Woman Pleads Guilty in Sex Abuse
By Chau Lam, Staff Writer
Originally published in Newsday, November 21, 2001
A Farmingdale woman who along with her former boyfriend was charged in the kidnapping and rape of an underage Massachusetts girl they met on the Internet has pleaded guilty to sexual abuse and sodomy, and has agreed to testify against him.
Beth Loschin, 46, admitted in court that on several occasions in August she sexually abused the 15-year-old girl as James Warren, of Hampton Bays, allegedly restrained the girl.
Loschin said she believed Warren, 41, when he assured her the girl was an adult. "I was lied to and I unwittingly did it," Loschin said in court yesterday.
Loschin pleaded guilty to first-degree sexual abuse and third-degree sodomy before State Supreme Court Justice Ira Wexner. In exchange, Nassau prosecutors dropped all other charges against Loschin and recommended she serve 4 years in prison.
Loschin, who is free on $165,000 bond, is to surrender to the court on Nov. 30, when Wexner would set a sentencing date. She declined to comment yesterday as her attorney, Michael Fishman, escorted her to a van.
Warren, who is charged with kidnapping, sexual abuse, six counts of rape and 10 counts of sodomy, is being held without bail at the Nassau County jail in East Meadow. Prosecutors are to present his case to a grand jury by early next week.
Assistant District Attorney Gregg Turkin and attorneys in the case said Warren and Loschin met the girl in an Internet chat room that catered to people interested in sadomasochism. The identity of the girl is being withheld because she is the victim of a sex crime.
On Aug. 3, Warren and Loschin drove to Wrentham, Mass., a summer resort town outside Boston, and met the girl at a mall, where prosecutors said she worked as a cashier in a candy store. The couple drove the girl to a motel in Rhode Island where they allegedly sexually abused her before taking her to Loschin's home at 103 Lockwood Ave., where she lives with her mother and children.
Four days later, prosecutors said the couple drove the girl to Michael Montez's apartment at 25-91 38th St. in Astoria, where he admitted holding her hostage and raping her.
Montez, 35, who pleaded guilty to first-degree rape, was sentenced Monday to 9 years in prison.
"A 15-year-old can't give consent to this type of activity," Turkin said yesterday.
The girl's parents reported her missing to Wrentham police when she failed to return home Aug. 3. Her parents and police attempted to reach the girl on her cellular phone and through the Internet. Authorities received responses to their e-mails, but Turkin declined yesterday to discuss what the messages said.
Then on Aug. 10 the girl used her cellular phone and called Wrentham police for help and told them she did not know where she was, Turkin said. Following their instructions, the girl found a package with Loschin's address on it, and Nassau police were alerted. They went to Loschin's house where they found the girl.
"She had bruises on her body, breasts and neck and her eyes were totally red," Turkin said outside court yesterday. "She had been choked."
