, the defendant was spending luxurious nights at the Pierre Hotel on the Upper East Side and buying expensive clothing, beauty products and high-end lingerie," prosecutors also wrote. It took a lot more investigative digging as well as interviews with real victims before she was charged with racketeering conspiracy, extortion conspiracy, sex trafficking conspiracy, and money laundering. Isabella Pollok must report to prison by April 25 to begin serving a 4 1/2-year sentence that U.S. District Judge Lewis J. Liman said resulted from her failure to rebel against Lawrence Ray's . Drury testified that they ate burgers and fries from the nearby Starlight Diner, but left her hungry. A U.S. District Court judge handed down the sentence to. Just about anyone who read our 2019 cover story, or followed coverage of Rays trial, or watched Stolen Youth, the new Hulu documentary in which Pollok participated, could see that Pollok was utterly brainwashed by Ray. But she was no less a victim.. Then, in August of last year, she agreed to a plea deal. Lawrence Ray, 59, who goes by Larry, is a well-known New York scammer who has strong ties to disgraced former NYPD commissioner Bernie Kerik. Titled "The Stolen Kids of Sarah Lawrence," the piece exposed how then-50-year-old Lawrence Ray, the father of a Sarah Lawrence student, moved into his daughter's dorm and slowly isolated four of her friends: Daniel Levin, Santos Rosario, Isabella Pollok, and Claudia Drury. Pollok now faces a maximum five-year sentence and a maximum fine of $250,000, or twice the financial gain of her conspiracy. Ray forced Drury to strip naked, handcuffed her to a chair and positioned her near a blasting air conditioner in the room at the Gregory Hotel in Midtown. Fox News Is Reportedly Shadowbanning Donald Trump. Plays Incompetent Willy Wonka at CPAC. Everyone Practices Cancel Culture | Opinion, Deplatforming Free Speech is Dangerous | Opinion. Kate Bedingfield, Bidens Translator, Leaves the White House. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google The sadistic fiend forced one woman, Claudia Drury, into prostitution and collected some $2.5 million from her over four years. Larry Ray was sentenced to 60 years in prison for sex trafficking and other crimes involving his daughter and friends. Polloks defense attorneys described a young college sophomore with a turbulent home life when Ray, then the 54-year-old father of Polloks roommate and best friend, moved into her dorm room and went to work on his awed protg.. I did what they said I did.. She had been estranged from her family and soon became one of the elder Ray's most eager acolytes. Santos Rosario testified that Ray ordered Drury to perform oral sex on him. Your crime was an extremely serious one, Judge Lewis Liman told Pollock before handing down the 54-month sentence in Manhattan federal court. , 31, in a Manhattan federal courtroom on Thursday afternoon. The former Sarah Lawrence College student pleaded guilty to a single count of conspiracy in September. She had problems that he could help her talk through. Another Sarah Lawrence student, Felicia Rosario, was also allegedly romantically involved with Ray. According to prosecutors, Polloks phone contained folders for each of Rays victims containing compromising material that could be used against them if they strayed from Ray. The prosecutor pointed to the dozens of cash pickups Pollok made from Drury while she was living in hotel rooms and sleeping with men for money. As originals that live up to their title from every conceivable angle, Peacocks Sex, Lies, and the College Cult and Hulus Stolen Youth can only be described as equal parts haunting as well as riveting. But she was no less a victim.. While it is certainly true that the defendant was unlikely to have instigated the abuse that was inflicted on the victims, she was a willing accomplice for years. Im now asking for a second chance.. Terms of Service apply. Ray then became her lover and convinced her of the need to explore her sexuality, the defense attorneys wrote. His techniques, well established tools of coercive control, easily bonded Isabella to him. Although Isabella will likely face jail time for her crimes, many people are wondering why Cynthia and Isabellas other family members didnt intervene from the beginning. Isabella Pollok was sentenced to four years in prison for. I trusted Lawrence more than I trusted myself and in doing so, I betrayed my own sense of right and wrong, she wrote. Isabella Pollok, a former Sarah Lawrence College student who fell under the influence of sex cult leader Larry Ray was sentenced to more than four years in prison Wednesday for conspiring. Sarah Lawrence College student, Isabella Pollok, admitted to collaborating with convicted criminal Larry Ray during his 10 years of heinous crimes, so what sentence does she face now? She had faced a possible maximum of five years in prison, according to a plea agreement. Isabella Pollok's stand has come days before she will be sentenced on February 22 after she pleaded guilty to a single count of conspiracy. . A co-conspirator of cult sex trafficker Larry Ray has been sentenced to 54 months in federal prison. She fetched a plastic bag for Ray to torture Drury, and a sex toy to aid in the public humiliation of another former roommate. Interestingly, Cynthia also shared that she had been planning to see her daughter, whom she hasnt seen in over a decade. It runs through Iowa following the course set by Huckabee, Santorum, and Cruz. Larry Ray, the master manipulator at the center of New York Magazine's story "The Stolen Kids of Sarah . A former Sarah Lawrence College student who fell under the control of convicted predator Larry Ray admitted on Wednesday to conspiring to launder money made from his sex-trafficking scheme. Polloks account mirrors that of Rays victims like Drury, Daniel Levin, Santos Rosario, and his siblings Felicia and Yalitza Rosario. It wasnt until witnessing this that I began to accept just how susceptible I was to being manipulated, she wrote. United States Attorney for the Southern District of New York, Geoffrey Berman announces the indictment against Lawrence Ray aka "Lawrence Grecco" on February 11, 2020 in New York City. Im her mother, I love her. I will live with the guilt forever., Unlike Ray, who had no family or friends in the courtroom gallery when his sentence was read, Polloks boyfriend sat a few rows behind her, as did her brother and aunt, who both flew in from Texas. Assistant US Attorney Mollie Bracewell told Liman that prosecutors would have introduced a host of evidence if the case had gone to trial, including witness testimony and financial records, including ledgers that were recovered from Pollok. It involved extreme and sadistic violence and it was sophisticated, Liman added. I will live with the guilt forever I am ashamed. A federal judge has found sufficient evidence to name Sarah Lawrence 'cult leader' Larry Ray's daughter, Talia, as a co-conspirator along with his so-called lieutenant and co-accused Isabella . Isabella Pollok, the former best friend of daughter Talia Ray, was a young student when Larry Ray started living in her communal dorm Slonim Woods 9 and sleeping in her room. In the hearing, the Sarah Lawrence student admitted she knew her activities were wrong, which included recording the abuse Ray inflicted on Claudia Drury in the fall of 2018. It was also stated in the documents that Ray had "tied his victim to a chair, placed a plastic bag over her head, and nearly suffocated her.". Isabella Pollok, 31, pleaded guilty in Manhattan federal court to a single money laundering conspiracy count, specifically related to proceeds of Ray's sick plot to traffic and extort a group. She had been estranged from her family and soon became one of the elder Rays most eager acolytes. So, where is she now, and what sentence does she face? Stolen Youth: Inside the Cult at Sarah Lawrence is out on Hulu now. This story has been shared 135,794 times. After the jury found Murdaugh guilty of murdering his wife and son, he was given two consecutive life sentences. I am not the same person who met [Larry] Ray over 10 years ago. 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc. All Rights Reserved, who fell under the control of convicted predator Larry Ray, Sarah Lawrence sex cult leader Larry Rays top lieutenant sentenced to 54 months, Sarah Lawrence sex cult leader sentenced to 60 years in prison, Sarah Lawrence sex cult fiend to face sentencing today, Jury finds Larry Ray guilty on all counts in Sarah Lawrence sex cult trial. Isabella Pollok, 'Trusted Lieutenant' in Sarah Lawrence Sex Cult, Sentenced to 4.5 Years in Prison The fellow victim of Larry Ray's psychotic cult, who helped him abused other students, will serve . Nearby, Felicia and Yalitza Rosario, two of Rays victims, watched quietly. It was in that institution, some 15 miles north of midtown Manhattan, that Pollok had met Larry Ray as a college sophomore in the autumn of 2010. Ray, who was sentenced to 60 years in prison in January, was introduced to his victims after moving into his daughters on-campus dorm at Sarah Lawrence College in 2010. Each of these pickups reflects initiative, Keenan told Liman, adding that Ray and Pollok blew the cash on day-to-day expenses, as well as on pricey restaurants, hotel rooms and shopping sprees at Bergdorf Goodman. They complied. NXIVM gets punked on the H3H3 podcast and Isabella Pollok gets sentenced for her part in Sarah Lawrence College cult leader Larry Ray's crimes. Pollok faces a maximum of five years in prison and she will be sentenced on February 22. A co-conspirator of "cult" sex trafficker Larry Ray has been sentenced to 54 months in federal prison. He is the host of Law&Crime podcast "Objections: with Adam Klasfeld.". Larry Ray accused of leading sex cult at Sarah Lawrence College, Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in, Please refresh your browser to be logged in, A students father moved into a Sarah Lawrence dorm and started a cult. Born Lawrence Grecco, the former US Air Force troop moved into his daughter, Talias, college dorm in 2010. Moreover, according to the last reports (2020), Talia was a paralegal at the Southern Coalition for Social Justice in Durham a post she could still hold today. Pollok wrote: "I trusted Lawrence more than I trusted myself and in doing so, I betrayed my own sense of right and wrong.". I already bought the tickets a month ago, and they sprang this on me yesterday, Cynthia told the outlet. 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It was up to Judge Lewis Liman to decide how much her psychological duress contributed to her participation in sadistic crimes. It was back in the fall of 2010 when 19-year-old Isabella first came across 50-year-old Larry as her best friend and roommate Talia Ray's father, only for their bond to soon evolve into much more. Legal documents show that Larry Ray, daughter Talia, Isabella and others were still living together in 2017. With Larry Ray's Arrest, Families of His Alleged Victims Breathe Sigh of Relief. The 4-Day Week Is for White-collar Workers. Pollok must report to federal prison in 60 days, a spokesperson for the U.S. Attorneys Office for the Southern District of New York confirmed with Oxygen.com on Friday.