RIGHT PHOTO COURTESY OF KOMO TV Lorelei Corpuz's photo in the 1995 Pearl City High School yearbook is shown at left beside a more recent photo of her. She was arrested April 1 in Washington state.

Police say busted ‘boy’ is really ex-isle woman

A woman from Oahu allegedly hid her sex to molest a teen girl

For her senior quote in the 1995 Pearl City High School yearbook, Lorelei Corpuz wrote, "Live your life the way you want to and not the way society wants you to."

Until her arrest three weeks ago, Corpuz, 30, was living as a teenage boy with the family of her 16-year-old girlfriend in Everett, Wash.

Police told the girl on April 1 that the person she had known for the past 18 months as Mark Villanueva, her 17-year-old boyfriend, is really an adult woman.

Corpuz told a police detective, "I am still exploring whether or not I should become a lesbian," according to the Snohomish County prosecutor.

Yesterday, the prosecutor charged Corpuz with child molestation in the third degree. The charge is a Class C felony punishable by up to five years in prison.

Corpuz is expected to be arraigned on the charge in state Superior Court next week. She remains in Snohomish County Jail in lieu of $150,000 bail.

The charge stems from actions that allegedly occurred before the girl turned 16, the age at which a person can consent to sex with someone at least four years older under Washington state law.

The girl told police she had sex with Corpuz, including intercourse, but had never seen her genitals, according to a court document from the Everett Police Department. The girl said Corpuz beat her regularly when her father was away at work in Alaska, and bit her on the back twice, leaving a scar, the document said.

The girl also told police Corpuz claimed to be an orphan because her mother died of cancer and her father committed suicide. The Star-Bulletin located Corpuz's parents, who reside on Oahu, but they declined to comment for this article.

Everett police arrested Corpuz on April 1 on an outstanding traffic warrant, said Sgt. Robert Goetz. They pursued child rape and child molestation charges after interviewing Corpuz's teenage girlfriend and determining her age. When police arrested Corpuz, the girl was with her.

Corpuz is being investigated for a similar situation involving a young girl in another jurisdiction and for numerous thefts and frauds in Snohomish County, according to the prosecutor. She assumed the identity of a fictitious 17-year-old, opened a bank account under that identity and wrote bad checks on the account, the prosecutor claims in an affidavit submitted in court.

The affidavit says Corpuz claimed to be homeless, did not have a job and was apparently surviving on money sent to her by her mother and by passing bad checks.

Corpuz has been living in Washington for 10 years, said people who know her.

Her Washington state criminal record dates to 1999. She has two convictions, from a 2001 case for attempted second-degree theft and for driving in 2003 with a suspended license, according to court records. Both are misdemeanors.

Corpuz graduated from Pearl City High in 1995 and was a color guard for the Charger Marching Band for three years. She was also a member of the school's Filipino Youth Club.

She was enrolled at Leeward Community College for one academic year, from August 1995 to May 1996, before moving to Washington.