interesting reading

Doc Bonn Explains: The Difference Between a Sociopath and a Psychopath

"Psychopaths, on the other hand, often have charming and disarming personalities.  They are manipulative and can easily gain people’s trust. They learn to mimic emotions, despite their inability to actually feel them, and will appear normal to other unsuspecting people. Psychopaths are often educated and hold steady jobs. Some are so good at manipulation and mimicry that they have families and other long-term relationships without those around them ever suspecting their true nature.  An example of such an individual is the serial killer Dennis Rader (“Bind, Torture, Kill”) who had a family, career, civic life and avoided detection for 30 years."

and this:

"It is also appears that the etiology of psychopathy and sociopathy is quite different.  It is likely that psychopathy is the result of “nature” (genetics) while sociopathy is the result of “nurture” (environment).  According to the late David Lykken, a behavioral geneticist known for his studies on twins, psychopathy is related to a physiological defect that results in the underdevelopment of the part of the brain responsible for impulse control and emotions. Sociopathy, on the other hand, is more the product of childhood traumas and abuse."

The full article:
http://docbonn.wordpress.com/2012/03/28/doc-bonn-explains-the-difference-between-a-sociopath-and-a-psychopath/

well, that was fast

News of Janet Hopper's ignoble life must be rushing like wildfire (heh) through the class of 1970. Should make for an interesting high school reunion next go-round!

J. Sterling Morton East High School. Class of '70. I guess it was the companion school to John's. How sickeningly cute is that? Almost like the boy next door scenario. So cute I could throw up.

And, no, nothing about success as a serial liar, but dig her specialties in HS: Art, modern dance, newspaper, library, Russian club, debate club, quill & scroll, and my favorite, forensics, where good ol' Janet placed third for original monologue.

I must get my hands on this yearbook, to flip through this and see the photos will be very interesting indeed.

But for now, let me break down the interests in high school which have featured so largely in her warped backstories for imaginary people and helped her hone her emotional succubus talents.

Art: it's undoubtedly how she's gotten in the door for many of these relationships. I'm sure her knowledge of art helped her form a bond with the ex-Mrs Fogelberg. Modern dance, oh my god, as the "Jesse" persona, she would never SHUT UP about dancing. Russian, another thing she wove into her story. Her mother was apparently Franco-Russian and never could lose her accent, kind of the way Janna could never lose her Fauxstralian/Brit accent. I'd pay good cash money for someone who had video of Janna speaking in her native Chicago accent.

But it's all the writing clubs she belonged to, especially the award for original monologue, that really crack my shit up. Oy, if they only knew then how original her monologue would get. Although it's not terribly original, I suppose - like Judith Krantz, it's the same old shit thrown in the blender and arranged slightly differently on the page for each scam. I'd love to know what her monologue was about. Perhaps I should see if anyone else in the forensics club can recall it.

And debate club?! Suddenly the reason why she's so fucking good at covering her ass, it all comes to light. She trained to be able to argue any point, whether or not she believed it.

Honestly, I'm surprised she wasn't part of an Irish or French club. I guess those obsessions came later.

More soon, I hope, with photos.

a little bit about me

I'm a storyteller. Not as in a writer, although when I was little, I always assumed I'd be a writer when I grew up. I admired them, I always did. Still do. I also assumed I'd marry Jack Lemmon someday, and we can see how well that turned out.

But I've always told stories. Not lies to others, but stories in my head, to myself. I'd see a worm in the rain, and he'd have a name (Fred, after the father I never met who wasn't my father) and a backstory (he was braving the elements to bring back provisions for the wife and little worms but he really wanted to work at a big company like CC Baxter) within a minute.  I make up stories for everything - animal, vegetable and mineral. Is it any wonder that Hans Christian Andersen was my read of choice as a child? Still is, did you know I visited his house in Odense? No, you didn't, because you don't know anything about me.

I become immersed in good art the same way. I can see what the artist had in mind, I'm inside that hot, dusty room, hearing the dull sound of the tools in Caillebotte's The Floor Scrapers. I can smell the tang of the suddenly exposed wood. And the sweat.

Good movies and television can also wreck my head, because I embellish - I finish the filmmaker's sentences. I see where they're going, or maybe it's just where I'm going. I started weeping during the first five minutes of Amelie because the way Jeunet writes the beginning, telling people's life stories in less than a minute, that's the way I think most of the time.

In my face-to-face dealings, say a job interview or even just meeting someone new, I still go through dozens of different scenarios in my head, working out the different ways a conversation might go, to prepare myself for any eventuality. I analyze everything, and most of the time I believe in Occam's Razor: the simpler answer is often correct.

This works evidently in my disfavor also, in the case of "Jesse Jubilee James." The TV show Deadwood sucked me in, the density of the story, and how beautifully it was shot and acted. I wanted to talk about it with others. And then I met "Jesse." Who had a story, quite a strange one, but I've known real people with stranger stories. And stranger names. (No llamas, though.)

Why am I a storyteller? What made me like this? Who knows? I'm an only child - lots of only children have to spend a lot of time entertaining themselves. I had bad shit happen to me as a child, lots of upheaval, maybe that's one of the ways I dealt with it, and now it's just a part of who I am. My therapist says I have excellent coping tools, perhaps because they never stay in the shed long enough to rust.

Don't get me wrong, I have a great life, an awesome life. I'm not a sad sack who generally sits around moping about what Janna did to me. I deal with the aftershocks of Janna the way I dealt with the aftershocks of the rest of my life. The difference with Janna is that most of the other bad shit was accidental or exceedingly brief. They were short sharp shocks.

What Janna did to me was intentional and orchestrated to hurt me, over a long period of time when she was aware I was fragile. Who invents a purported love of someone's life and then has them DIE? Janna could have closed up shop anytime she wanted. All I had for "Jesse" was a cellphone number and PO Box address. She could have disappeared at any time, or said "hey, y'know, I found a nice local girl to date." I would have chalked it up to disinterest and forgotten about it. But she milked this, she fed off my grief with the personas of more than a dozen people. She watched me get sick and, impersonating "Jesse's" doctor friend, diagnosed me. (don't worry, it was a weekend when I couldn't see my regular doctor, and I did see him right away that Monday, I'm not that stupid). She could have not given me an address, or accepted any of the gifts I sent, or at the very least, not encouraged me.

It's the malice aforethought I have problems with. I was on that message board for a year before Janna showed up. She watched me, she learned things about me, and then she struck.

And yes, perhaps Janna and I are two sides of the same coin, perhaps that's how I fell for her scam - by being the kind of person who fills in the blanks, and for trusting that since every other individual I'd actually met in person from this message board had proved to be real, that "Jesse" would be too. And because, who does that? The other women that Janna scammed, I think they're all storytellers too. I think she chooses us for that reason. It makes her job easier.

Janna's a storyteller, too, but she uses her talent to take things from others under false pretenses. Doesn't that deserve punishment?

I've tried to be patient here, I really have. I've answered many questions over the past several weeks. Because it doesn't seem to be letting up and I'd like to continue to remain a non-sad sack, I'm going to step away from this for a bit. Rest assured, I'll be back at some point, and I'll try to answer your questions in a civil manner.

If something interesting happens with the case, I'll update, of course.

a little bit about Janna

Because this does bug me  a bit, I'd like to clear something up that one of the LJ people has assumed. Some folks didn't like that I mentioned Janna's weight here. But what you all need to understand about Janna is that nobody hated on fat people more than Janna St James. As her alter egos, "Bean" and "Alice" amongst them, she would say hateful, scathing things about herself, all to do with her weight.

As some of her other alter egos, she'd talk about how beautiful and skinny and wonderful she was till those nasty Mexicans raped and nearly killed her in a cornfield. Janna would say to me as herself that she weighed 112 all her life until that rape, and she gained all that weight because she was in a hospital bed recovering from many plastic surgeries and operations and now she only had a single lung so it was hard for her to exercise blah blah blah.

Janna told me that she tried Weight Watchers, but they didn't like her because she wasn't born a fatty, that she had no respect for them because they were fat by choice and not by misadventure like she was. Not once did I care about Janna's weight, although I was sympathetic that she was upset about it. When I met her, I confess I was a little taken aback at her size, but only because I was trying to work out in my head how someone could go from 112 to 250 over a ten year period, especially when several of those years was spent eating hospital food, and some of that time her jaw had been reconstructed and she could only have liquid nutrition.

Of course, when I found out that all of her backstory was a lie, there was never a rape, never any sort of hospital convalescence, and she was obese for her entire adult life, I realized that she was completely obsessed with her own weight. Yes, my comment was mean, it was meant to be, but please understand it was meant to tweak her because of this history.

I can't speak for Josh's motivations in taking that angle, since he has never discussed his article with me at any length whatsoever. But for the record, yes, he is kind of an asshole, and everything is about him.

needs moar llamas*

Okay. I have to say, over the past however-many-years it's been (six, did I mention?) probably my favorite reaction to this entire awful debacle, and one that pulls me out of the funk I find myself in when I've been reading lots of holier-than-thou comments from people who think they're smarter than me, is the exercise in  FTW-ness that is Fandom Wank.

The sheer delight that these (what do I call you? "Wankers" just seems so wrong!) people take in the utterly ludicrous aspects of this story (and believe me, I'm fully aware of how much ludicrousness there is) is hysterical beyond belief. There's no anger, no judging, no finding lulz in how Janna pwned me. Just seeing the ridiculousness and rolling in it. They've just gone full throttle with the llamas. It's awesome. And just what I needed tonight. You have no idea. So, thanks, FW-ers.

P.S. Never mind John Fogerty, how can we set Harlan Ellison up with a bunch of llamas?

*via xturtle

Brrrrr.

Thanks to, uh, Anonymous.  Happy Thanksgiving!

it ain't over till the fat lady tweets

Janna -

You are a creative typist as opposed to a writer because you use the same situations, the same stories, the same bullshit, over and over. So, get it: the first Judith Krantz book might elicit an emotional response from a novice reader, but upon reading successive books, it becomes quite clear that her talents are VERY limited. Self-plagiarization taken to extremes, formulaic twaddle, and the boldness to make the story incredibly outlandish and convoluted.

So yeah, you may have a hook, but you're a hack. The Brian De Palma of con artists.

(and since you know how much cinema means to me, you know that's a fuckin' insult)

I know you write for you. I'm sure you get off on every person that responds "oh, your story touched my heart and made me cry."

Next time you're in "mixed company," why don't you try this one out: "I'm a sad, fat, twisted old lady with limited talents and an unhealthy obsession with child molestation, who spends her time in internet chatrooms pretending I'm a woman and/or man with a dead son and/or boyfriend." Let's see who laughs at that, especially if Barbara, David, Bill, Marie, Jan, Jenny, Jessica and Dan are in the room.

and another thing

...you wanna get into this, Janna?

Lookit what folks stumbled upon.



Second one down. Four days before you posted the exact same thing on your own Twitter account. Don't bother deleting it, it's already been saved for posterity. Duh.

You wanna know what else folks found? You wanna see more?



If not, then G.O. A.W.A.Y. You lost this one.

P.S. Congratulations on the uni-chin, if you're not lying about that too. What're you down to now, have you hit the 200 lb mark yet? And clearly whatever ails you ain't keeping you from using Twitter an awful lot to make a half-assed attempt to defend yourself, so duping people on the Johnny Weir board and Twitter and Facebook with your sad sack story is just child's play to you (just cut and paste and change the name from Dan to Jesse to Denali). And you're still making/selling your art glass trinkets on Etsy, as ArchipelagoArts and janarchy, hell, you're even entering contests on blogs for people to win your fucking trinkets, so, you can't be that blind.

You're losing it, chica. Call a waaaaahmbulance.

P.S. When you talk about "your" tweets, you might want to double check that it was "Janet Wilder" and not the REAL you who said something before you assert that the real you would never say that. The Christopher Walken comment, f'rinstance. QED. You can't even keep your selves straight. Dipshit.

P.P.S. The point of you pretending to be someone else is that "they" can do things that you cannot. Like just about anything, so of course all the things they say they do you cannot do. Bein' my point.

P.P.P.S. Didn't even realize you had a Twitter account in your real name till just an hour ago, though. It probably only popped up on Google search now because you're posting like fuck.

Addendum

So, this has brought some people out of the woodwork, and I'm happy about that, and some conversations have brought up some extra stuff.

1. I think we need a name, all us people who were conned by Janet Wilder -- sorry -- Janna Hopper St. James Saint James Priggie. Nothing with her name in it, nor anything to do with Irish llama musicians. I was thinking that we're sort of shaping up as the Moriarty to Janna's Schlock Homes, so maybe that.

2. From my conversations with, you know, us up there, the Moriartys, a constant of Janna's big bamboozle is to store up every personal revelation from her target for future ammunition to embarrass and belittle and demean them. She's like a fucking elephant. And it doesn't matter how many years have gone by, she'll drag out that drunken admission by you that you used to think Don Johnson was hot, that you sing Celine Dion songs in the shower, or that you wouldn't kick John Boehner out of bed. But it's funny what pops up about Janna when we converse. So, Janna, you'd better chill, or I might divulge some stuff you don't want people to know about you, your family and the few women that you've managed to keep as your friends all these years, as well as what you really think of them.

And think on this, too: I'm smarter than you. I know stuff about you you don't know I know. Picture a couple dozen angry women who are also smarter than you. I'll give credit where credit is due - you know how to pick 'em, you've got good taste in dupes. I like every single person whose path you crossed, they're intellectuals, and funny! But mostly smart. And happy to contribute to the cause of making it as difficult for you to do this to anyone else again.

So next time you're talking to someone online, when you're sizing them up to see if you can work your sick magic on them, you'd better ask yourself: does this person already know who I am? Because, we might, "janarchy" - kiss kiss.

3. One of the people who reached out to me here was a woman who was a Deadwood board lurker, who'd been following "Jesse's" blog. She contacted me after his "death" from "liver cancer," because she had been fighting her own constant battle with cancer herself. Her name was Kelly, and she gave me the link to her blog. We chatted a bit, and became friendly, keeping in touch every month or so. After the Janna debacle, because I was damaged and paranoid, I found it difficult to trust Kelly, but I'd pop in now and again to read her posts and to comment, but forced myself to be detached. She understood. Well, she's dead now. For realz. Her family posted after and like a normal dead person, there were actual obituaries and a place to send notes and flowers. It's sad that I blew what could have been a good friendship with a funny woman who looked her illness in the eye and managed to still see joy and beauty in the world. And I'm sorry she's gone.

remarkable, isn't it?

So, here's a few little tidbits from twenty-six-plus years ago. Back when Janna was simply Jann Saint James and even had the letterhead to prove it. But I'm getting ahead of myself.

This is an alleged letter from Tommy Shaw. We all know it's not. Even Janna knows. The person that Janna pulled the Styx scam on, well, that went so far as for Janna to actually procure a Siberian Husky pup from somewhere, and pretended that Tommy gave it away to her.





Note how even here, a quarter of a century ago, Janna was still making digs about her own weight through other personas. And "Tommy" calls her Janny. Ain't that sweet.

Now, here's a letter that I actually love. A tandem effort by darlin' Janny and "Tommy" talking about their impending wedding. I'm including the envelope so you can all see the date of the postmark, and the location. Even then, Janna was mailing shit from places she didn't live.












It's funny how her own handwriting is so elaborately girly, to detract from the other guy-like handwriting she uses when she's pretending to be a guy. "Tommy" had the same kind of fractured psyche that "Jesse" did. And the same handwriting. To keep you from having to do the fishing, here are some links.

HANDWRITING 1

HANDWRITING 2

I mean, really, there's no doubt here, is there? Or perhaps it's just a really big coinkydink. My ass.

And when Janna -- sorry -- JannY's target had finally become frustrated and suspicious that Janny had been lying, about some things at least, and got herself into a decent relationship with a real fella, Janna shot off this little guilt-inducing missive. She's so goddamned good at it, even more than half her life ago she was the queen of tweakitude.



Nice letterhead, huh?

There's more letters, way more, tons more, and quite a cast of characters, of course peripherally bolstering the validity of the person Janna was impersonating. Her MO.

Eventually, this person and a few other people JannY deceived spoke to her mother about this. So her mother has known about Janna's chronic lies for decades. This serial deceiver is surrounded by enablers - her mother Barbara, her daughter Jessica, her husband Bill, and all the other friends she has that know what she's doing and turn a blind eye to it.

Enablers at the very least, if not outright accomplices.

And considering the mad skillz she has in her skanky, rat-infested toolshed, the internet enhances them a thousandfold. Now, she doesn't even need to handwrite letters much; she can deceive dozens of people at a time, in less time. Thank Jebus for cut and paste!!!

It's sad for me to realize now that I will find it very difficult to trust strangers ever again. She really did take that away from me. I was hoping it would come back, but naw, it's gone for good. I know many of you will say that it's probably a good thing, but all the friends I do have, they were strangers once too. So I guess it's just good that I've got the friends I've got, because it's gonna be tough to get any more. Still, I've just gotta throw another "fuck you" out at her for this. Fuck you, Jan Jann Janny Janet Janna Hopper Saint James St. James Priggie, who is neither British nor Australian nor Russian nor French. Nor a man. Nor interesting.

Sigh.

...what really kills me...

It's been three years since my dog died. Which means three years since "Jesse" died. And nearly three since Janna St. James Priggie's scam was exposed. I should be clearer and point out that the scam she pulled on ME was exposed. The earlier scams, the one she pulled on the Fogelberg message board folks (not to mention what she did to Anastasia), and the ones she pulled even earlier than that, she was exposed by her victims, too. Luckily for her, though, up till she pwned me, her victims tried simple confrontation, involving various members of her family over the years, and exposure on a small scale, within their group. Clearly didn't work, wouldn't you say? Her entire immediate family knows what she does, has been doing, for decades now. Decades. I'll bet even my lawsuit hasn't made her put the bullshit brakes on.

This crazy lady has been doing this shit to people for AT LEAST THIRTY YEARS. Let that sink in a minute. Janna Saint James has been pretending to know/date people in bands since the birth of disco. What was happening three decades ago? The biggest band in the world was the fucking Bee Gees, and probably the biggest movie star was John Travolta. Ironically, Ted Bundy had finally been captured in Florida. It was Jimmy Carter's first year in the White House. The Sex Pistols were touring. Queen Noor of Jordan had just become Queen Noor of Jordan. Bebe Buell hadn't birthed Liv Tyler. Steve Perry hadn't even joined Journey yet, people! They were still doing nuclear testing in Nevada. Probably many of you reading this hadn't even been born at this point. The internet hadn't even been invented.

Point being, that was a long time ago. Long time. And for all I know, she's been doing it for even longer than that. If she was, I'm sure I'll be hearing from more victims eventually. She didn't need the internet to screw with people's heads - she used baldfaced lies face-to-face with people, forged letters, but the same basic underlying bullshit: mental illness, addictions, firemen, horses, blahdeblah. But the internet, well now, it's so much easier for Janna to pretend to be someone else, in fact, not only someone else, but someone elseS, many many people all at once, and to more than one targeted victim at a time. I'm also not stupid enough to think that she stopped after I popped her Jesse bubble, so no doubt there have been more after me, and although I wish it were otherwise, I'm sure I'll be hearing from them too, eventually.

So, for any browsers that are curious if the person they met online is real, google Munchausen's by Internet and see if that cancer-riddled, bipolar, abuse victim whose gentle soul always seems to rise above their life's challenges exhibits any of the listed traits. Do they flip out when you even vaguely suggest that they might not be everything they say they are? Do they put you on the defensive for even daring to think such a thing?

Look for the red flags, folks. Yes, that person might be the light of your life, you might eventually hook up in the real world, and you will be everything and more to each other. But that person also might be Janna Hopper St. James Saint James Priggie, an obese lunatic senior citizen who is a career emotional vampire who has found her ultimate weapon, the internet, and is wallowing in it like the depraved pig she is.

I think about my beloved dog, who, in the twilight of his years, was deprived of my attention because Janna played her headfuck with me. I will have to live with that guilt always, that I didn't give my pup that extra scritch because I was talking "Jesse" down from one of his many bipolar freakouts. It seems like a small thing, but it's not. I've talked about the squandering of time before, and I cannot stress enough: YOU WILL NOT GET THAT TIME BACK. EVER. So make sure it's worth it. At least make sure this person really truly exists. It may seem embarrassing to have to ask, but in this day and age, would you have sex with someone in the real world without seeing a current HIV test in the negative? Why give someone your valuable time, a chunk of your life, without some sort of hard proof that they really are who they say they are?

Oh, and I'm still doing fine. Thanks for asking.

wow

I don't know who all you folks are who're still reading this blog, but hey, I hope none of you are new victims of Janna's.

But still, I'm super-happy that I'm getting more hits on my business website than this blog here. For a while it wasn't that way.

I have been asked this, and I've worked it out a bit in therapy, so I want to put it here, by way of explanation as to why this blog exists. In my journey in learning about Janna's background, I have met other people she has done this to in the past. While I appreciated their assistance and their candor, I could also see how revisiting the dreadfulness that Janna's monstrous mendacity created made them relive it all over again. I felt enough of that while simply going through my receipts for taxes and coming across gifts I'd purchased for Janna et. al. last year.

So, in addition to really truly not wanting anyone else to go through what I've gone through these past few years, I also really truly do not want to get a phone call or email from someone in ten years' time, asking the question: "sorry to bother you, but I think I've been the victim of internet fraud by a woman called Janna Saint James Priggie." I would rather put all of this out there now and be done with it. I don't want to be thinking about Janna ten years down the road.

Get it? Got it? Good.

in a nutshell

Looking back over all of this, there's a lot to process, even for me, and I lived through it. So I'm streamlining. No point in keeping up entries where I rail about what a mean, manipulative person Janna is, or talk about how I feel about what she did to me, at least not every single one. It's self-evident. Anyone in their right mind can see it. Enough of you have read this blog, and my links to hers in her various incarnations.

So, I'm keeping the posts that have actual evidence, and I'm gonna summarize a bunch of the facts here. Keep it as concise as possible.

FACT #1
There is no "Jesse Jubilee James," or any of his "friends" and "family." We're still digging up facts, so you never know what'll turn up next.

FACT #2
I know Janna's jumbled Brit-stralian accent is 100% utter bullshit, as are her stories explaining how she came to speak that way. As are most of her stories.

FACT #3
Janna's family is well aware of her hijinks, and chooses to do nothing about it. It leaves me with little sympathy for them, for allowing Janna's sociopathic behavior to be unleashed on the unsuspecting.

FACT #4
I choose to not disclose my name here, because I am not the one who misrepresented myself in this whole hideous charade, and there are other people who are close to me who really do not need the exposure. Plus, I'm a little gunshy about disclosing anything too personal about myself in a public forum, unnerstand why? Janna Saint James insinuated herself into my life, my head, and my home. I'm still washing her off.

FACT #5
Janna actually has admitted, over and over, that she has lied to me. The dispute is the level of her deception. But whether Janna covered for someone else who allegedly exists, or whether she's just made the whole entire damn thing up, the fact still remains that she accepted gifts and money from me under false pretenses.

FACT #6
If everyone that Janna is "protecting" was so afraid of me that nobody could bear to divulge a single true fact about themselves to me over a year and half, how is it that Janna St. James still felt so secure that she would take a vacation with me, or travel halfway across the country to position herself in my home? And why would she? And what gave her the right, as someone who had lied to me for twenty months?

FACT #7
I have offered, twice, to put this entire debacle to rest by having an impartial third party whose expenses I would pay in full, depose Janna and "Jesse's" people, and offer up an affidavit stating that there is enough evidence to prove that "Jesse" once existed (without disclosing any identities), and that Janna's stories about herself and others are not lies. She chose to ignore that offer, and has maintained over the past seven months that I am attacking her groundlessly, even though it would take far less time for her to set the issue straight in a legal manner.

FACT #8
Janna's first husband John didn't die at his own hand, or of cancer, back in 1989 and leave her with a tiny Jessica to raise. The photos of "Jesse" are all of John, and I don't blame him for leaving her, not one bit. But he didn't have to die to do it.

FACT #9
Janna St James is NOT a nice woman. At least I acknowledge my vindictiveness. Hers makes mine pale by comparison, though, you betcha. She also isn't missing any lungs, nor has she had reconstructive surgery for the rape/beating she never received

FACT #10
Janna was never best friends with Annie Martel, John Denver's ex-wife, nor was Annie "Jesse's" therapist. Janna perpetuated fraud for years with people on a Dan Fogelberg message board, as well as in Pagosa Springs, Colorado, where she lived for a time, and she spent enough time around Dan Fogelberg's ranch (and llamas) to take photos and use them a decade or so down the line as pictures of "Jesse's" home.

FACT #11
People lie. They do it all the time. I don't know anyone who doesn't lie. It's the scope and breadth of Janna St. James Priggie's lies that make her so, um, special.

is there a graphologist in the house?

I've scanned a few notes I got from Janna and her various Jannafestations. Any input would be appreciated, either through comments or via the email address I set up for this purpose, on my profile page. I reserve the right to publish on this blog any emails I receive at this address, so anonymous threateners, watch your ass.

First we have a letter from "Jesse," as a handwriting sample, but also another example of just how far Janna will go. This was a letter she showed to me when we were at "Jesse's" favorite spa in New Mexico, celebrating his birthday together. She told me that "Jesse's" business managers/lawyers sent her the letter after "Jesse's" death. She said I should keep it. Click on the pages to biggify.

And yeah, that's right, apparently there's "Jesse" semen somewhere, for potential impregnation of his ex-wife "Krista." And if we're to take Janna's and "Alice's" allegations post confrontation that every single person involved with "Jesse" fabricated names, professions, locations and fuck knows what else, how amazing is it that "Jesse" chose to perpetuate the charade of using his made-up name and the made-up names of his therapist, ex-wife, sister and son, even when he's nearing death and leaving a confidential letter with his lawyers to give to his most excellent best friend who he loves more than anything. Go figure.


Next up, a couple of notes from "Cakey" - one that was sent to me very early on, probably in August/September 2005, along with a couple of things that "Jesse" sent me.

This next one came to me via Janna when I was in Chicago for a few hours, in October 2006. We went to a restaurant and she gave me a little package from "Cakey" - a hat, some rocks from the ranch, and this postcard.

This is the first time I've looked at these since I put them in the box with the rest of my "Jesse" memorabilia. It doesn't look like the same handwriting at all, does it? I'm inclined to think that Janna either forgot about the first note, or didn't think I was weirdly sentimental enough to save it.


Now we have a drawing from "Rhys," 6-year-old son of "Jesse."

This was allegedly done in "Annie Martel's" office while "Jesse" was waiting for his therapy appointment with "Rhys." "Rhys" was apparently disgruntled that he had limited art supplies to work with. He called me the "land mermaid."


A postcard sent to me from "Aidan Blaine," "Jesse's" Irish half-brother, son of "Davian."

This was sent to me after Janna was found out and ousted from my home. I don't know if she was still trying to cast doubt on my friends' discoveries, or if she was just fucking with me, or what. I do know that she could have called someone in Australia and asked them to send it for her, the message is so fucking oblique it could mean anything, and means absolutely nothing. Sorry for what loss? The loss of "Jesse" or my dog seven months earlier? The loss of Janna's friendship? Means nothing.


I received this box in early April 2007, Janna still trying to do I'm not sure what.

The customs label is in what one would assume is "Krista's" handwriting. The signature, illegible. In the box was the quilt I'd bought "Rhys" for his fifth birthday in 2005, as well as the Mozart toy I got him. I reckon it's either a "fuck you" from Janna, or her still persisting in pretending all these people existed and "Rhys" just couldn't bear to possess anything given to him by someone as horrid as me.

Here's the return label.

The address? It's a mall. I knew "Krista" was loaded, but didn't know her family owned White Plains mall. Wowee.


A thank-you card from "Janna" and her family from January 2007, for the Christmas gifts I gave them.



And last, but not least, a handwritten note from Janna that she left me when we were at the New Mexico spa. Really. I save everything. Poor poor Janna, for not realizing what a sentimental packrat I am.

This is practically the only thing I have that's handwritten by Janna, most of the lengthy notes she sent me were computer printouts, and no, that wasn't a red flag neither. My friend Caroline does that all the time, and I know she is who she says she is.

That's it for now. I'm tired.

biting the hand that doesn't feed me

I've been doing a lot of reading, in between having a life. Spending too much time thinking about this again, at least more time than I'd like to be spending. Score twentyzillion for Janna Saint James. But fuck me, this shit's been dredged up again, and it is a part of my life, unfortunate though it may be, and when you hear from friends (and enemies) about the fucking article, it's like the scab's been picked raw.

It's interesting to read what complete strangers have to say about this: it's real, it's fake, "Jesse" exists but faked his own death and Janna is covering for him (hey, whose soap opera is this?), it's Janna's fault, it's my fault, it's society's fault, it's Josh's fault, it's the internet's fault (I'm sure a tighty righty somewhere will blame Al Gore for this). Whatevs. Opinions are like assholes, remember? Armchair analysts will pontificate till the llamas come home (what's the internet obsession with llamas, anyway? someone please to explain).

I've covered this before, but let's assume "Jesse" is real, some guy friend of Janna's who wanted to extricate himself from this "relationship" we had. Why was he imploring me to get a divorce right up until three days before he croaked? Okay, he's mentally unbalanced, who knows what a bipolar person is likely to do, right? But faking a death? Janna and his "ex-wife" and "friends" and "therapist" and six-year old "SON" all still talking to me for seven months afterward, all pretending "Jesse" is dead? Are they ALL insane? Janna going on a VACATION with me on "Jesse's" birthday and crying real tears in front of me, missing him? Uh, okay, sure. Contributing to a tribute blog for the not-really-dead man in their midst? Janna's coming to LA to visit me? Okay, they're all fucking nuts. But Janna was their frontman, then, by her choice, and even if this is the case it still ain't goddamned acceptable.

And why did "Jesse's" sister "Alice" send me that photo of "Jesse" and "Rhys" that was titled JohnJessicaVista.jpg? John was Janna's deceased husband, Jessica her daughter. "Alice" despised Janna, what the fuck would she be doing with a 25-year-old photo of Janna's first husband and baby? And why did they look EXACTLY like the other pictures I'd seen up to that point of "Jesse" and "Rhys?" (I dunno, but I'll bet Janna will have a faaaabulous explanation for that!) So let's go with Janna's future explanation about how she allowed "Jesse" to use photos of her dead husband and pretend they were him, and that she and "Alice" are really thick as thieves, or that she was at "Jesse's" ranch and left that photo in their scanner. Let's instead turn to things that cain't lie. Technology. Funny what looking at the headers of the eleventy-billion emails turned up when I had geeks who could interpret all of that for me. Amazing that emails from "Jesse's" friend "Pavlo" in Argentina, his brother "Aidan" (I am getting SO fucking tired of quotation marks) in goddamned Africa, his sister "Branna" in Eire, emails from "Jesse" in Paki-fucking-stan, all bounced from IP addresses originating in -- say it with me, kiddies -- Illinois. Christ, there was an email from "Jesse" in Colorado mere minutes before I got one from Janna in Batavia, and they had the SAME. EXACT. HEADER. That's some fucking coinkydink, wouldn't you say? So, maybe "Jesse" did exist, and all his friends and family exist, and maybe they all live in Batavia, Illinois. Peyton Place, watch the fuck out, you've got some seriousass competition. But hey, maybe you're right. Maybe "Jesse" just wanted to be shut of me. I guess some folks just don't know how to say goodbye.

Back to the matter at hand. Those armchair analysts.

What I really find astonishing is how many people seem to believe the article is accurate, and whether or not they criticize me for being either stupid, in denial, delusional, or all of the above, they seem to think that I enjoy playing the victim, that I'm getting off on this because of this blog, because I'm outlining what Janna St. James did to me in detail (i.e. "airing [my] dirty laundry", as someone out there on the internuts said). Now, let me get this straight, before I put you in Bill O'Reilly's corner. You think I enjoy this? You think I'm not sick to the eyeballs of all this crap? You think I don't have a moment (nay, many moments) every day where I just want to pull this whole fucking shit festival off the interwebs? You rationalize that my damage was negligible, she didn't do that much to me, aside from fuck with my head, screw up my capacity to do my job to my best ability, make me sick with grief for months, and accept thousands of dollars worth of gifts under extremely false pretenses? 'Scuse me, but what's your fucking definition of damage? You think I should just chalk it up to experience, shut the fuck up and slink away and let Janna do what she thinks she does best, give other people not as smart as any of you (no sirreeeeee) headfuck after headfuck, cajole gifts and love out of people until she drops dead, and perhaps beyond, depending on how many people (if any) are part of her coterie?

Who the FUCK are you people? Are you the same people who think if a woman dresses provocatively and gets raped that she was asking for it? So, because I was trusting, because I just assumed that the guy I was talking to on the phone for a year (whose phone number I had), his sister who I also talked to (whose phone number I also had), his many friends, his ex-wife, his child, his therapist, and the bitch Janna, who was real, to add to the confusion, because I believed all that and was taken for a seriousass ride, because I was strafed and humiliated and headfucked to the nth degree, I should at least have the dignity to keep my anger and pain to myself? It's fucknuts like you who keep victims from stepping into the light and shouting at the top of their lungs I AM AS MAD AS HELL AND I'M NOT GOING TO TAKE IT ANYMORE. (apologies to the late Messrs. Chayefsky and Finch)

I will not go gentle into this good night. FUCK no. I don't neeeeed your sympathy. I don't want it. What I do want is for Janna St. James to nip it in the fucking bud, and for any other online scumbags to have second thoughts before running a scam on someone, because some of us will fight back. Janna St. James will find it fucking difficult to pull this shit on anyone else, if I have anything to say about it. Victims should have a voice, and they should goddamned well not be afraid to use it.

laughing at me, not with me

I am not sure, but hope I've made it clear, that from a more detatched perspective, I'm still able to see the humor in all this, even though I'm the asshole that lots of folks are laughing at. I totally see your point(s).

OMGWTFLLAMAS!!!! indeed. (by the by, the Llama School song by Sifl & Olly is one of my favorites, so that should add to the hilarity)

My point being, when entrenched in the middle of such a duplicitous crazyquilt, it's sometimes hard to see the big picture.

I'd even read The Night Listener years before, and loved it, I was a Maupin fan anyway. And sure, I'd heard of people doing the things that Janna St. James has done on the internet, and even before that, through chain letters. But The Night Listener, well, okay, that was done to a FAMOUS dude. And I'm a fuckin' nobody. I questioned it, hells yeah, talked about it with a few of my skeptical friends, and even not-so-skeptical friends. Mentioned it to "Jesse," who was mortally offended by that, asking WHY would someone do that? To what gain? Indeed.

Plus, I had "Jesse's" cellphone number, and "Alice's." The photos I did see before "Jesse's" death, I didn't spend a huge amount of time perusing them, I was getting dozens and dozens of emails from "Jesse" daily, and IMing when I could. The emails with the photos just got shunted into a folder with the other thousands of emails I got from him. I had a PO box address, sent things to J.J. James in Colorado. Don'tcha need ID to open a PO Box? And since Janna was in Chicago, who was picking up the stuff at the PO Box in Denver? But the main thing was, why would someone fake all that shit? Who has the time for that kind of thing, especially a deception so elaborate, opening a dozen email accounts, mailing things from different cities, wherever "Jesse" happened to be at the time?

This is the other reason I don't believe Janna Saint James is crazy. I find it hard to believe she acted alone. I can't see her flying to Ohio, New Hampshire, Alaska, Australia, to mail things to me. Someone in Spain got the gifts and postcards I mailed to "Jesse's" son, because Janna described the cards and contents of the packages to me. She has one or more accomplices, possibly also obese lonely fiftysomethings with too much time on their hands, perhaps her brother, who I believe might possibly be "Cakey."

Most likely, we'll never know. Most likely, Janna St. James has already snared someone else in her interweb, as Jane goddamned Doe. Most likely, this will all roll over her like water off a duck's back. But maybe not. And I'm willing to risk my good name, which I know is out there, for that maybe, however minuscule it may be.

catch you on the rebound, talk to you later when I have less time

So, then. This will be the last lengthy post, unless something utterly amazing happens, like Janna St. James suddenly coming clean in public fora.

I've given up waiting for the article about her to appear. High-powered legal beagles futzing over minor contract points is ridiculous and bound to be protracted. When the article does finally make publication, I'll post a link here. Probably in 2011, knowing the way goddamned lawyers work.

I've said a lot already, but a few things need repeating, I think, and a few things need stating.

• I think Janna Saint James really thinks she did something good for me by pretending to be "Jesse" and his random coterie of faux friends and relatives. I would like to state unequivocally that she did nothing good for me. All she did was make my job more difficult by distracting from it with "Jesse's" various trials and tribulations. All she did was disrupt my sleep with worry and eventually grief. I fully believe that she contributed to (if not outright caused) the illnesses that befell me following "Jesse's" death by weakening my immune system with all the grief and guilt and days without sleep. All she did was try to screw up friendships I had with my real-word friends. All she did was make my home life uncomfortable at best and unbearable at worst. She did not "free" me, which is what I think she comforts herself with when she's alone with her private thoughts. All it was, all she did, for nearly two years (whoops, sorry, a year and a half), was shovel the bullshit on, and it's that crap-covered yardstick I use to measure those twenty months by.
  
• Last month I sent Janna's daughter Jessica an email, to an address I believe is her own, although who knows to what lengths Janna has gone to deceive? I will assume that Jessica received it, and would hope that she read it, and this blog, and has taken appropriate action in getting her mother to the nearest psychiatric facility. Of course, it could very well be that she was in on this whole scam from the beginning, and is happily availing herself to some of the many gifts I showered upon "Jesse". Still being the cockeyed optimist that I am, I'd like to think that there's at least one normal one in the St. James family and that she's done the right thing with her demented mother. If not, well, maybe she didn't get the mail. Or maybe she doesn't care. Or maybe it really just is all Janna. Maybe there's not even really a Jessica. If there is, and she's reading this, mazel tov, move as far away from your nutjob mother as you can after the wedding. I suggest Europe. And keep her away from your kids. She's obsessed with child molestation.
  
• I have decided against pressing charges, although a lawyer in Chi-town will be sad to not soak Janna for her car, fancy Indian silver jewelry, and other assets. He'll have to make do with the retainer he's been paid. My main reason for wanting to sue Janna was to get the courts to rule that she see a shrink for at least a couple of years and to limit her computer usage, but that kind of thing is virtually unenforceable by the courts. I'm hoping that by giving Jessica the information about what Janna spent her time doing for nearly two years that she cares enough about her mother to do the right thing.
• Going through all my receipts for taxes, and going further back into 2005, I spent WAY more on "Jesse" et al than I first (and second) thought. All that stuff at the beginning, a personalized iPod and all the accoutrements for $650 (which, yeah, "Jesse" reimbursed me $300 for, but I didn't reveal how much I spent because I like gifting those I love), expensive bath stuff from Lush, the sterling silver handmade bracelet for $300 that "Jesse" asked to be cremated with, a $600 reservation at a Laguna Beach B&B that had strict no-refund cancellation policies (cancelled because "Jesse" had to voluntarily check in to a psychiatric hospital to avoid his sister committing him), that $550 R/T nonrefundable plane ticket to Denver that I never used, $100 worth of organic asparagus ("Jesse" liked asparagus), $250 for toiletries bags with the Jesse prairie dog photo on them, one for me and one for Janna, $200 to FedEx the birthday package to Spain for "Jesse's" "son," which was of course returned to me (and in fact phenomenal amounts of shipping charges for all those items I sent to "Jesse" and Janna via Priority Mail and FedEx), $600 in moving boxes/packing to put my stuff in for my move to Colorado, $400 for a few bottles of "Jesse's" favorite wine, so I could drink it in tribute after he died, $40 for a goddamned clothes shaver, and another $40 for a backup in case "Jesse's" "son" burned out the first one, horseback riding lessons and the fucking useless boots recommended by "Cakey," the entire New Mexico/Colorado trip, outfits I bought on ebay thanks to "Jesse's" prompting, and all those little stupid things that time and trauma had erased from my memory banks. Teetering at the ten grand mark. Over two years -- sorry -- a year and a half.
  
• I've gone through all the stuff I bought for "Jesse" and his "family" but hadn't had the opportunity to send before "Jesse" died, as well as some things I received. I'll be selling most of it, with the proceeds going to a couple of local organizations who help abused kids. Most of the stuff I got for "Jesse's" "son" has already gone to these shelters. The things I don't sell I'll destroy, if I haven't already - I enjoyed shredding that bullshit prairie dog giclee with the bullshit sentiments written on the sides. I'll have a pass at selling that painting of Doug that Janna did, if nobody wants it, I'll shred that too. As much as part of me thinks that I should sell these items to recompense myself for the money conned out of me by Janna Saint James, I'll just think of it as a pricey life lesson. I don't want that money, because it has the stink of bullshit on it. And especially after Janna sucked up sympathy from so many for poor poor "Jesse's" abuse by his mother's husband and the drug dealers he was traded to, I think it's about fucking time some poor kids who really did have to go through that shit get something positive from this icky negative.
• I know that I'm sane, rational, and honest, all things Janna is not. I don't even think she's that smart. I was impressed by "Jesse's" breadth of knowledge as a 35-year-old man who'd spent half his life drug-addicted. Not so much when you find "Jesse" is a fiftysomething Batavia, Illinois hausfrau who has all the time in the world to read histrionic tomes and watch Oprah while chowing down on Hot Pockets.

Janna, as "Jesse," and also as herself, didn't much rate Tom Waits, supposedly because he romanticized pain and suffering. I never thought that, more that he documents the truth of the world, and pain and suffering do exist in this world. Of course, a drama queen like Janna Saint James saw it as romanticizing pain, because that is exactly what she does. She saw Tom Waits as the competition*. She worked the pain, milking sympathy from every available metaphorical cow to feed her ego. Janna also liked criticizing me by proxy, being horrid to me as one of "Jesse's" friends or relatives, or pulling out the stops in her blog to save her own skin, still usually quoting what some other individual less saintly than herself told her to say, or telling me Madam X mocked me fiercely when I called myself a navel-gazer. But at least I seek, and I think that Janna the psycho dyke-o is just jealous because she hasn't seen her own navel since the 70s. Is that mean? Yeah. Oh well. I never said I was perfect (unlike Janna), and I'm still feeling pretty mean about her.

Janna's biggest danger is that she tries real hard to create an alternate reality that shows her as a loving, kind, unlucky person. We joked at the beginning, "Jesse" and I, about how I was probably a wizened man with bristly hair in my ears and plaid pants hiked up to my armpits, emailing from my senior care center in Sarasota, and that "Jesse" was probably an obese housewife in Chicago. Well, guess what? I think that was the first and last time that "Jesse" was ever honest with me. Janna is exactly that. Exactly that, but she'd regale me with stories about how she never weighed more than 105 pounds until she was gang-raped, beaten, and left for dead in the middle of a cornfield about ten years ago by three Mexican men. But thanks to "Jesse," he sent her to the best doctors in Europe for reconstructive surgery, and slept on the floor by her bed in the hospital room, when even her husband didn't do that. "Jesse" would always talk about how wonderful and clever and brilliant and beautiful Janna was. Blah blah blah blah blah. It goes on and on, about how tiny and petite and pretty she always was and now she's a huge hideous house and the Weight Watchers people don't understand or sympathize with her because she hasn't been fat all her life. A million stories, a million excuses for why she is the way she is. I really never gave a shit what size she was, or for how long. I never asked for explanations, but was a huge issue for her. Huge. She had to convince me that she was once attractive, desirable, sexy, and that it was misfortune rather than one too many supersized McDonalds meals that made her the way she was. We all have things we wish we could change about ourselves. I'd like racehorse ankles and calves that boots could fit over. It don't mean I'll pretend I once possessed these things (well, maybe I did, when I was nine). I'd also like to be nicer to people, but the fact is that I'm not a very nice person, and I'm happy to be a bitch when bitchery is called for, and as far as Janna is concerned, she deserves a shitload of bitchery.

Janna lied to me for twenty months, and then once she was found out by my friends, she lied for a few more months, about me. And probably still is lying now, and will lie tomorrow, and the day after that. She's probably right now studying some new fashionable illness that she can give her next Perfect Man, and god knows, she's probably absorbed some of my life into her new Mister Right. She may be sick, but she's also fully cognizant of what she's doing, because the calculated way she tried to tear me apart following her outing was utterly spectacular, and hey, talk about mean. I've spent my time since February rethinking everything I've known to be true and cannot find it in my heart to forgive Janna for any of this. I can't even say with assurance that if she'd been up-front with me prior to, or even following, her unmasking by my friends, that I would have been less angry with her than I am now. I also can't guarantee that if I ever run into her that I won't want to give her a serious slap across the face. Maybe two. I do know that she should count her blessings that so far her victims have been relatively benign, because even here, with my friends, she was thisclose to getting herself a righteous ass-kicking by a couple of my (normally pacifist) friends. Next person Janna does this to, she might not be so lucky.

I really hope that this blog serves its purpose and warns anyone else who gets tangled up in the Janna St. James web before emotional harm is inflicted upon them. But since Janna is in deep, deep denial, and who knows how much she's fucked up her own life, I reckon she'll just keep herself out of the next deception and reconfigure Mister Right for some other unsuspecting person who trusts just that little bit too much. I've done what I can, and it's up to those who love Janna to keep her from pulling this kind of cunning stunt again. I just hope that there is someone out there who loves her enough. Or at all. Otherwise, I guess I'll just see her in hell.

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*note to Janna, who I know is reading this, either as herself or as a Jannafestation: I know Tom Waits and you are no Tom Waits [with apologies to the late Lloyd Bentsen]. He has talent. You have limited creative typing ability.