IBM office in Vermont, on November 4.
“Did James Kopp phone you within the last two weeks?”
She said nothing.
“What about the $7,000 withdrawal you made on November 5? What was that for?”
Rock’s stories did not add up. But from the phone records it was clear she had not been in touch with Kopp since Mexico. The was clear she had not been in touch with Kopp since Mexico. The 3716 immediately upon arriving home. After searching the records of a pager company called Smart Beep, agents learned the pager was for a John Rizzo. On November 20, an agent called the Rizzo pager. A woman picked up the page. She went to a phone booth to return the page to avoid having her call traced, using a prepaid phone card, and unwittingly spoke to an agent on the other end. The bureau had made contact with Loretta Marra—Rizzo was one of three false pager names she used—but the agents still did not know exactly where she was living.
It was December 18, 56 days after the murder of Dr. Bart Slepian. A man named John Caldararo, of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey Transit Police, conducted his routine check of the long-term parking lot at the Newark International Airport. He noticed a black Chevy Cavalier with an expired Pennsylvania registration sticker. The car had one plate on it: New Jersey, RAJ 889. He noticed the window was ajar and keys still in the ignition. The long-term parking lot was a well-known place for people to ditch cars. He recorded the car’s VIN and ran a search on the number, 1G1JE2111H7175930. A notice came up on the computer screen. Amherst police and the FBI wanted that car. He got on the phone.
License plates change, but the VIN is the key. It was James Kopp’s car. He had switched the Vermont license plate on it, but it was his vehicle.
Special Agent Arthur Durrant visited the airport to examine the car. He pulled out his notebook and started writing. “One 1987 Chevy Cavalier, RS Model, black in color, 2 door, hatchback, red pinstripe on the front bumper, green PA Inspection Sticker dated 4/97.” The car was removed and taken to the first floor of the FBI garage at 910 Newark Avenue. Items recovered included: a Tasco binocular case on the floor in front of the passenger seat, a plastic Tops Markets grocery bag behind driver’s seat, samples of hairs and fibers vacuumed up from the interior and trunk, religious medallion and hanging ribbon and flower on the front dash, service sticker on inner windshield for Autospa of North Bergen, in center console three AAA batteries, keys, fuses, bulbs, small flashlight, drill, wire, bit, chalk, token; in rear hatch knotted cord and hardware, pack of auto fuses, religious card, pine needle in engine compartment.
The jet descended over, London, the Thames River snaking through the city below. Jim Kopp had been to England several times before, primed for battle in the abortion wars. This time, he was invisible. Had to be. Indeed, he might not be staying long. Not at all. The flight touched down at Heathrow Airport. He deboarded. The connecting flight was later in the day, to Australia. Jim loved Australia. Even though he came from roots that were, he maintained, of Austrian and Irish origin, and even though he respected Canada, he identified most with the Australians. That country had the national experience that most closely resembled the American, he felt. One-time colony, a frontier mentality, fierce fighters in wartime. He sat in the airport. Something didn’t feel right, though. Nothing had ever felt right since he had started running. His senses were on fire. Trust no one. The man with the $500,000 bounty on his head, the man on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted List, got up and left the airport. There would be no trip to Australia. Not today.
He thought of this time on the lam as “sleeping,” as though he wasn’t conscious, or was dreaming. The next several weeks were a blur. He was living hand-to-mouth, barely surviving, finding odd jobs in exchange for food and permission to sleep in a closet somewhere. On the run before long he lost 30 pounds, grew a beard, shaved it off, grew it, repeat, changing his appearance as frequently as possible. He wasn’t just feeling the heat from the FBI. In his mind’s eye, Scotland Yard was on his case, British intelligence, Interpol, city police—they were all looking for him. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but soon, the FBI would connect the dots, they would stomp on every person he had ever known or loved back home, he thought. That much was a no-brainer. And so they would come looking for him. But they wouldn’t find him. He had to move again.
Loretta Marra was now 35 years old, had a young son and was pregnant with a second child. She was underground. Where might she finally show her face? On December 12, her father, William Marra, was driving home to Connecticut from Birmingham, Alabama. He had spent the past two months teaching seminarians. He stopped at a friend’s home in Berkeley Springs, West Virginia. After dinner he left. On Route 81 he suffered a heart attack, managed to pull over, was taken to hospital. A family friend called a priest who arrived just in time to give him last rites. The FBI learned of his death. Would Loretta surface to attend the funeral of her beloved father? Agents were among the mourners, or hidden nearby, at the service. Loretta did not attend.
On January 28, a woman named Joyce Maier took her driver’s license exam in New York. The real Joyce Maier was a 31-yearold mentally disabled woman who had been unable to work for years. She was also a niece of Dennis Malvasi. The woman with dark hair and pale green eyes who passed the driver’s exam was Loretta Marra. Malvasi had given Joyce’s ID to Loretta. He also got his wife an ID in the name of Rosemarie Howard, who was deceased. Assuming the identity of a dead person was an easy way to get a driver’s license. It was a trick that Jim Kopp himself had used many times. Officials rarely checked ID against death certificates.
Marra registered a 1988 Mazda using Joyce Maier’s social security number. She listed her address as 4809 Avenue North, in Brooklyn, Apt. 148. In fact it was not a residence; 148 was a mailbox number at an American Mail Depot. In February, Marra opened a new bank account at CFS Bank in the name of Joyce Maier. She was proving to be an elusive target for the FBI. Her husband, on the other hand, had always been on the FBI’s radar—he was still on probation. Agents interviewed Malvasi’s probation officer, trying to determine if he was still with Marra. The probation officer told the FBI that he had recently seen a baby seat in Malvasi’s Acura. The officer had also visited Malvasi at his home at 2468 Lynden Avenue, and was told through the door by a woman who remained hidden that Dennis was not home. Agents interviewed an employer of Malvasi named Anthony Castellano. He was not enthusiastic about speaking to the FBI. Castellano said that Malvasi kept company with a woman, but Castellano only knew her as “Rose.” An agent pulled out a photograph.
“Is this her?”
Castellano looked at the photo of Loretta Marra. He paused.
“Yes.”
Malvasi was ordered to appear before a grand jury in Buffalo in connection with the search for Kopp. He testified on February 10, 1999.
“Do you know James Charles Kopp?”
“I have never met him,” said Malvasi.
“Do you know Loretta Marra?”
Dennis Malvasi cited his Fifth Amendment rights and refused to answer the question. He said he lived alone.
“Has anyone used your 1990 Acura? Does anyone else drive that with your permission?”
“Not steadily, no.”
“Have you ever loaned it to a friend who has a baby or has a child that requires a car seat?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“And who would that be?”
“My niece.”
“And her name is?”
“Joyce Maier.”
On March 1, 1999, Loretta Marra signed a lease for a new apartment at 385 Chestnut Street in Brooklyn. She and Dennis were listed on the lease under the names Joyce and Ted Barnes. In April, Loretta went to Canada to give birth to her second child. She had many Canadian friends and, with her aliases, she could still easily cross the border. She gave birth that same month, near Ottawa. It was her second boy.
