Original subtitles

[teapot whistling]

SANTOS: Oh, my God.

Yeah, that's college.

[laughs]

That's funny.

I don't even remember what we were doing in this photo.

It's like I almost don't recognize us.

It's bittersweet because it's hard to think of

these times and, like, enjoy the memory

just because I know what's coming.

It's like a, I guess, a sense of impending doom.

It's like, "Oh, that was fun,"

but what comes after was not so much fun.

[soft music]

♪ ♪

PERSON: For so many of us and our children,

college is supposed to be a time of self-discovery

and newfound independence.

A chance to explore and learn

all within the safety of a college community.

[chatter and laughter]

[indistinct singing]

NEWS REPORTER: Stunning allegations

against a New York dad.

He's accused of orchestrating a sex cult

made up of his daughter's college classmates.

♪ ♪

PERSON: But as the alleged defendant exploited

that vulnerable time in these victims' lives

through a course of conduct that shocks the conscience.

[indistinct shouting]

PERSON 2: Please...

PERSON 3: My God, it's a nightmare.

PERSON 2: Don't!

♪ ♪

[sirens wailing]

PERSON: Today, we announce criminal charges

against this man, Lawrence Ray,

who for nearly a decade exploited and abused

young women and men for his own financial gain.

LARRY: Remember, you are the one that has hurt me.

You are the hurter. I am the victim of your hurt.

PERSON: Ray sometimes recorded his victims

to extort hundreds of thousands of dollars

from their parents' savings accounts.

SANTO: Just give me until Monday.

I mean, I'll get your money.

VICTIM: I'm scared they're gonna do something to me.

♪ ♪

PERSON: When he was arrested,

one of his daughter's roommates and one of

the female victims were in the residence at the time.

REPORTER: Do you have any comments?

PARENT 2: [speaks Spanish]

[car engine revs]

[upbeat music]

♪ ♪

SINGER: ♪ I'm feeling rough ♪

♪ I'm feeling raw ♪

♪ I'm in the time of my life ♪

- I can't even. [laughter]

♪ ♪

SINGER: ♪ Let's make some music, make some money ♪

♪ Find some models for wives ♪

♪ ♪

RAVEN: We called it the Sarah Lawrence bubble.

It feels like its own little world.

Like, a old, tiny, like, village.

Things are a little bit magical and special.

MAX: Their slogan at the time was

"You are different. So are we."

And they were trying to attract the kind of students

who were maybe outcasts of some kind in high school.

The nerds or the artists.

SINGER: ♪ We got the vision, now let's have some fun ♪

RAVEN: Everyone's expressing themselves

and dressing how they want and reciting Shakespeare

and climbing trees.

You know, 18 year olds starting your new

way in the world, building your new identity.

DAN: You know, having a chance free of the places

we'd all come from and the families

we'd all come from to, like, self-determine.

JULI ANNA: We were all seekers.

We were all really open to possibilities

and actively looking for new things.

DAN: All these people were so different

and they were so vibrant.

All I wanted to do was just hang out.

♪ ♪

GABE: We would get drunk and dance

pretty much every afternoon we could.

None of us were good at dancing.

I would say definitively terrible.

♪ ♪

SINGER: ♪ I said yeah, yeah, yeah ♪

RAVEN: One night after staying up super late,

we were, like, kind of cuddled up

in sleeping bags together watching the sunrise.

And we made a joke about how we're four legs of one animal.

It felt like a little separate family.

Like a new family.

♪ ♪

GABE: I think we'd all sort of had the general idea,

like, we should all live together.

We'd all been having so much fun our first year.

It was like, well, let's just keep doing this.

♪ ♪

DAN: Slonim Woods, it was a huge step up.

♪ ♪

It's, like, eight people, everyone gets a single room.

MAX: I was at the end of the hall upstairs.

Next to me was Dan, Gabe, and Claudia.

Downstairs was Juli Anna, Santos, Isabella, and Talia.

And Raven was basically living there.

I mean, she was around all the time.

JULI ANNA: I liked being close to the woods.

You were far enough away from main campus that

security wouldn't be called on you for noise complaints.

No one patrolled over there.

MAX: It felt like living in a real house

just with no supervision.

- It was great. I had a great time.

Just it's hard to try and think of those memories.

It's like the memories are, like, pale

because we're talking about a very different Santos.

You know, with a completely different path.

JAMES: Can you tell me about meeting Talia?

Can you tell me that story?

SANTOS: It was a Roman literature class.

Egypt, Caesar.

Afterwards, it was, like, a running joke

'cause she was saying I smiled at her first,

but I was saying you smiled at me first.

I was like, hey, I'm just gonna go

chat to this girl after class.

I'm like, let's, like, let's go get lunch together.

JAMES: That seems like a pretty bold move.

- Yeah, never done that in my life.

[producer laughs]

- [laughs]

I quickly felt like I could talk to her about anything.

You know, this was my first girlfriend.

I felt like, oh, I'm so lucky 'cause she's beautiful,

she's smart, and she's, like, awesome.

You know, it's like, what more could you ask for?

- Talia was not really like me or my friends.

- Talia had a mission.

She knew exactly what she wanted to do.

JULI ANNA: Talia wanted to be a lawyer.

She wanted to help people like her dad.

RAVEN: Pretty much the first and only thing that

she talked about whenever it was her turn to talk

it was my dad this, my dad that.

JAMES: And this would happen, like, at a party?

- Yeah, at like--when we're trying to have fun.

Like that's when it started to feel weird.

[indistinct chatter]

DAN: Santos was the perfect listener

and she needed to be listened to.

[indistinct chatter and laughter]

JULI ANNA: Talia characterized her dad as a hero.

He was in some special military operations.

Parachuting into places.

He was practically James Bond.

- She was talking all about how her dad was in jail

and how unfair it was

and how he never had done anything wrong.

DAN: Fairly soon after we moved in,

we started hearing her dad was getting out of jail finally

and they were gonna be reunited.

RAVEN: I remember Talia being like, just don't judge him.

He's been in jail.

He's been through a lot of hard things.

JULI ANNA: All of his things had been confiscated.

It didn't seem odd then that he would crash on our couch.

RAVEN: We were in agreement that we were gonna be,

um, accommodating, and...

it was gonna be fine.

[curious music]

♪ ♪

MAX: The image I have is of him

walking up the stairs into the living room.

Talia had said, "Hey, guys, this is my dad."

- He just looked like a dad.

DAN: I have the image in my mind of Talia

jumping into his arms.

Larry's actually not that big of a guy,

but in my memory,

he's big and she just, like, vanishes in his arms.

- He talked for hours and everyone was just transfixed.

DAN: Larry talked about being in the marines.

It was a huge part of his identity.

MAX: He talked about his time in the CIA

doing psyops against foreign leaders.

Infiltrating the inner circle of their, you know, top brass

and messing with their minds.

SANTOS: And he talked about how he had worked with NATO

to help in the Kosovo crisis.

He says all these outlandish things

and you're wondering, did this really happen?

And then he would pull out this letter

and you're like, okay.

DAN: He talked about how he was Gorbachev's guide

when Gorbachev came to the U.S.

- And then he would pull out a picture with him and Gorbachev,

and you're like, what the hell?

- I remember I didn't really care,

but everyone else was like, wow.

- I thought it was the coolest thing ever.

[laughs]

- He brought up Bernie Kerik that night.

GABE: He talked about how there were corrupt

law enforcement who were working against him.

I Googled.

[keyboard clacking]

NEWS REPORTER: Kerik is a former New York City

police commissioner who was a familiar face

in the days after the September 11 attacks.

NEWS REPORTER 2: Larry Ray is the FBI informant

who was once Bernie Kerik's close friend.

MAX: Larry had blown the whistle on some major scandal.

- Anything I say, I have documents to support.

MAX: And they had gotten

retribution against him for that.

According to Larry, these very powerful people

had put him in jail on trumped up charges.

JULI ANNA: They had tried to ruin his life

and now, he could pick up the pieces

and, like, fight the good fight.

- I don't know if Talia ever actually sat us down

and was like, "Look, my dad is going to be staying here

"four out of seven days a week

for an extended period of time."

It just slowly, like, snowballed until he was there.

JAMES: Was it weird that he was around?

DAN: I mean , it sounds stupid,

but mostly I was just like, oh, you know,

they're like taking up the living room couches again.

So we, like, can't play "Super Smash Bros."

And also, just like, so what? Like, what am I gonna do?

We're not gonna separate Talia from her dad.

- It was so weird, and also,

everyone's, like, a little bit stoned all the time.

So like, we're just, like, am I weird, or is this weird?

And, like, we weren't, like, really sure.

- He made it seem normal that he was there.

It just felt like a fact of life.

JULI ANNA: Larry was totally the funny dad of the house.

He had tube socks bunched up around his ankles.

He'd put on one of Talia's frilly aprons

to do the dishes.

He actually keeps the kitchen clean which is a nice change.

He, like, buys us pizza, cooks us dinner.

He was contributing to our little household in his way.

MAX: You know, when you're a college student eating

dining hall food and instant ramen and peanut butter,

a nice home-cooked steak is a welcome change of pace.

SANTOS: Anyone who would come in, he'd be like,

"Hey, you want some? Come, sit down.

Eat with us."

You know, very, like, gracious approach.

- He did sort of exude a sense of authority.

Like, oh, like, you have a problem?

Larry probably has a solution.

He's seen the world. He can tell you what to do.

MAX: One day, Larry spreads the news to everybody.

House meeting later tonight.

We're all gonna gather in the living room.

MAX: He unveils to us his philosophy

called Quest for Potential.

DAN: Larry told us,

"You have a person that you're capable of being.

"A true self.

"That person, your potential,

is held back or restrained or clouded."

DAN: He could take away the things that were in the way,

resolve the confusions, and untie the knots.

And then you could just be who you are.

SANTOS: Really what it translated to was

just like this is how you have clarity

because you guys don't have it right now.

And you don't have it right now because all this, like,

gunk in your head from, like,

your parents and how you guys grew up.

- He could help identify,

articulate, and then process

repressed memories, trauma, abuse.

[thunder clap]

If we went through that process,

we would be healed.

That's what it means to have clarity.

- As a 19 year old, it was attractive

because, like, oh, look, there are answers.

DAN: The first person that

Larry started helping was Isabella.

♪ ♪

MAX: Talia and Isabella were best friends.

They were pretty much inseparable.

SANTOS: She lived in Slonim Nine with us

and she was effectively a social recluse.

JULI ANNA: She hid a lot.

She hid in her room. She hid behind her hair.

She always had hair just, like, hanging in her face.

SANTOS: She came from Texas and had nobody.

You know, and her one friend, Talia,

her father, who seemed to be this awesome guy,

took her under his wing.

♪ ♪

DAN: Somehow, I became aware of the fact that Larry was

in Isabella's room and had been for many hours.

According to Santos, she was going through something

really intense that was, like, private--

something about her family, and Larry was helping her.

I believe he was in her room, like, overnight,

and the idea was that they had just been talking

for, like, 12, 16 hours.

- It seemed like there was a lot of, um...

a lot of bonding happening.

CYNDI: Isabella had been

talking up Talia and her daddy.

JAMES: What was your impression?

- That he was a good man.

And then right before the Christmas break,

the phone rings and Isabella tells me

that she's not coming. I said why.

"Well, I'll let you talk to somebody for me, Mom.

It's Talia's dad."

He said, "Well, I don't know if you knew this,

but she was molested when she was, uh, younger."

I said, "What are you talking about?

I don't-- what are you talking about?"

And he said, "Yeah, and she's--it's been--

"she's brought it up recently and she said if she goes

"to San Antonio, she's gonna kill herself.

She can't stand to be alive."

CYNDI: I didn't know half the things

that he's saying went on.

Who knows if it's true?

But the way he acted like he cared for Isabella,

I mean, he was gonna help her because she deserved it

and she was such a good child.

You know, he was very convincing on the phone.

- I did not have the money to go up there.

I didn't even have-- what is it?

Talked to her on the phone barely.

So I proceeded to tell him,

if she's gonna kill herself if she comes home,

of course I don't want her to come home.

I will tell her she doesn't have to come here.

♪ ♪

SANTOS: All of a sudden, she became vibrant.

That's the word I remember. Like, she became vibrant.

She was smiling. She seemed happy.

She was engaged and, like,

dynamic and interactive with everyone around.

I mean, I saw him having this, like,

incredibly positive effect on a peer,

and that just kind of reinforced the idea.

Like okay, this is a very good, helpful person in general.

Like a very special person

who, like, walked into our lives

who could help all of us.

It was one night.

I straight up asked him if he could talk.

I told him about my family.

Both of my parents are from Dominican Republic.

I have two older sisters.

I was closer to them than to my parents

because my mom worked seven days a week.

My father, he would be out and about.

The implications were that my father

is married to my mother, but he cheats on her regularly.

And is that okay?

I assumed that it's not okay.

That's what I've learned, that it's not okay.

Like, is there more I don't know?

That confusion led to me just feeling depressed

and not understanding why.

I couldn't figure out the answers to these questions

and then I had no one to ask

because my parents certainly weren't talking about it.

I really opened up to him about all this stuff that

felt really heavy for me at the time.

SANTOS: Larry hit the nail on the head

for every, single part of my family dynamics.

- And then he says, "And then the effect on you

is that you've become uncertain."

That resonated like nothing ever before.

- I was like suddenly, like, jolted awake.

It felt like I understood myself.

I felt like I understood my family a lot better.

Here was a kind, compassionate individual

who made me feel that he understood me.

I had been in therapy before

and no one had been able to do that.

DAN: Santos' posture changed.

He was puffing out his chest more

and walking around with his shoulders back a little.

He idolized Larry as the type of man

that he could be or wanted to be.

Strong, is able to provide,

is able to think clearly, and solve any problem.

♪ ♪

[eerie music]

♪ ♪

RAVEN: At the beginning, Claudia and I

would, like, joke about how weird he was.

Why is he here all the time?

Me and Claudia, we were really close.

She had, like, a messy, chaotic, artist brain.

Just 'cause of her personality, she had, like, an inclination

to be like, it's kind of special and artsy and cool

to be a little damaged and broken.

Larry fed into that with her.

Over time, he would engage her in conversations.

I would go downstairs to get something

and they'd be talking.

And I'd come up, watch a few shows or a movie,

and come back down and they'd be

in the exact same place talking.

MAX: One night we were all smoking weed.

Normally Claudia would have participated,

but this time she declined.

She said, "Oh, 'cause I have schizophrenia

and weed can exacerbate schizophrenia."

And this was news to all of us.

- I said, "This is ridiculous now.

"You really got to stop listening to Larry.

"He doesn't know what he's talking about.

You're fine."

She was like, "Telling me that I'm not schizophrenic

is only harmful to me getting better."

And she just insisted and she started saying,

ever since I was little this, and all my life this.

Stuff I'd never heard her say before.

Everyone at the beginning thought he was weird,

and then one by one,

he would get them alone, have these conversations,

and suddenly they're like, "Oh, he's not so bad,"

to, actually, he's pretty great.

Actually, he's saving my life.

Actually, he's the best thing that ever happened to me.

Actually, I'll never not listen to him.

Actually, fuck you.

I'll never listen to you if you talk bad about him.

And it happened steeply, and it shocked me.

♪ ♪

DAN: A big part of this process has been

to reconcile memories and start to

put together a more complete picture of the past.

JAMES: So your memory from that time is incomplete?

DAN: I don't know.

Part of it is just, like, you don't remember things.

And...

but I think it's probably just that something, like, so big

and so terrible and that's so completely shifted

the nature and character of my life

happened so soon after.

[soft music]

♪ ♪

It's towards the end of the year at Sarah Lawrence.

Raven and I had been dating

and our relationship was very, uh...

tumultuous, didn't feel very good.

And I was like, I should be able to just deal with this.

Like, I should be able to know what to say

or what to do and I don't.

SANTOS: I started saying to Dan,

"Larry's really been helping me a lot and Claudia too.

I think he would make time for you."

DAN: It felt kind of exciting.

Like, he might provide some insight.

So we met for coffee in the city.

From the beginning, it was like you'll have a coffee.

And, okay, and then like, this is the best way to have coffee

is to have a little half and half in it.

It's like, okay,

because also, like, I felt like

I didn't know what was best.

It's like--he's like, here is how to be an adult.

And we talked about how the relationship was going

and how I felt kind of freaked out.

He said, "You're exceptionally intelligent

"and you can build a more complex maze

"in your head than most people.

"Why do you feel so insecure?

Why are you, like, so...squirrelly?"

I had felt like since puberty

confused about sexuality.

You know, and one of the things I worry about

is like whether or not I'm gay maybe,

and then he said, "Well, are you attracted to men?"

And I'd be like, "Well, I mean, no.

I don't know." [chuckles]

He said, "I know for sure that you're not gay.

"That worry is dragging you down,

so just leave it."

JAMES: And how'd that make you feel?

- It took the weight off of me, of my own life.

Like, you don't have to figure it out anymore.

I'll figure it all out for you.

We had this whole conversation,

and then kind of an afterthought he said,

"Raven is in your way."

He had me call as we walked.

- I remember saying something like,

"Oh, are you fucking Larry now?"

Like, I was--I got really specific and mean about it.

- I said, "He's like actually a really helpful guy

"who, like, cares about all our friends and me.

"So if you don't care about what he has to say,

then that means you don't care about me."

- Well, what am I supposed to say to that?

How am I supposed to respond?

Because it's like, again, I'm between two big rocks.

Like, I can't say you're right,

I don't care about you, 'cause that's not true.

But I can't just go along with something that I know is wrong.

That was our last conversation.

[somber music]

DAN: We rounded the corner

and there was a limousine waiting there.

♪ ♪

Isabella and Santos and Talia and Claudia

were all sitting in this idling limousine.

♪ ♪

And I realized that they had been

sitting, waiting for six hours.

♪ ♪

There was no reason not to get in the limo.

♪ ♪

[birds chirping]

JAMES: So Dan seemed enamored by him.

Or what words... - Yeah.

JAMES: Would you use to describe--

- No, that-- enamored is a good word.

He seemed enamored by him.

- Or enthralled.

CHARLES: Yeah. That's another good word.

It seemed like he was developing a friendship.

This worldly man was really interested

in his-his life and his issues

and what he was struggling with.

And maybe he could say things to him

that he couldn't say to his parents.

But that summer, Larry says,

"Oh, you know, he can stay in my apartment in New York."

Made sense.

'Cause then he wouldn't have to pay rent

and he could just save his money."

I didn't feel like he was gonna be in danger there

or anything like that.

[upbeat music]

♪ ♪

DAN: The apartment's on the 15th floor

of this building on the Upper East Side.

There's an entryway. A little, like, foyer.

There's a little bathroom to your left.

A fairly large living room with windows.

Very generous of Larry to let me stay there.

SANTOS: End of sophomore year, Larry's just like,

"Hey, what are you doing this summer?

"You want to come by my apartment

"and help me, like, renovate it?

"I want to paint it something nice for Talia.

It'll be fun."

I mean, the alternative was

either stay at home and do nothing

or go hang out with my friends.

And spend time with my girlfriend.

And Larry is there.

MARITZA: [speaking Spanish]

- [speaking Spanish]

♪ ♪

SANTOS: I slowly start spending more time there.

Then, Claudia, she's living a few blocks away,

she comes over.

Now, it's me, Dan, Claudia,

Talia, Isabella, and Larry.

It was effectively a sleepover

because everybody was in the living room

except, like,

Larry and Isabella were in the bedroom.

JAMES: And that wasn't weird?

- It was weird.

But the explanation that Larry provided--

that he said it was like, "Isabella needs a lot of help

and she's in a very vulnerable space."

After the past year,

seeing how Isabella changed

and seeing how he helped me and Claudia,

like, I took his word for it.

[bugle playing "Reveille"]

♪ ♪

[giggling]

♪ ♪

DAN: Larry convinced everyone

that we should get more on top of our shit.

And it was rooted in the Marines approach

to taking anyone and making them their best self.

[Black Angels' "The First Vietnamese War"]

He put together this playlist that he insisted

had to be played every morning.

It was our, like, "Reveille." You know?

And he's, like, waking us up for boot camp.

SINGER: ♪ You give a gift to me in my young age ♪

SANTOS: We would get up at 7:00,

do five of 20 push-ups a week.

Then next week, do five sets of 30

and then keep going up.

DAN: That number sounds insane.

But then you can do 400 push-ups.

So you're kind of like,

"Well, it was kind of amazing."

- Yeah, we felt really good. It was--like, it was great.

SINGER: ♪ Spent my time there by the shore ♪

DAN: Larry believed that it is biological

and it would make you feel better

to just, like, embrace your masculinity

or femininity.

Claudia started to wear makeup more.

She was more interested in being feminine

than she had been.

I remember shaving my head.

Brightly-colored polos.

Bright colors meant that you were secure

in your masculinity.

Yeah.

[laughter] So I can see

I'm having new experiences in my 21st year.

LARRY: [chuckles]

- Larry believed that he was pushing

a kind of progressive viewpoint,

which was that everyone is incredibly sexual

and wants sex.

And we live in a puritanical society.

- Another one for you... - Everything was framed

around how I needed to build confidence sexually.

LARRY: Well, Dan--so what do you say to that, Dan?

- Uh, it's very nice. I'm very moved.

He asked me if I found Isabella attractive.

As if the assumption was that I did, that I must,

because she was so attractive, according to him.

[laughter]

I didn't want to be mean. It was kind of like,

"Yeah, sure. Totally. I don't know." Like, you know?

LARRY: Dan, you get-- you're gonna blow with her.

- [chuckles] LARRY: Yeah?

♪ ♪

DAN: This one night, somehow everyone was gone.

Isabella crept out of the bedroom.

I was in my boxers, asleep on the couch.

Uh, we...

I don't know how much detail I need to go into.

But we--like, we hooked up.

And, you know, there was a part of me that was like,

"Uh, this is cool that someone is,

like, randomly performing a sex act on me, I guess."

Um...it just was so hard not to feel like

she had been sent out.

What came to pass soon after that

was that I was, like, explicitly being enrolled

in this, like, sexual education.

And Larry was my professor.

And, like, Isabella was his TA.

[Gregorian chanting]

♪ ♪

Larry said the best music for this kind of thing

were these 13th-century Gregorian chants.

He would be talking about how it's really important

to tease someone.

So he'd trace his fingers along her back.

And then, like, you know, he'd be like,

"Now, you know, you try." It was like Simon Says.

♪ ♪

And she seems to be, like, moaning in pleasure.

No one's ever reacted, like, quite this intensely

to anything I've done.

Like...maybe I-- like, yeah, there's, like,

something to learn here, you know?

♪ ♪

It did grow into, like,

him having sex with her

and me having sex with her, all three of us together.

But this is where, like, my brain starts

to, like, lock up those memories.

♪ ♪

But I do remember that there was part of me

that felt special, you know?

I had been brought into the, like, royal court.

♪ ♪

And I remember the feeling of leaving the room.

'Cause it wasn't like I would sleep there.

And I would wonder what would happen

after I left.

[door closes]

♪ ♪

[tape player clicks]

[somber music]

♪ ♪

SANTOS: We would go to school during the day.

And at night, we would go back to Larry's apartment.

Larry's offered a sense of, like, community

for me and my friends.

Because Larry was helping all of us,

that made me think like, "Hey, I want him to talk

my sister Yalitza too."

She just seemed sad.

- That was, like, the darkest period of my life

up until that point.

I'd been working to get to college

since I was 10.

But it wasn't anything that I thought it would be.

I didn't have any friends at Columbia.

It was very lonely for me.

[car honks]

I went to the apartment

where Santos and his friends were staying that summer.

And I saw how in this small apartment,

all--like, all these people were, like,

able to live together.

It felt like it was full of life.

People having conversations in this corner

and in another corner.

There was music playing all the time.

It was like, "Whoa, so much color."

It was fun. [chuckles]

[thunder rumbles]

I didn't feel bad about being depressed

or feeling like-like something is wrong with me,

um, because everybody in the group

had something that they were working on.

YALITZA: It's pretty dissimilar.

PERSON: Hey, Larry.

LARRY: I'm getting candid video.

ISABELLA: Oh. [chuckles]

Lare, it's your ornament.

PERSON: Oh, okay.

- Your disco days. YALITZA: [giggles]

LARRY: What do you mean, disco days?

Disco lives!

- Oh, my God. Disco's dead. [chuckles]

I gotta say.

TALIA: Ooh, I want to put on Tinkerbell.

JOHNNY: ♪ Everywhere you go ♪

PERSON: She had one of these. GABE: I remember, like,

I would invite them to hang out

and they just would either flake

or say they were busy.

I wasn't concerned at the time.

I was more just, like, sad, you know?

I was feeling like, "Okay, they're moving on.

"You find new friends.

That's a choice they're making."

MAX: I went to the apartment once.

I was absolutely weirded out. That was--

I mean, I-I had never seen anything like that before.

I didn't realize at the time, before I got there,

but all of my friends were living

in that apartment with him.

Why were they there instead of on campus?

Why would they rather be piled into this

little, cluttered apartment with this guy?

PERSON 1: Heard it, you are. PERSON 2: You are.

You actually are. PERSON 3: I got you.

MAX: We would make jokes.

Say, "Oh, you know, just all those kids

living in that apartment. That's weird, huh?"

I mean, it's college. People spread rumors.

And I just assumed it couldn't be that bad

because that kind of stuff doesn't really happen, right?

LARRY: Leave it to Santos.

RAVEN: I was sure it was an unhealthy attachment

to a manipulative person who was using them

for something that I didn't understand.

And I think that's what drove me crazy

is I couldn't tell what he wanted out of it.

I couldn't see what he was getting out of it.

YALITZA: The state of the apartment.

It was, like, a weird combination

of, like, there was a lot going on

and it felt, like, exciting, but at the same time,

there was, like, underlying, like,

"This is, like, not tenable."

It was very cramped.

There's a lot of stuff in there.

- Even though it's disorganized, we're gonna clean it up.

It'll be a group project.

[somber music]

♪ ♪

DAN: Larry would tell us, "I can see it.

"There is a way to perfectly organize all of this.

I'm just waiting for you to figure it out."

Okay, so we're gonna pull this out now.

We would say like, "Maybe we need to put up

more shelves or get more bins."

This is the bin

which does not have locks on it.

YALITZA: He would cut up Adderall.

It was supposed to help us, like, be more focused

for the rest of the day.

DAN: He said he had to keep us awake

for long periods of time

because when we were really exhausted,

we were like raw nerves.

And that made it more possible

for him to, like, help us advance.

He was putting so many things in the space,

we were bound to do something wrong.

DAN: In the apartment,

there was this set of pans that just kept getting ruined.

It's, like, hairline scratches.

YALITZA: Larry had this really big thing

about accountability.

So if you did something wrong,

you had to be honest and be held accountable

so that you can feel like a real person

in the real world

and have, like, an actual, like, decent life.

SANTOS: It would be like, "Why did you damage the stuff?"

Like, and I would say, "I didn't."

YALITZA: Given his skills and experience and knowledge,

it's like, "Wait, if he's asking me about it

then there must be basis for it."

Except I don't remember doing it.

- And then I'd be like, "I don't--

I don't really remember." He'd be like, "You remember.

Think about it."

SANTOS: The entire time,

Larry gave me no reason to question him

or doubt his good intentions towards me and the rest of us.

So if he says that I did it, then I must have done it

and I just don't want to remember.

So I'm just gonna try and think about what happened

and just say it as soon as I think of it.

- Maybe this is what it means

to, like, access a repressed memory.

If someone's helping you, I mean, it's like,

"There it is."

I'm wondering if it's true and I'm thinking like,

"Is this true?" And, like, there's the doubt.

But then I would, like, say it and Larry would accept it.

And it'd be like, "Okay, Larry is

"the arbiter of truth.

Like, if he accepts it, it must be true."

SANTOS: Then he leaves it at that.

A pat on the back. "You did great.

"Good thing that you're, like, being honest

and straightforward and, like, forthcoming."

LARRY: Do I need to get--

do I need to come in and fix this situation?

DAN: Over time, Larry got obsessed

with woodworking.

LARRY: You guys put that saw back yet?

[indistinct].

He started filling the apartment with tools.

[saws buzzing]

It just accrued.

And there'd be bigger and bigger tools.

And then the 1,000 pound band saw

that I cannot remember how that--

we got away with getting that into the apartment.

LARRY: I'll flip this thing over by myself.

Got it? DAN: Yeah.

LARRY: You guys are embarrassing, man.

See how easy it is, gentlemen?

YALITZA: Every item is precious.

It's either really expensive or, like, really high quality.

DAN: It felt kind of like Santos had committed

the sin of dating Larry's daughter.

He would be the first one sort of accused.

- He was not happy with any of the answers

that I gave him.

So he just, like, cranked it up.

[dishes bang]

SANTOS: I remember at that point, like,

not knowing what was true and what was not.

Like, I had completely lost,

like, uh...like, a compass.

- It's like everybody else is silent

as, like, Larry is doing it.

Unless he, like, prompts people to be, like,

"What do you think about that?" Like, "That's messed up."

Or like, "What's wrong with you?"

SANTOS: Isabella would back up anything Larry said.

- Talia would jump in whenever she was around.

- She and Isabella were, like, the "safe ones" with Larry.

Like, they ne--sh-- they never had to worry.

And everyone's, like, staring at you

and telling you to, "Come clean. Come clean.

Come clean."

- This is a list that Santos made...

Of all of the things that he supposedly damaged.

This, like, poor guy.

Fuckin' hell.

SANTOS: I would spend several hours

and I would email it to him.

I would be like, "Hey Larry, here's the list."

He's like, "Santos, just make sure

"that that list is complete. Are you being forthcoming?

I don't feel like you're being forthcoming."

And I'd be like, "Oh, God, I must not be being forthcoming

"if that's what he's saying.

Let me go back and revise the list."

[sighs] At a-- at a certain point,

I literally--on that list of the supposed stuff

that I damaged of his,

I literally put down every single item in that apartment

that I could have conceivably come into contact with

and I said that I damaged it.

I was so desperate to, like, do the right thing

that I clung onto the idea, like, "Okay, if I--

"if I can replace the stuff that I damaged,

then I'll be okay and I can move past this."

But then how do I know what to replace?

I look at my list. And what's on the list?

A ridiculous number of items

with a ridiculous ending price tag.

And then that's when I started asking my parents for money.

$750.

SANTOS: At a certain point, he was like,

"You don't really want to pay this back.

"Like, who are you asking to help you?

Just your parents? They don't want to help you."

So I was like, "Okay, I'm gonna ask

everybody that I know."

♪ ♪

JULI ANNA: Get a call from Santos which

puzzled me because I hadn't talked to him in months.

He told me he needed $5,000.

But my suspicion was that it involved Larry.

And so I--I, you know, politely refused the money.

- Santos called me out of the blue

and he asked for either $2,500 or $25,000

as a loan.

And, like... [chuckles]

I was working at, like, a drugstore.

I didn't have $25,000.

He never talked to me again after that.

RAVEN: I did believe

and said to multiple people on campus

"I think there's something very inappropriate

"happening with Larry Ray,

and I'm worried about my friends."

I said that to a lot of people.

Probably not in those words, but I expressed that. Often.

JAMES: What words do you think you used?

Um, "He's a pervert and a sicko.

And something fucked up is going on in there."

MAX: I was worried about my friends at that point.

I had no idea what was going on.

And then we all got this email from Claudia

with the subject line "The Truth."

It was addressed to the dean of students,

but it was an open letter.

She CC'd it to everyone who lived in the house.

And Larry.

It was just kind of out of the blue,

very out of character for her.

JULI ANNA: It's basically her...

Confessing to...

I--you know, so much of this, when I got this email, was--

it was just like...

MAX: It was an email taking back

numerous slanderous allegations

she had supposedly made against Larry.

But I had no idea

about any of the allegations in the first place.

RAVEN: When you try to read it,

it doesn't make any sense.

She never said this stuff to anybody.

If you look at the words, these are Larry words.

It's Larry's attempt to undo

what I was saying all around campus.

♪ ♪

MAX: I mean, who writes an open letter to the dean

and CC's their entire dorm?

The fact that one of their students

would send an email like this

should have absolutely raised alarm bells.

They didn't even reach out to us.

They didn't ask any questions.

JULI ANNA: I mean, I was shocked

and really confused,

and frankly just thought

Claudia had gone off the deep end.

GABE: I tried to get in contact with her.

I got no response

until all of a sudden she called me.

Out of the blue.

- That was when I think I would have first started

using the word "cult" to talk about what was going on.

- I talked about it a lot, especially to Max.

I would say, "Do you think this is happening?"

"Do you think he's abusing them?"

"Do you think that they're okay?"

Like, I had a lot of theories

about what could be going on.

But none of them were as elaborate

or horrible as what was actually to come.