283: Sherri Papini DOUBLES DOWN on Abduction Claims. Says She’s the Victim
01:14:50 Share

Hey, true crime besties. Welcome back to an all-new episode of Serialistly. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to an all-new episode of Serialistly with me, Annie Elise. We have got, like, the motherlode of all deep dives today. It's a case that I honestly did not think that I was going to be revisiting anytime soon. Not even anytime soon. Anytime period. I didn't think that I was going to be revisiting it. Yet, here I am.

Here we are, because this chick, the enigma that is Sherry Papini, just will not go away. Now, you might have recently heard that a new documentary came out where Sherry is giving an interview. She's retelling her version of events and what happened that day, which if you have no idea what I'm talking about, don't worry. I'm going to recap it for you. But you might have heard how she's like doubling down on her claims.

That's not all. In addition to doubling down on her kidnapping story or abduction story, she also is making some pretty serious allegations against her former husband and almost as though she's justifying what happened to her and what she did and saying that he is the root of all evil and that he was evil long before the whole hoax happened

thing ever really happened. So there is a lot that we need to dissect. There is a lot we need to go over. Now before I give you the very brief recap of who Sherry Papini is and what she did and why I

pretty much, I would say, the majority of the country dislikes her. I do want to give you some good news, okay? You might have heard if you listened to headline highlights last week, but once again this year, I am heading off to CrimeCon. This year, it's in Denver. Last year, it was in Nashville. Last year, about 6,000 people attended. And if you don't know what CrimeCon is, it basically is exactly what it sounds like, almost like Comic-Con, but...

for crime and it's not some weird crazy convention like let me just get ahead of it it's not like where all these like crazy true crime fans are going and it's all weird it's I mean I guess a little bit but it's more than that it's basically a convention where yes true crime content creators podcasters and networks all come together victims families also come last year John Benet Ramsey's father was there the Petito family was there Dateline goes Court TV goes Nancy Grace goes and

It is just this big crime convention where there are panels, there are live episodes being recorded, there are crime scene analysts who are giving you guys tools and tips and things on how they do all the scientific stuff forensically. There's also educational courses. And so

it's become a pretty big deal. Like I said, last year, over 6,000 people went. And this year, it's expected to be even larger and it's in Denver. So last year was my first year. This year, I'm going back. We're gonna have a booth set up again. I'm gonna be doing a live episode from there. I'll be at the booth meeting you. We'll have exclusive merch. We'll have all of the things. But my point in all of that

is that I am giving away two free passes to you. I've partnered with CrimeCon and they sell their passes as like a full weekend pass. I think they also sell day passes, but they are giving away two free weekend passes to you. So I'm going to give you some details later on in the episode of how to enter. I will announce the winner this Thursday, but give you all those details later on in the episode. So if you are interested in coming and you've been

thinking about it but you're not quite sure if you're ready to pull the trigger just wait and I'll give you the full details and if you know you want to go and you don't want to miss out and you don't want to wait and risk tickets selling out because they definitely sold out last year you can always go to the crime con website and buy your tickets right now and you can also use my promo code annieelise to get 10% off but if you prefer to wait and have the freebies and take your chance at that totally understand it and we'll give you the details soon.

So now let's get into Sherry Papini because as I said, this woman is like a full-on enigma. I don't even know how to describe her. I don't know how to get inside her brain. There is so much to unravel and I'm really curious to hear from you after I break down this new documentary. Do you think that she was lying all of this time and that it was all some big hoax because she wanted to just run off and be with her ex for a while?

Or do you think that there is validity in what she is now saying and truth to her allegations against her husband and allegations of the abduction? I'm curious to know what you think. So we are going to jump right in. I'm Sherry Papini. I was abducted and I was tortured and the FBI said I made it all up. I really challenge anybody watching this film, how truthful are you? Hello.

I'm Sherry Papini. Nice to finally meet you. The story that the world thinks they know is that I am a master manipulator who's fooled everyone. That's my magic wand. Sorry. I'm gonna do ridiculous things because some of this is ridiculous. So this was Sherry's first ever major interview since 2016, since all of this first went down, so almost ten years.

Last year, we did see her husband Keith speak in a docuseries called The Perfect Wife, The Mysterious Disappearance of Sherry Papini, and he definitely did get to speak his piece. We heard some new allegations there and some things that he had to share that were a little bit unsettling, to say the least. But now it seems almost as though Sherry's taking her opportunity to not necessarily retaliate, but...

to speak her version of the truth. Now, like I said, I know for a lot of you, the name Sherry Papini is one that you've probably at the very least, at least heard or are a little bit familiar with. But because this case did happen nine years ago at this point, I am going to give a little bit of a brief backstory of just who Sherry is, the main event that had her name and face in the headlines for all the wrong reasons, and just a little bit of the back

story. So Sherry Papini was a 34-year-old mom of two back in 2016, and she was seemingly a very doting and loving wife to her husband, Keith Papini. The two of them had married back in 2009, and from then on, it seemed like the rest was history. And I'll be honest, from the outside looking in, Sherry's life was perfect. In

In every single picture of this beautiful family of four, they were all holding each other close, snuggling up next to each other, had these big bright smiles, just looking as happy and as wholesome, if I'm going to be honest, as possible. They were the type of family who people really envied.

Keith and Sherry seemed head over heels in love with each other too. I mean, it just seemed picture perfect. They had brought these two beautiful children into the world. They had this amazing love story and perfect connection. I mean, what's not to envy, right? But as we all know, and as I say way too many times that I can even count at this point, sometimes looks can be deceiving. And what's the saying? He who shouts the loudest has the most to hide.

And that definitely feels true in this case. And that's pretty much the perfect description of Sherry and her situation. That is what I will refer to it as, her situation. So on November 2nd, 2016, this petite, beautiful, blonde hair, blue eyed, all American mom went out for a jog,

like so many people do in the morning, right? It was nothing huge, just a little lap that she was going to make around her neighborhood in Redding, California. Something to just get the day started, get the blood pumping, you know, start off the day on a good note, get those endorphins in. But not too long into this jog...

She was abducted, just grabbed right off the street. She was missing, and it wasn't until later in the day that her absence was even noticed. Keith came home from work, and he found it weird that she wasn't there because she typically always was at the house right around the time he got home from work.

On top of that, the kids were not home either. So, a little bit worried, he ended up calling the kids' daycare to see exactly what time they had been picked up that afternoon from Sherry. Maybe he'd get a better idea of what their day had been like, where they could all possibly be. Maybe she picked them up early, took them to ice cream, to a movie. But the problem was, the daycare told Keith that the kids had not been picked up at all that day. In fact, they were still there.

So that is when Keith called 911. Hello, can I help you? Yeah, so I just got home from work and my wife wasn't there, which is unusual. And my kids should have been there by now from like daycare. So I was like, oh, maybe she went on a walk.

I couldn't find her, so I called the daycare to see what time she picked up the kids. The kids were never picked up, so I got freaked out, so I hit, like, the find my iPhone app thing, and it said that her, it showed her phone, like, at our end of our driveway. We don't have really good service. Okay. Not the end of our driveway, but the end of our street. So I just drove down there, and I saw her phone with her headphones because she started running again.

And it's, I found her phone and it's got like hair ripped out of it, like in the headphones. So I'm like totally freaking out thinking like somebody like grabbed her. Okay, what's your address? Redding. Okay, what's your last name? Yes, Papini, P-A-P-I-N-I. And your first name? Keith. K-E-I-P-H?

Yes. Okay. Did you go pick up your children? No, I'm going to call my mom and have her do it. Okay. What's your wife's name? I'm going to knock on every door. Sherry. S-H-E-R-R-I. And same last name? Yes. She white female? Yes. What's her date of birth? It is June 11, 1982. Okay.

Is her vehicle there? Does she not have a vehicle? She has a vehicle. It's at the house. Okay, the vehicle is at the house? She's running. How? Okay. Yes, I'm in it right now driving, and I took a picture of her phone on the ground before I picked it up. Okay, how tall is she? 5'3", 5'4". How much does she weigh? 100 pounds. Eye color?

Like a bluish blue. Okay, hair color? Blonde. Do you know what she was wearing? I'm assuming she went running. Okay, there's not an outfit she always wears or anything like that. Does she run with a dog or by herself? By herself. Okay. What time were the kids? We just started running again. When's the last time you heard from her?

She sent me a text asking me if I was coming home for lunch. What time was that? Give me one second.

Now, pretty much the moment that Keith called 911, Sherry's case blew up. I mean, not only was her disappearance being covered by local news stations, it pretty much became headline news nationwide. All the major programs were reporting on it. You were hard-pressed to turn on the TV and not see the photo, the infamous photo of Sherry just

Big, bright smiled, smiling with her bangs swept to the side, her long, straight blonde hair. It was plastered everywhere. And to be honest, the media presence surrounding her disappearance is one that should probably be studied because I don't know if it was because of her looks, maybe her ethnicity. I'm not really sure what. There are a lot of different factors at play. But for whatever reason, everybody pretty much knew about Sherry and everybody was looking for daily updates on her case.

Here was this mother, this young mother of two beautiful young children. She was happily married, the picture-perfect all-American family, and now she was abducted, ripped away from her family, ripped away from her children. Everybody was searching for updates, and everybody was praying that she would make it back home to her husband and kids. Yet, of course, at the same time as all of the nation was pretty much praying for her safe return...

They also were fearing the absolute worst. People were just astounded at the fact that, you know, someone like her, and that's such a cliche quote, but it's true, but they were just...

shook that someone like her could go missing. They didn't understand how a mom and a wife could just be minding her own business one minute, going for a jog in the morning around her seemingly safe neighborhood, and then be abducted the very next moment. So maybe part of the public interest and public attraction was because people saw a little bit of themselves in her? I'm not really sure. Maybe it made them even more fearful or empathetic towards the situation? I'm not sure.

Now, as we all know, when somebody goes missing and foul play is suspected to be involved, most of the time, the first person and the first point of contact that investigators will look to is the spouse, the partner, right? And it's all a bit subjective depending on who you're asking or what video you're watching.

But all in all, Keith seemed to truly be a very confused and very scared husband. He was doing extensive media interviews. He was constantly pushing for more updates, more information, just really trying to get Sherry's case known and out there. And he was just not letting up, which is a good thing. Don't get me wrong. And on top of that, he was cooperative with the investigators. His story completely checked out. So now, without the focus being on the spouse...

The question really was, and the theory was, you know, where is Sherry? What happened to Sherry? Who could have done this to her? Today's episode is sponsored by Haya Health, and I've talked to you guys about them before because, like, as a parent, I feel like I've tried so many vitamins for my kids, which, let's

Let's be honest, most of them are just like sugar bombs and cute little packaging. But that's why I was really excited when I discovered Hya because it's a chewable vitamin that is actually made for kids, but it doesn't have any of that gummy junk or the added sugar. And my kids love them. I mean, no joke. They loved decorating their own bottles with the stickers that came with the first order. They love the way it tastes. And it kind of just made it feel almost like it's their vitamin, if that makes sense, because it's like kid-friendly, kid-driven.

And Haya fills in the most common gaps in modern kids' diets. They have a blend of 12 organic fruits and veggies and 15 essential vitamins and minerals. It's super clean, no GMOs, no dairy, nothing weird, just what little growing bodies actually need.

And if you're also tired of battling with your kids to eat their greens like I am literally daily, Haya also launched a Kids Daily Greens and Superfoods Powder. It's chocolate flavored, it's packed with over 55 whole food ingredients, and honestly, it is so, so good. You just scoop, shake with milk or any non-dairy drink, and you're done. It's a total win. Try it for yourself and let your kids be the judge.

And the same multivitamin that more than a million kids and parents love is now available with Disney's The Lion King with a new Lion King unboxing experience, including Lion King bottle and Lion King stickers. And we have worked out a very special deal with Haya for their best-selling children's vitamin. Receive 50% off your first order. To claim this deal, you have to go to HayaHealth.com slash AE because this deal is not available on their regular website.

But go to h-i-y-a-h-e-a-l-t-h dot com slash a-e and get your kids the full body nourishment that they need to grow into healthy adults. That's hiahealth.com slash a-e for 50% off your first order.

Today's episode is also sponsored by O Positive, and this is for all of my females out there listening. I know I have a lot of you, and I just want to get real for a second. A lot of us, including myself, sometimes deal with things like discomfort or feeling off down

there and nobody really ever talks about it. Whether it's from tight leggings, working out, hormones, or just life, vaginal pH and flora can easily get thrown out of balance. And that's where Uro comes in. U-R-O. It's a vaginal probiotic from O Positive, a woman's health brand that actually just gets it. They've created a formula with four clinically backed probiotic strains and prebiotics to help support a healthy vaginal pH, balanced flora, and all things that go with it.

And honestly, women are obsessed. Their reviews are wild. People are talking about feeling more confident, more comfortable, even saying that it's changed their intimacy game completely. Two capsules a day and noticeable results in just weeks. So if you've ever wondered if something could help you feel more like you again, this might be it. Try Uro by O Positive because vaginal health is health.

So Sherry was missing. And if you looked at this case from a media perspective...

Anybody who was watching this case and researching it and just seeing it unfold, she had without a doubt been abducted. And a lot of the speculation was that she had been abducted by potential human traffickers. And everybody was, like I said, fearing the worst. So although there were some different theories floating as to who could have been responsible, the main root of this that everybody agreed on was that she had been abducted.

And the same went for law enforcement. Everybody thought that she had been abducted, and they were not only looking for Sherry, but they were also now looking into any potential avenues of foul play. They didn't really have much evidence to go off of, but they were using whatever they had to work with trying to piece this case together. Now what the public didn't really realize at the time was that...

was that the FBI was heavily involved with this case behind the scenes, pretty much from the get-go. And when it came to the FBI's theories, well, let's just say they were making sure to check all of the boxes. They wanted to just be very, very thorough of all of the possibilities. Maybe.

Maybe they were even, I don't know, a little bit skeptical. I mean, of course, they were still looking into the possibility that Sherry had been kidnapped because, by all means, it certainly looked like that was the case. But they also had their suspicions. Like Keith said in the 911 call, he took a photo of Sherry's phone that was lying on the ground left behind before he picked it up. And that picture was a big red flag for a lot of the FBI investigators.

To put it bluntly, Sherry's phone just seemed a little too staged. It was right there, lying on the ground, face up, no scratches, no damage to screen, certainly not indicative of there being any type of struggle or being thrown out, just almost very carefully and strategically placed. So much so, in fact, that the headphones were still connected. They were coiled up together on top of the phone.

which if you go back to 2016, that is before AirPods were a thing, that's before people wearing little beets, before any of that stuff, it was when you had the tethered, corded little buds for your ears. So here it was, it was almost like coiled up together, just wrapped like in a circle on top of the phone, almost like somebody laid it on the ground that way. And yeah, sure, her hair was also wrapped up inside of it, but it didn't look natural.

Now, in this docuseries, a woman named Denise Farmer, who was the lead investigator for the FBI on Sherry's case but has since retired, described their suspicions overall by saying, "This isn't our first rodeo." Which, that's a pretty bold statement, right? Meaning, they had seen kidnapping cases before, they knew what to look for, they had seen some very serious and very gruesome things. And something about this case? It was just off.

but they couldn't pinpoint exactly what it was. And despite all of the extensive searches, despite the FBI being involved and Sherry's face being plastered nationwide, Sherry stayed missing for three whole weeks. But then, early morning on Thanksgiving Day in 2016, Sherry reappeared. Almost as quickly as she had vanished, she was just poof, back.

And she was seen on surveillance footage running through a parking lot, almost as though she was running for her life away from her captors. She had managed to flag someone down during this sprint, and she had them call 911 for help. And it was truly like a moment out of a movie. Somebody escapes their captors, she's running, she flags down this car, they call 911, and she's saved. 911 emergency, what are you reporting?

Hi, I have an emergency. There's a lady on the side of the road needing help. Her name is Sherry Panini. Can I talk to her? Here. Okay.

Now after Sherry reappeared and was discovered alive, there was no question that Sherry was in really, really bad shape.

She had bruises all over her body, all over her face. She also looked so malnourished, so skinny. It was almost as though she had been starved for the past three weeks. And I saw one source that said she only weighed 87 pounds. In addition to that, there were burn marks on her skin. Also, her nose was broken. I mean, it was bad. I definitely cannot deny that. This woman looked as though she had been put through the ringer.

Now, one of the darker things on Sherry's body that had been left behind by her alleged captors was a brand on her back, a branding mark right toward her right shoulder. It was in the stages of healing. It was scabbing over, but it still looked really rough, really gnarly, and it was a brand of

the word Exodus, like in the Bible. The word Exodus just right there, burned onto her skin. So thinking that's a sign or that it would give the investigator some more information as to who could have been responsible for this, they looked into Exodus. But there weren't any verses or anything that really made a whole lot of sense to her situation. So it seemed now more almost like a codename or something like that, something more than an actual deeper meaning.

Now, even though this was arguably the most notable thing about Sherry's condition, this huge branding mark on her back, the FBI and the local authorities agreed they needed to keep this branding a secret, at least for the time being. Mainly because if it was the work of some sort of human trafficking group or something like that, some type of trafficking ring, they didn't want to alert the ring right away. They didn't want to let them know that they were onto them.

They still wanted to have a chance to talk with Sherry, maybe get some more details about what had happened, maybe learn something that could lead them back to whoever had done this to her. But then, once they began talking with Sherry, the FBI became more and more skeptical of her story. You see, Sherry seemed to have all of the answers to every single question that she was asked.

Yet, at the same time, it was almost like she had no answers at all. For example, she was able to give a description of her kidnappers, who she, by the way, described as two Hispanic women who were wearing masks, but then she explained that they had kept a bag over her head the majority of the time, so because of that, she couldn't really ever see much. And Denise, the FBI investigator, noted that she was really descriptive about some of the things, yet never too descriptive about anything of use.

Like how, for example, she remembered the exact coffee table that she was bent over against when she was branded by her captors. She remembered the color, the style of it, everything. Yet she could never recall the color of the vehicle that she had been thrown into when she was abducted. And Denise almost made a joke about this in the docuseries, kind of being like, you know, I can't exactly find a place or a kidnapper based on the coffee table that they own. Like, I need something more, right? And she wondered if that was purposeful on Sherry's part.

Again, this isn't the FBI's first rodeo, and Sherry's interviews with the investigators just kept bringing up more red flags. Denise also noted in this episode that she found the description of the kidnappers to be very odd, because not only do women not typically do the heavy lifting if they are involved in some sort of kidnapping, but they also do the heavy lifting if they are involved in some sort of kidnapping.

But in general, women don't really do a lot of kidnappings or abductions. I mean, sure, yes, Sherry was a tiny woman, so overpowering her definitely would not have been too difficult. But still, it was just weird. I mean, why wouldn't a man be the one doing the abducting and the kidnapping? Why would two women do it? What's the motive there? What's the endgame there? And it wasn't as though these women were doing the man's dirty work, because according to Sherry, she said that those two women were the only ones that she ever came into contact with.

with. There weren't any other women where she was taken to, there was never another man, just these two women that she described. So what would their motive have been? Then there was also the fact that Denise said that during Sherry's interviews with the investigators, she came off as almost flirtatious, kind of like sexual in nature, which that was very odd considering everything that had happened to her.

But she was smiling and she was laughing most of the time. So again, it didn't seem like the behavior or the mental state of someone who had just gone through hell the past three weeks and finally returned. And I gotta say, there are some parallels too with Jodi Arias and Jodi.

how Sherry was acting. And obviously, it's very different circumstances, right? But in Jodi's interview, in many of her interviews, she did play up the sex appeal, the flirtatious kind of demeanor, almost as though

They think their charm and their wit and their personality is going to distract these investigators from the real issue or from identifying any red flags, which, spoiler alert, it actually just does the complete opposite. It's not working on anybody and they can see right through you.

So Denise also thought that it was strange that as more time passed, Sherry still wasn't remembering any new information. And I use the term remembering very loosely. Let me just throw some air quotes around it, okay? Because apparently, Denise had worked with many victims of kidnapping. And usually, it's very common that as time goes on, the victims will slowly start to remember more and more details. Yet...

Sherry never did. So when Sherry first reappeared and she was taken to the hospital, the investigators took some DNA samples from the clothing that she was wearing, right? Hoping that one day maybe the results from this DNA would come back and they would be able to really tie this case together. And spoiler alert,

It did. They did get the DNA hit that they wanted, just not in the way that Sherry was hoping for, I think. Now, it took years for this DNA to be tested and to get a definitive match, but the match wasn't one that anybody was expecting. See, in March of 2022, so six years after this abduction, the DNA came back as male, and it wasn't her husband Keith's. In fact, it was a match to Sherry's ex-boyfriend.

A man named James Reyes. So when the FBI went to confront James about this and be like, hey, why is your DNA on our victim of an abduction? He pretty much folded like a lawn chair, almost like immediately. And what he told the investigators...

Didn't really come as a surprise, but it definitely was a bombshell that nobody in the public, I think, really expected at that point. Because James told the FBI that Sherry had wanted to fake the entire thing. That she's the one who orchestrated all of it. He claimed he was just trying to help his friend out, this former flame of his, this former fling, and Sherry gave him very specific instructions and...

According to him, he just played follow the leader. He claimed that Sherry was trying to get out of her marriage, which she claimed to have been miserable in for months. So the two of them would text each other on a burner phone, just kind of coming up with the perfect plan, figuring out when they're going to pull the trigger on all of this. And...

Sure enough, Sherry did. She had no reservations. According to her, she wanted to escape her horrific marriage, which, don't worry, we're going to get into those allegations here in a bit. Now, at first, the FBI wasn't sure if James was telling the truth, because it would have been just as easy for him to say that he went along with this whole thing if, in reality, he's the one who orchestrated it, right? He just as easily could be like, no, it was her idea. It was her. It didn't have anything to do with me. So they needed to vet him. They needed to vet his story.

And they were able to do that pretty easily because the FBI became very quickly convinced that James was telling the truth when he told them that he knew about the brand that was on Sherry's back. Remember, this is something that they kept very close to the chest. They did not want that detail out, yet James knew about it. And just like the plan that he claimed Sherry orchestrated...

He also said Sherry is the one who branded herself. He claimed that Sherry instructed him to go to a nearby craft store. I believe it was a Hobby Lobby to be specific. And she had him buy a wood-burning kit. With that, she then had the tools to brand herself or to have him help her assist with the branding.

So according to James, the entire thing was fake. The abduction, the being held against her will for three weeks, being branded by these captors, it was all Sherry's doing.

Yet, of course, when Sherry was confronted with all this information, she denied everything. She stuck with her story, saying, no, these two Hispanic women abducted me. She claimed that she never saw James. She never even came into contact with James. And she even doubled down that she had never come into contact with a man, period, during her abduction. No man at all, let alone her ex-boyfriend. But as all of this was happening, simultaneously, the FBI was able to confirm that the two of them had been talking.

They had been talking for months prior to this kidnapping, all on burner phones, just planning the whole thing, just like James had said. So now it was this back and forth between Sherry and James. Who was telling the truth? Surely only one of them could be telling the truth, and it definitely didn't seem like it was Sherry. Your presence here is voluntary. Yeah. You can go at any time, and...

All we want is truthful statements because it's a crime to lie to federal officers. Wow, yeah. That's good. Understood. The reason why he got a rash on your arm was because you cleaned his house. The reason why the brand is because he went to the store, bought the brand new tools, and branded you. The reason why your nose was broke is because of a hockey stick. I know all of those things, and I know there was no sex. I know all of that because he passed a polygraph test.

That said, it's not an abduction. She asked me to come get her. No. I rented a car. No. I drove up and picked her up. He passed the polygraph test, Sherry. If that's not what happened, what did happen, Sherry? I don't know. No, there's no way it's changed. There's no way. The DNA doesn't lie. His DNA. His DNA was on you. There's no way. Robert saw you in the house.

So finally, on March 3rd, 2022, Sherry was arrested for lying to federal agents and for faking her own kidnapping. Six weeks later, she pleaded guilty to one count of making false statements and one count of mail fraud. Meanwhile, her husband Keith, he filed for divorce almost instantaneously. He also filed for full custody of their two children. But now investigators say Sherry Papini made the whole thing up, convincing an ex-boyfriend to take her to Southern California to

And according to the criminal complaint, her ex-boyfriend said those injuries came from hitting herself to create bruises and burning herself on her arms. At one point, even allegedly asking her ex to give her a bruise by slapping a hockey puck at her, telling him, bank a puck off my leg, then telling him to go to Hobby Lobby to buy a wood-burning tool and brand her, which he did, telling investigators Papini never really complained about the pain. So Sherry was sentenced to 18 months in prison.

However, she only ended up serving a little shy of a year. Then she was released. Now that is the Cliff Notes version of her hoax, her abduction. And this took the media by storm. Because remember, years had gone by since her abduction, her miraculous return. And then to be hit over the head with the fact that it was all fake, it was all planned by her.

And she immediately became the villain because now what people were once asking of, oh my gosh, praying that this mother of two and this wife is safely returned home and that she's alive. Now people were asking the question, why would this mother of two children and this wife to an amazing husband fake marriage?

her own kidnapping and leave her children for three weeks, leave her family grief-stricken in turmoil. What kind of monster would do something like that?

And she was just like the instant villain across every single screen. So that, like I said, is the Cliff Notes version of the hoax. It took the media by storm. Now ever since her release, there has definitely been some chaos brewing in the Papini world. Because as I said, Keith filed for divorce. He also filed for full custody. So they have been in this ongoing custody battle for a long time now over their two children.

But then in 2024, Keith dropped a major bombshell, one that was going to put the entire custody dispute on its head, something that literally nobody saw coming because if people thought that it couldn't get any worse than this mother of two staging her own kidnapping, it was about to get way worse. ♪

all right i have talked to you guys about this before but i have had my helix mattress for four years now maybe actually even longer and i am still just as obsessed with it as i was the very first night that i slept on it before helix i was waking up constantly either with back pain hip pain overheating or every time jeremiah rolled over i felt like i was like rocking and on a boat and i could feel every piece of movement but helix changed all of that i took their sleep quiz and i got matched with the sunset luxe and it honestly feels like it was custom made for me

It is the perfect mix of comfort and support, and the cooling features are so amazing, just like a lifesaver. I'm having deeper sleep now with my sleep scores on Aura. I wake up feeling rested. I'm not sore, and that's actually saying a lot. I have two little toddlers, so waking up well-rested is like a huge win. I love it so much. I told you too. I got one for my mom. She is obsessed with it. She didn't even need a new mattress, but she slept over one night and was telling me how comfortable it was and how much she loved it, so I was like, let's get you a new mattress because everything

I believe everybody needs a Helix. She now is also telling everybody about it. It's almost like she's a brand ambassador for them like me, even though I'm not a brand ambassador, although I should be because I truly do love it that much. So yeah, four or five years in now, still sleeping like a dream in my fluffy moon cloud, and I'm still recommending Helix to anyone who will listen.

So if you've been thinking about upgrading your sleep, this is your sign. Go to helixsleep.com slash serialistly for 20% off site-wide. That's helixsleep.com slash serialistly for 20% off site-wide. helixsleep.com slash serialistly. Summer is here and it is my favorite time of year.

But it's also usually when I feel the tension between wanting to enjoy cookouts, beach days, easy sandwiches, but also trying to stay on track with my health goals and like being in my summer swimsuit. But that's why Hero Bread has totally just like changed everything for me. Everything that I thought I knew about carbs has been changed because I've been using their bagels, their tortillas, and their buns nonstop for probably about a year now. And I'm not kidding when I say they taste just like the real deal. Soft,

fluffy, and honestly better than some of the traditional options. I make breakfast sandwiches with their classic plain bagels before I run out the door every day. I use the tortillas to cook quesadillas for the kids. It's just so good. And the nutrition is unreal. I mean, their bagels have zero grams of sugar and just four to five net carbs, but up to 19 grams of protein.

So I'm getting more fiber, I'm cutting sugar, and I'm still enjoying all of my favorite foods from tacos to wraps to burgers to bagels, you name it. They even have small batch drops like a Hero Croissant with only two grams of net carbs. So I always am stalking the site like waiting for their new little drops to drop because they're so good. Bottom line with Hero Bread, there's zero compromise. It's

all the flavor, all the satisfaction without wrecking your goals. Hero Bread is offering 10% off your order too. Just go to hero.co and use code AE at checkout. That's A-E at H-E-R-O dot C-O. Hero.co. Use code AE for 10% off at checkout.

So now fast forward two years after Sherry's arrest, and she's also been released at this point. And in 2024, Keith spoke out in a docuseries titled The Perfect Wife, The Mysterious Disappearance of Sherry Papini. And in this docuseries, Keith accused Sherry of purposefully getting their children sick, making their children sick, sort of like a Munchausen's by proxy situation. He was quoted as saying,

One day after Sherry was already in prison, as I go and lay my daughter to bed, I push off the bed and I kind of make this little grunt sound like, ugh, ugh, you know, I was a little bit sore. And Violet, she was like, daddy, are you sick?

And then she goes, why don't you do mommy's trick? So I was like, mommy's trick? What are you talking about? And she was like, well, you just breathe in this rubbing alcohol. So I was like, what? She then goes to the bathroom and she knows right where the rubbing alcohol is.

She wads up a thing of toilet paper, just soaks it in the rubbing alcohol, and then hands it to me for me to breathe. Almost like huffing. So he claimed that he then asked his daughter, how often, you know, did Sherry, how often did mommy make you do this? Which her response was, well, whenever we got sick.

We did it every single day. So he continues this interview by saying, you know, the next thing I know, my kids are getting forensic interviews done. We find out that Sherry would soak rags of alcohol and then put it in a Ziploc bag and tie a string to it, that she would tie a string around their neck onto the Ziploc bag so that the fumes would just go up.

so that they would continue to smell the fumes to make them not feel good, so that then she could take them to the doctor. Now, I know that that was a little bit of a fractured quote, but I wanted to just recite it verbatim. So basically what he's saying is that his daughter confides in him that, oh, you know, every time we're sick, why don't you do what mommy does with us so that you'll feel better? You soak the toilet paper in the rubbing alcohol, you put it up to your mouth and nose, and you start huffing it in. Then...

As he tells the authorities and they start getting forensic interviews done, it goes beyond just that. It went so far as she would soak these rags in the rubbing alcohol, put it inside a Ziploc bag, open the Ziploc bag, then make that like a necklace that they would wear around their neck so they're inhaling these fumes just automatically.

all day, until ultimately, it of course made them very, very sick, and she would then have to take them to the doctor. Now these are obviously very serious allegations, pretty hefty claims, and I think both sides of the authenticity of these claims could be argued, right? Because, like I said, they are in an ongoing custody battle.

So her reputation had already gone to complete shit at this point. I mean, that happened the moment she was arrested, and it doubled when she pleaded guilty, and all of her stories and lies came to the surface. So now you add in that she's potentially abusing her children as well, she would never stand a single chance of getting custody. Not parental visitation rights, not shared custody, not full custody, I mean nothing. However, like I said...

I think you could probably argue both sides, because could this just be one more thing that proves that Sherry is unhinged, that she's dangerous, and that she... I don't even know what the word would be. Not egotistical, but always has to make things about her. Her abduction, Munchausen's by proxy. Like, certainly it could prove that, and Keith may very well just be wanting to protect his kids, especially in a custody battle, but it could also be argued that...

Keith wanted to win this custody battle, and that he had resentment towards Sherry for running off with her ex-boyfriend for three weeks, for lying about the abduction, and that he could fabricate a story to make her look worse than she was, which...

or more dangerous, I should say, than she was. So there was a lot of division as to what was to be believed, although I will say the majority of feedback that I saw in the public was that people were siding with Keith. They certainly believed him because I think that it was easy to believe that Sherry would be capable of something like that, given her history. But there were some people who questioned the reality of it, the truth behind it. So that was aired out in 2024. Not very long ago, right?

And now in comes this new docuseries and it just released and it's being advertised as a type of like Sherry Papini finally speaks or Sherry Papini is ready to tell the truth or tell her truth, which I'm just going to go ahead and lay it all out there. I 1,000 million trillion percent believe that this is

all part of some greater plan to try and prove that she is not this psychotic monster and that she deserves to see her children, that she is the victim in this. I think it is carefully crafted, carefully orchestrated, just like her abduction story.

Because if it's not part of a plan in the greater scheme to see her children, it all just seems like very coincidental timing, right? Why didn't you speak out and share your version of the truth until now? Why have you waited years? It's been almost 10 years since the abduction itself. Why now? Why did it have to be when custody was threatened?

I don't know. And you tell me what you think as we start going through her new claims in this docuseries, which I also just have to throw this out there before we get into it, and I will mention it as we go. Her behavior in this docuseries was very uncomfy to watch. It was, I don't even want to say cringe or ick. There needs to be a new word for it. She was like,

thinking that she was funny and charismatic and like making jokes and flipping her hair and thinking that she was like funny and cute but

To me, it just looked like a woman who was highly disturbed, if I'm being honest. And this really kicks off within the first few seconds of the episode, in episode one of the docuseries, because she's laughing, she's making jokes, and it's really, honestly, uncomfortable and difficult to watch. And if you had no idea what this case was even about, her demeanor definitely wouldn't have even clued you in. She didn't give any sort of indicators. It just felt very performative. Hello. Hello.

I'm Sherry Papini. Nice to finally meet you. The story that the world thinks they know is that I am a master manipulator who's fooled everyone. That's my magic wand.

Sorry. I'm going to do ridiculous things because some of this is ridiculous. So the first episode really dives into things like her disappearance, the FBI skepticism, her magical return home. Except we already start to see this narrative that Sherry is trying to create through this.

There's talk about how Keith only cared about his image, how he made sure that the media portrayed their family as happy and whole and wholesome and, you know, the perfect all-American family the entire time that she was missing, despite other people close to the family saying that in reality, it was the complete opposite.

Then when Sherry sits down for her portion of the interview during this episode, the producers just kind of lay it all out there for her. They immediately just say point blank to Sherry, you're a convicted liar. So tell me, why should we believe you now? And her response to this wasn't even trying to sugarcoat it. I don't know if she thought that this was going to land. I don't know what she was thinking. But she asks, haven't you ever lied? Have you ever lied in your history of existence?

and then that lie has been blown up and broadcasted around the world, it's so much more complex than just pointing the finger and saying, you're a liar. I'm sorry, it's not that much more complex. You lied about being abducted. You lied about your captors. You pulled a race card out saying it was two Hispanic women. You branded yourself and said that it was your captors who branded you and you were gone for three weeks. Like, it's...

The story is, yes, complex, but that is not somebody who tells a white lie. That is not somebody who says a small little lie and then it gets blown up and broadcasted. That is a diabolical lie. So as you can imagine, she now is with this, is kind of coming from this angle of, yeah, I lied about some things, but with good reason. And now I'm ready to share the truth. So you should just believe me because now I'm going to tell you the truth, which is

after almost a decade which again begs the question why now why are you finally ready to share your truth so immediately she starts talking about keith just building off things that were already introduced in this segment she agreed that yes he was all about his image the image was so important to him that he wanted her to be the perfect wife he didn't want anything to ruin their reputations he didn't want this hoax to ruin their family's reputation he was just very much you know

Image, image, image. And I made note of this earlier, of the fact that she talked about how immediately after her arrest, Keith was just like done with her. He wasn't even there to pick her up when she got released on bond. He just left her to kind of fend for herself, though she did have some people there. The judge ordered my kid to drink it. The judge ordered my kid to drink it. How do you feel about that? You're not even a best friend. You're not even a best friend. Why do you think he has to be today?

You don't want to say anything at all? You think you'll be doing 5 or 20 million money, Sherry? You say about the same thing that you defrauded $30,000. Huh, Sherry? Sherry, what do you want to tell people? How was it like in jail?

By the time she made it back to their house though, her things were all in trash bags and she was told to leave and find somewhere else to stay. And look, I'm going to try to not get too heated or opinionated here, but let me just ask you this question. If

If you had supported your spouse and had been writing for them for literal years, backing their story in their corner, totally defending them to anybody who was skeptical of what the truth may be, then you find out that they've been playing you for a fool the entire time and lied to everyone and left you and your children willingly. How would you react?

I'd probably do the exact same thing. I, you know, I wouldn't even put this stuff in trash bags. I'd probably torch it all, honestly. So maybe some people will think that Keith overreacted in that situation. I don't know. Maybe not. I certainly don't. I'm just saying like what this man had gone through for six years of just having her back and supporting her, going to PTSD treatments, to just giving her everything she needed and doting on her, then to find out, uh,

no, it was all a lie. It was all fabricated and orchestrated by her. I would imagine that that sense of betrayal runs pretty deep. So then she starts getting into her story, which, buckle in, grab your popcorn, because this is where it gets truly unhinged. She claims, she double downs, and she claims that James, her ex, that he kidnapped her and that he held her hostage.

She says that he beat her and tortured her for 22 days. And she made a big deal of the fact that none of it was consensual. None of the interactions, none of the physical interactions, that nothing was consensual. It wasn't planned. She didn't tell him to come pick her up. Nothing. She was basically saying, I was abducted. And yeah, it wasn't two Hispanic women who abducted me. It was him who abducted me. Point blank, period.

Which I have to say is pretty rich, right? Maybe there's truth to it. Again, I want to know what you think. You tell me if you believe this. But I think that's pretty convenient. And why are you only saying this 10 years later? Why would you plead guilty and have to serve time in a facility in prison or jail or whatever the facility was if this was your truth? If this really happened?

Why go through all of the public torment and being painted as a liar and all that if this is what really happened? It makes no sense. Now here's how things all went down according to her. She says that there was some type of relationship between the two of them, but around that time when all this went down, she could tell that James was getting feelings for her. So she knew that she needed to end things before things got too sticky. But when she tried to end it,

He apparently got very angry, and he started threatening her, saying he would show up to her house or to her husband Keith's job, that he wanted to be with her, that he wasn't going to take no for an answer. Yet she says that she still wanted to end things, but because of how angry and passionate he was becoming, she figured that it would be better to do so in person. Just a final goodbye, as she described it. So she told him they would get together that day, that she was going for a run, and that was that.

Only during her run, she says he showed up and that's when he kidnapped her. Which first of all, let me just tell you this too. Keith lives in Huntington Beach or lived in Huntington Beach at the time. She lived in Redding, California. Those aren't neighboring towns. That is hours of a drive apart from one another. So it's not like, oh, he found out that morning they were going to meet up later that day and she was going for a run and he just happened to cruise by the neighborhood. Just logistically, it didn't make much sense.

Also, why were they communicating leading up to this kidnapping or this abduction with the burner phones? Well, don't worry. She had an answer for that too. She then switches gears in order to explain the entire story better, and she goes back to her marriage with Keith. And she starts painting Keith as very controlling.

She says things were okay when they were both working, but when she got laid off and became financially dependent on him, he apparently started showing his true colors. She claimed that he started isolating her from her friends and her family, so because of that, she basically became just very lonely, very miserable. And she also described that Keith apparently came up with a new rule.

This rule was that Sherry wasn't allowed to talk to him at night, and she wasn't in any position to not obey because she was dependent on him financially, emotionally, lovingly, whatever it was. She also told a story that happened prior to their wedding when she had gone to one of those wedding expos. Those used to be really big back in the day. It was like a big wedding convention. I think they still are around a little bit, but certainly not to the degree that they used to be. But it's like where you could find florists.

Wedding dresses, colors, linens, whatever it is you want. I mean, maybe they're still as big, but I have never heard of them. But you get what I'm saying. So there's this video that was played during the episode of her outside of this expo where she's bragging about how Keith showed up to the expo to surprise her and support her, help her plan for the wedding that they were both so excited about. Now, she claimed that the video was a good example of how things really were in their relationship.

Picture perfect on the outside, but a complete disaster on the inside. She claimed that Keith hadn't shown up to surprise her in a supportive way, but rather because he hadn't trusted that she was actually where she said that she was going to be, saying he wanted to catch her in a potential lie. And like I said, that was before they were even married, so according to Sherry, apparently it just got worse and worse over the years. She even noted that after the abduction, but before her arrest,

Keith still continued to control her finances. She said, and I quote,

And I will say, interestingly enough, they pulled up picture proof of those withdrawals on the docuseries, and they even reached out to Keith's legal team for comment.

which his team claimed that the withdrawals were for, quote, shared household expenses. So maybe that's true. Maybe she has some truth in there. Maybe it's somewhere in between. I mean, take that how you may. Now, all of that to say that it was this alleged abuse and control that had been going on for years from Keith that ultimately led her to reaching out to her ex, James, in the first place. She clarified that she was only ever emotionally cheating because, again, she says that she felt lonely and she felt isolated.

She just wanted somebody to listen to her, somebody to hear her. And according to her, she knew that James would be that person. Now, I do want to just throw this out there, even though I don't necessarily believe everything that she is saying. But I want to be clear. If this is all true, it's obviously really, really sad. Because any case of spousal abuse or financial abuse is incredibly heartbreaking and absolutely unacceptable.

It's emotional control. It's emotional power. So I don't want it to seem like I don't believe that things like this never happen or make it seem like we shouldn't believe women who come forward or anything like that. I'm just putting it into context with everything she's lied about already and admitted to lying about and where there could possibly be motive now for this new lie. So again, do your own research, come to your own conclusions, form your own opinions. She absolutely might be telling the truth.

We do know that the FBI proved she faked her own kidnapping. She admitted to it when she pleaded guilty. Now her story's changing again, but that's really all we know. Those are the facts that we have to work with. And in my opinion, she is a master manipulator. And like most master manipulators, I think that she throws in a bunch of little truths to then make the lies seem more believable.

But then again, maybe everything she said about Keith is true too. I don't know. Who really knows? So going back a little bit, like I said, she started messaging James, and she said that she didn't want to get caught by Keith because they had a post-NUP agreement in place. It would essentially leave her with nothing and in a really bad life predicament, so she had to do this under the radar. It had to be in secret. And the post-NUP pretty much said that if she was ever caught cheating, and they divorced because of the cheating, that she would get absolutely nothing.

And being that she already had basically nothing, she felt like she would be screwed if she got caught doing this. So by saying all of this, she's essentially arguing that the whole purpose of the burner phone was to protect herself while emotionally cheating.

The burner phones weren't purchased or used to concoct this elaborate kidnapping scheme. It was simply done so that she wouldn't get caught emotionally cheating. And to be as fair as possible, I do want to mention that during episode two, one of the investigators does say that technically anything is possible.

They were never able to access all of the messages on the phone to see the full conversations, and I think they worded it somewhere along the lines of, the only people who know what they were talking about all of those months were James and Sherry, and they obviously are both saying very different things. So as far as all of that goes, we can't say 100% for a fact that Sherry was lying about what the messages entailed.

because we just don't know. We don't have them. We haven't seen them. It really just comes down to who you personally believe. Which brings me to my next question.

What if James kidnapping her really was the truth? Why did Sherry not just come forward before? Why not tell the truth when the FBI was, you know, breathing down your neck, threatening to arrest you, which they obviously did end up doing? But again, according to Sherry, she had an answer for all of this. She knew exactly what to say. And Sherry pretty much argued that she never came forward before because it was very simple. She was terrified.

She claimed that James warned her that he was going to be watching the coverage on the case and that he would know if she told anyone, specifically if she ever told on him. She also claimed that he threatened her with the leverage that he had against her, aka the emotional cheating, the back and forth messages, all of that.

Now my only thing with that explanation is why not tell the FBI when they first confront you about everything or not even when they confront you right out of the gate when you are rescued and reappear. Why not tell them that James was responsible so that they can arrest him and put him behind bars so that he can't hurt you.

Which I get it, it doesn't always work perfectly like that. Sometimes it doesn't work like that, and that's why a lot of people who are victims do not come forward. But my point is, if you even remember back to what I said earlier on this episode, when they found the DNA that matched him, he of course said, no, she orchestrated this, it was all her doing, but easily that could have been a lie. He could have just been saying that because he didn't want to get caught as being this kidnapper and this abuser, but they had the DNA.

So why not tell the FBI the truth almost 10 years ago now if that really was the truth? Why now? And I guess you could argue that she was still worried about him telling Keith about the cheating and then her being stripped away with nothing if Keith divorced her so that she would just continue this lie. I don't really know.

I get that sometimes there's a lot of fear and there's a lot of unknowns. You want to pick the lesser of two evils. But it kind of looks to me like she chose the greater of two evils instead. So, I don't know. Just some food for thought. Now, her main thing through all of this is that everything was done with her kids in mind. She says she survived the kidnapping because she was constantly thinking about her kids.

She says she didn't come forward because she didn't want Keith to find out about the emotional affair and then get full custody of the kids. She didn't tell Keith the truth about this fictitious story because she didn't want to lose custody of the kids. Just the kids, the kids, the kids. So again, the reason that I believe that this is all coming out now with this motivation of looking good in this custody battle is...

Once again, because of the kids. Especially because she brought up what Keith said about her in that 2024 docuseries. You know, the Munchausen by proxy stuff. And her explanation for all of that? Well, it is something. ♪

Today's episode is sponsored by SimpliSafe and I have to tell you I was using SimpliSafe before they ever became a sponsor of this podcast. Now you know that moment at night when you're like locking the doors turning off all the lights and you want to just feel completely safe before heading to bed? That is exactly what SimpliSafe gives me. We've had it for a while now as I said and I can honestly say it has changed how I feel about home security. I've been using SimpliSafe for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time and I've been using it for a long time

I used to stress out about every little bump, every noise. I would like look in the hall when it was pitch black at night and I could swear I would see like a shadowy figure or something like that. But now I sleep better knowing that SimpliSafe is watching when I can't. And what really sold me is their new ActiveGuard outdoor protection. Unlike most systems that only react after somebody breaks in, SimpliSafe helps stop it before it even happens. Their AI-powered cameras work with live monitoring agents, all to detect anything suspicious.

If someone's lurking, an agent can talk to them, live, turn a spotlight on them, and even call the police. It's proactive protection, and it actually works. There's no contracts, no hidden fees, and plans start at just around a dollar a day. It's no wonder they were just named Best Home Security System of 2025 by CNET.

So if you're looking for peace of mind, I cannot recommend SimpliSafe enough. I not only have them at my house, but I also have them at my studio now because of all of the equipment. Like I want to make sure things are just like airtight, super safe all the time. So visit simplisafe.com slash Annie to claim 50% off a new system with a professional monitoring plan and get your first month free. That's simplisafe.com slash Annie. There's no safe like SimpliSafe.

Alright guys, as I mentioned at the top of the episode, it is time for you to win those CrimeCon passes. And all you have to do to enter to win is head into the show notes, click the link, and right there it'll take you to a form, fill out a couple of questions, and you will be entered to win the two passes for CrimeCon in Denver, Colorado this September.

We'll be contacting you if you're the winner. I also will be announcing the winner in my Headline Highlights episode this week, as well as on my community page on my YouTube channel. So good luck, all of you. And even if you don't win, I hope you consider coming to CrimeCon. I would love to meet all of you. And as always, thank you so much for your support with this podcast and with all the episodes that we do.

So now we get to the part of the docuseries where Sherry addresses the Munchausen by proxy claims, to which she claims the idea of her poisoning her own kids is not only insane, but just absolutely untrue. She explained that both of her kids have extremely sensitive skin and that they always get rashes whenever they use Vicks Vaporub.

So she says that whenever they would get sick, she would have to come up with something else to help them feel better, but she would need to accommodate their skin issues. If she wanted to give them the vapor and the fumes, but not put the Vicks Vapor Rub on their skin and cause it to be irritated. So, okay.

According to her, the next best thing is huffing, I guess, because she says that she would take a cotton ball, fill it with peppermint essential oils, then put it in a Ziploc baggie and tie it around their neck like a necklace. Very similar to what her daughter claims Sherry did, although now she's substituting that rubbing alcohol for peppermint essential oils and peppermint.

She also was saying that it's because she didn't use Vicks Vaporub, but she wanted them to have those fumes. She also made it very clear that she never let them go to sleep with it on, and that it wasn't ever tied very tightly around their neck. She claimed it would always be loose, it would always be hanging down around their chest, so that the vapors would just be right there under their nose, almost as if they had Vicks on their chest.

Now, could that be true? Possibly. Do I think it's true? Probably not. Even if your child has sensitive skin and you don't want to use Vicks...

fine don't use Vicks but then put some oil in a diffuser in their bedroom that's what I did with my daughter that's what I still do with my kids they I use Vicks as well but you put these oils and these you know whether it's eucalyptus peppermint whatever you want to use put it in a diffuser so that they're inhaling it all night or put it in a cotton ball and

tap it right under their nose. Don't put it in a Ziploc bag around their neck and just have them walk around and lay down with it. That makes no sense. But again, it's almost as though back to the master manipulator conversation, little bits of truth peppered in with a lie. So is this just enough to where it explains the Ziploc story, but in a way that it doesn't make her look as bad?

Possibly. But then again, remember that during the forensic interviews, the children said they had to do this so frequently that it didn't help their illness. It in fact made them sick and it made them go to the doctor. So what's the truth? And just for fairness sake, one of Sherry's attorneys did note in episode three that the allegations that had been made by Keith are completely unfounded.

She basically says that she's her divorce and family court attorney, and if that was something that was proved and actually on the table when it comes to the custody battle, that she would know about it.

But I just got to say, for not only that allegation that Keith made, because that is a very serious allegation, but also the allegations and the accusations that now Sherry is throwing towards her ex James, is nobody scared about like slander or defamation? Those are very serious things. And you're saying it on a huge national platform, international platform. Are you not scared of the repercussions if they're not true? I

I don't know. I mean, I would be, right? So then toward the end of episode three, Sherry starts discussing some sexual trauma that she experienced as a child. And very similar to the financial abuse that we talked about, this isn't something that I'm going to argue against or really question.

I want to make it clear that the only thing that I do not believe her of being truthful about is the abduction. I think that that is completely fabricated. Other than that, I don't know what is true, what is not true, and I'm not about to question somebody's

life story about things like that. And the only reason I believe that the abduction story is fake and a lie is because the FBI has also come out saying that it's a lie. Everything else in Sherry's life absolutely may be true, and that is her story to share. But the reason I even bring this up is because her therapist argued that this trauma from her childhood, as well as her parents' reaction to the trauma,

is a huge factor into her diagnosed self-defeating personality disorder. And it's a huge factor into everything else that has taken place in her life.

And there's one really huge thing in episode three that I want to touch on because it might be a detail that makes your opinion sway one way or another about if James really did commit this kidnapping and abduction. Because like I said, she's retelling this story of how the abduction happened, how she agreed to meet with James. It was going to be sometime in the day. She went on a run, all of those things. So she says on camera that when she noticed that it was James in the car, she dropped her phone in complete shock.

Then, as she bent down to pick it up, everything went black. That was the last thing that she remembered.

But what doesn't equate with that version of her story is that there are transcripts from an interview that Sherry did after her reappearance where she full stop admitted to her husband Keith that she's the one who pulled out her own hair and that she pulled out her hair and strategically placed it on those headphones because she knew that by leaving that behind, it would indicate that she had been kidnapped.

And the exact quote in the transcript is, So the producers called her out on this, pretty much saying, okay, well, which is it?

And I am not joking, you can see her face just go completely, not like ghost white, but like shell shocked. Just was not expecting it. She is fully stunned. And then she gives some kind of random answer that makes absolutely no sense to the situation. Just kind of faking like she's confused about what they're even asking. Even though they asked it clear as day. They literally said, did you drop your phone by accident or did you place it there for Keith? And

And I don't know what else she could have thought that they were saying, but she was acting confused, acting like she didn't understand the question. And ultimately, she ended up saying that she was telling the truth about it falling by accident. So apparently she was lying about all the strategy and hair placement and, you know, placing it there for Keith to find. So then in episode four, the last episode of the series, Sherry took a polygraph test.

Now, prior to taking the test, she said that she was not worried about the test at all, that she hoped it would be worth it, but she wasn't concerned in the least. Now, this test, it came back with mixed results. So if you were hoping for a solid result to maybe sway you one way or another, don't get too excited. But there were three questions that Sherry answered no to that came back as truthful.

And those questions were, She answered no, and that was truthful. She answered no, and it came back as truthful. Did you ask James to brand you?

She said no, and it came back as truthful. But then there were some questions that came back as inconclusive. Those were, did you arrange for James to pick you up while you were out on your run on November 2nd, 2016? Do you remember getting into James's car on November 2nd, 2016? On November 2nd, 2016, did you enter James's vehicle voluntarily?

So all of those questions came back as inconclusive. So does that polygraph test really clear anything up one way or another? Not really, in my opinion, especially because you have 10 years almost to master the answers and the behavior, right? It's also important to note that in this episode, we also learn that pretty much nobody in Sherry's life, even the ones that she is still close to, believe her entire story. For example, her mom Loretta doesn't even fully believe it.

She was quoted as saying in the documentary, quote, Even her own sister-in-law, Keith's sister, who let her live with her after she and Keith had divorced, doesn't believe her entire story. She told the producers, quote,

I think that she thought that she and James were going to go on a daytime date, and he knew that she was going to be in that location because they were in communication. But I saw her body. I saw her brokenness. She doesn't have any sort of historical context of being into physically abusive sexual practices. And it's also very problematic to me that if it were to be true that she orchestrated all of this, that even if she were to go to someone and say, hit me in the face, or drug me, starve me, burn me, then...

that he's never had to have a consequence to that. So again, it's interesting to me that even those closest to her feel that she often mixes the truth with a set of lies. Her mother is saying that she went with James willingly, that it wasn't a kidnapping, that she just wanted happiness.

Meanwhile, her sister-in-law says, yeah, they were in communication that day. They were going to go out for a day date. Then James abducted her, even if he didn't abduct her and if that was fake, and he was hitting her and branding her at her direction, why has he never had any consequences for that? Now, as of when I'm filming this episode, there was supposed to be a court date for a custody hearing on May 20th.

However, it was delayed due to flooding at the courthouse. And so far, I haven't seen anything about it being rescheduled. So I'm not sure when that's going to take place. Maybe it will have taken place after the time of this recording. But regardless, I will definitely be seeing some updates here soon. I will keep you updated as well because I am very curious to see how all of this plays out.

But my question for you is what do you think of this docuseries? Did it totally blow you away and give you a whole new perspective into Sherry's case? Do you believe her? Or did it solidify your opinions about her as being a master manipulator? Thank you so much for listening with me today. I know that it was a little bit of a roller coaster and hopefully I will not have to talk about Sherry Papini ever again. Well, except for the update with the custody stuff, but I'll probably just like bake that into a Headline Highlights episode.

Other than that, I will be talking to you again this Thursday with an all new headline highlights. So tune in for that and keeping you updated on all things Karen Reed. The defense is fully underway now painting their picture of what really happened that night. And I'm curious to know where you guys sit with that too, if you've been following it because it has been a...

very wild ride of a trial so far. So all of those updates, of course, get posted every single Friday. So as I said, thank you so much for tuning in and until the next one, be nice, don't kill people, don't fake your own kidnapping, don't brand yourself, and definitely, definitely, definitely don't make your kids like huff any fumes. All right, thanks guys.