Everyone Thinks They Know What Happened to Sherri Papini. They Don’t.

[SPEAKER_06]: Today, on Ms.
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[SPEAKER_06]: You had so many chances to come clean.
[SPEAKER_06]: Why did you not take that opportunity?
[SPEAKER_06]: Well, I didn't have the opportunity.
[SPEAKER_06]: People are wondering why you would take a plea deal.
[SPEAKER_05]: You can't beat a game that's already rigged.
[SPEAKER_06]: Why are you writing the book now?
[SPEAKER_06]: Why are you talking now?
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm reclaiming my life.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's time to tell the truth.
[SPEAKER_02]: Every single day she committed to the lie.
[SPEAKER_06]: In two thousand and sixteen, Sherry Papini disappeared while out for a jog near her home in Redding, California.
[SPEAKER_06]: For twenty-two days, the world searched.
[SPEAKER_06]: Her husband pleaded for her say for turn.
[SPEAKER_06]: And when she reappeared, bruised, starved, shackled with a chain, she told police she had been kidnapped by two Hispanic women at gunpoints.
[SPEAKER_06]: The story made headlines around the world, but as time passed and details unraveled, investigators said Sherry had staged the whole thing, running away voluntarily to stay with an ex-boyfriend and then fabricating the abduction.
[SPEAKER_06]: In twenty twenty two, she was sentenced to eighteen months in prison for lying to federal agents and using victim funds fraudulently.
[SPEAKER_06]: Later she admitted she had lied about the identities of her kidnappers, but she did insist she was abducted and was abused.
[SPEAKER_06]: Now with a book and a documentary out of her own, among other documentaries that have been made about her and other books, Sherry Papini has started to speak, but today's conversation is different.
[SPEAKER_06]: Because in this episode of Misunderstood, Sherry tells something she hasn't said in any other interview.
[SPEAKER_06]: Trust me, I've watched everything, I've listened to every interview she's done, I know she's done a couple because she's promoting her book, but this one is different.
[SPEAKER_06]: She sits with me again, I did it on Zoom because she's in California and I'm in Palm Beach, but she was with me one-on-one, not with the script, not with a legal team, but with her own voice.
[SPEAKER_06]: To answer the questions, everyone has been wanting to ask.
[SPEAKER_06]: This is not a press tour moment.
[SPEAKER_06]: This is a raw, unfiltered conversation about why she did what she did, what she says actually happened during those twenty-two days and how she explains the lie that changed the course of her life.
[SPEAKER_06]: And she gets into what the truth really is.
[SPEAKER_06]: This interview leaves no stone unturned, and when it's over, you'll walk away with more insight than you've heard in any headline or headline recap.
[SPEAKER_06]: You'll be forced to ask yourself, was Sherry Papini the liar she really was made out to be?
[SPEAKER_06]: Or is there a deeper truth we've refused to consider?
[SPEAKER_06]: Listen and let me know what you think.
[SPEAKER_06]: As always, thank you so much for tuning into Ms.
[SPEAKER_06]: understood.
[SPEAKER_06]: If you're listening on Apple or Spotify, please subscribe and leave us a review.
[SPEAKER_06]: It means everything to me.
[SPEAKER_06]: You can also watch the full interview on YouTube.
[SPEAKER_06]: And if you want to hear our personal reactions right after we wrapped, head over to our Apple subscriptions for Patreon for our bonus conversation exclusively available there.
[SPEAKER_06]: So let's get into my conversation with Sherry Papini.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm so excited that you're here on Miss understood.
[SPEAKER_06]: Thank you so much for joining me.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm really happy that you're here and that you're speaking out.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm thank you so much for having me.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm honored to be here.
[SPEAKER_06]: Thank you so much.
[SPEAKER_06]: So I wanted to start off by just like really getting to the point because before we started the show, I told everybody, I reminded everybody of your story.
[SPEAKER_06]: So we kind of got the facts in there.
[SPEAKER_06]: But I want to play a little game of you for one second.
[SPEAKER_06]: I would love for you.
[SPEAKER_06]: Take yourself out of being shared with me for a minute.
[SPEAKER_06]: And if anyone is listening and they don't know your story and you were just like, oh my god, there's this girl.
[SPEAKER_06]: I misunderstood more about to hear her story.
[SPEAKER_06]: How would you in like, you know, two or three paragraphs?
[SPEAKER_06]: You know, not very long.
[SPEAKER_06]: How would you just describe who this person is, what the saga was, what the scandal was, just explain it in your words.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm just curious how you would perceive or how you would tell that story.
[SPEAKER_05]: I would tell the story in twenty sixteen I went missing and was kidnapped and then was subsequently released twenty two days later and upon my release I was absolutely terrified to name the identity of my capture
[SPEAKER_05]: and was pretty viciously interrogated and came out with a lie made as a cover-up to keep the identity of my Captain Secret and then it blew up around the world.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then law enforcement through their investigation six years later determined that the identity of my capture was in fact an ex-boyfriend, not to women that I had initially told them.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I was too fearful to come out and tell my ex has been at the time that I was having an emotional affair.
[SPEAKER_05]: And when the story broke, my entire life fell apart.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then I was arrested.
[SPEAKER_05]: signed a plea agreement to take accountability for my deception and not naming my chapter.
[SPEAKER_05]: And got a really raw deal.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then the media storm that there was films and documentaries and article after article created about me without me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And a lot of misinformation and a lot of things that were mistaken by the media that created this firestorm that completely obliterated my life for which I'm
[SPEAKER_05]: still suffering the consequences of and trying to navigate picking up the pieces and moving forward from now and actually reclaiming my voice and participating in speaking to the media.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, I appreciate that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_06]: I prefer to hear it from you rather than be recapping it.
[SPEAKER_06]: Do you know what I mean?
[SPEAKER_06]: So you just came out with a book.
[SPEAKER_06]: Sherry Papini doesn't exist, which by the way, I can't wait to read, I just ordered it.
[SPEAKER_06]: And one of the sort of subtitles, it starts off with the lie that defined me.
[SPEAKER_06]: What is that lie in your mind that defined you?
[SPEAKER_05]: I think currently there's a huge misconception that now that I'm speaking, there is a new story.
[SPEAKER_05]: That's what keeps getting spun out of control.
[SPEAKER_05]: And from day one, I've always maintained that I was kidnapped and tortured and brutalized.
[SPEAKER_05]: I have never changed that and in fact, given them went at great length to go into great detail about every injury that occurred.
[SPEAKER_05]: down to like the last fragment of carpet describing the room.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was simply just too afraid to tell anyone his identity and was up against insurmountable odds and between a rock and a hard place.
[SPEAKER_05]: So it's not a new story that everyone is concluding that it is.
[SPEAKER_05]: It is the same story.
[SPEAKER_05]: We just have more information about the identity of the character.
[SPEAKER_06]: Right.
[SPEAKER_06]: So the big lie, though, was who did it?
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, the lie was not that you were kidnapped.
[SPEAKER_06]: The lie was not that you got abused.
[SPEAKER_06]: The lie was who did it?
[SPEAKER_06]: And in your own words, why I just I feel like so many people cannot
[SPEAKER_06]: understand that lie.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I want to get into to the background of why that was so important.
[SPEAKER_06]: But just succinctly now, why in that moment?
[SPEAKER_06]: Because I think a lot of us have seen some of the documentaries, I have had the opportunity.
[SPEAKER_06]: I've been very lucky to have gotten to listen to a lot of things that people have not gotten to listen to in terms of, you know, people, you know, being interrogated.
[SPEAKER_06]: And two and a half hours of all sorts of things that people have not heard and we'll get into that as well.
[SPEAKER_06]: Why in all the times that you are asked, who did it?
[SPEAKER_06]: You know, you had so many chances to come clean, right?
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, let's be honest.
[SPEAKER_06]: Why do you think you did not take the opportunity in all of those multiple times to come clean?
[SPEAKER_06]: Even if Keith wasn't in the room, Keith being your ex-husband.
[SPEAKER_06]: Why did you not take that opportunity?
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, I didn't have the opportunity.
[SPEAKER_05]: So to be clear, every interrogation which you've seen videos of, he's sitting next to me.
[SPEAKER_05]: The only time he wasn't sitting next to me is when I was faced with the obstacle of removing him from the room.
[SPEAKER_05]: So when I was asked, it's like when law enforcement comes to investigate a house call, for example, they'll interview you and remove the husband, but you can still see him standing outside the door and then they leave.
[SPEAKER_05]: So for them to say, would you like us to remove Keith from the room?
[SPEAKER_05]: I had to answer that in front of him, and I was completely terrified to say, yes, because he was still standing outside the door, and then I would have to go home with him afterwards.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's not like a law enforcement went home with me to protect me from him.
[SPEAKER_05]: I had to manage the situation where I was in jeopardy of the punishment that I would suffer if it got out to my husband that I was having an emotional affair.
[SPEAKER_05]: That fear was very great for me.
[SPEAKER_05]: Secondary, I knew that I had already lied to law enforcement, and I was in a huge bind.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't know how to navigate unraveling the cover-up of the identity of my caster, and in that interview I asked for a lawyer not once, but twice, and generally in interrogations,
[SPEAKER_05]: They are supposed to stop and grant you audience with a lawyer and that didn't happen.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't have an advocate and it was three very aggressive men against me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And thirdly, when I was in captivity during captivity, James Reyes mentioned multiple times,
[SPEAKER_05]: that he was addicted to crime shows and he'd witnessed when interrogations were leaked on the internet and broadcasted.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so he'd already set up during the brainwashing and during the torture of twenty-two days that he would be watching everything ensuring that I didn't come forward and disclose his identity.
[SPEAKER_05]: And that was part of my negotiation tactic to get home and to stay alive.
[SPEAKER_05]: So those compact top of each other really make this conclusion of this choice where I made the best choice that I could.
[SPEAKER_05]: And for me, I wasn't thinking about lying to law enforcement or committing a crime.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was thinking about
[SPEAKER_05]: being safe.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was thinking about keeping myself safe.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was thinking about being home with my children.
[SPEAKER_05]: I wasn't thinking about trying to lie to people or create this big lie that's fun out of control.
[SPEAKER_05]: For me, it was how do I manage a situation and stay safe?
[SPEAKER_05]: in the situation.
[SPEAKER_05]: That was the best that I could do.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I regret it.
[SPEAKER_05]: I have deeper grit and sorrow for not being more courageous to be more truthful and be able to explain that from the mountain tops from day one.
[SPEAKER_05]: But initially, my very first interrogation was in the hospital and it wasn't with one forcement.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was my
[SPEAKER_05]: ex-husband, who I could not say that I was having an emotional affair with.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, they fixated a recording device to him and he led the interrogation first.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: So, but let me ask you a question about that.
[SPEAKER_06]: What is your emotional affair with James beforehand, have to do with
[SPEAKER_06]: him taking you and I mean let's say that it started in a nice way and you wanted to be with him and then all of a sudden you got abusive and then you wanted to leave and come home either way it doesn't matter the abuse happened you were kidnapped and you got out and the point is is why at some point I think a lot of people want to know
[SPEAKER_06]: whether it was to your husband or anyone else, would you not just say, listen, this was not consensual.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm not trying to be with this man.
[SPEAKER_06]: I was abused.
[SPEAKER_06]: I was raped.
[SPEAKER_06]: I would, anything that happened, why wouldn't you just come clean?
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm trying to get to the point of why you are so fearful of that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Well, I appreciate that question.
[SPEAKER_05]: That is a fantastic question.
[SPEAKER_05]: There is an interrogation that's been released online where law enforcement officers are interrogating Keith Bopini.
[SPEAKER_05]: And in this interrogation, you very clearly hear Keith say that, I apologize, I don't have the transcripts in front of me, so I apologize if it's not the exact words, but he says, I don't know what's worse.
[SPEAKER_05]: Her having an affair or being abducted.
[SPEAKER_05]: Like for your husband to say, it's potentially worse to find out that she could have potentially been kidnapped and tortured.
[SPEAKER_05]: It already sets a precedent that he doesn't care what happened to me.
[SPEAKER_05]: He cares about his image and he cares about me.
[SPEAKER_05]: having any type of emotional affair.
[SPEAKER_05]: That is a level of control that demonstrates his authority and his capability to punish me if he finds out that something's unacceptable to him.
[SPEAKER_05]: And frankly, he has friends in law enforcement and he knows everybody in town.
[SPEAKER_05]: He has this huge reputation and this huge cloud in town that was nowhere for me to go.
[SPEAKER_05]: to find any safety.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was there was no way to get away from him.
[SPEAKER_06]: So something I want to bring up that some people may know and I know you signed a post not based on the fact that he had found out you had had some emotional relationships or whatever the issues were he had asked you to sign a post not was this this was I'm assuming before the abduction correct?
[SPEAKER_05]: Yes, and, you know, that's interesting.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'd love that you bring that up.
[SPEAKER_05]: Thank you so much.
[SPEAKER_05]: Keep a peony is interrogated by law enforcement, and he gives one answer.
[SPEAKER_05]: He says that it's because I was having an emotional affair that he had caught me in.
[SPEAKER_05]: Then he gets in his Hulu documentary and he says another thing.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then he's on the stand under oath and states that it's just because I was bad with money.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then his Hulu documentary, I believe he says it was just to try and keep
[SPEAKER_05]: his assets say for whatever.
[SPEAKER_05]: So it's like you you witness Keith Bapini himself being this like accomplished con artist and giving you three different testimonies on three different occasions and
[SPEAKER_05]: it's it's infuriating for the entire world to say that they can't trust anything that comes out of my mouth and yet that some of the key players that have major culpability in my case are right in front of your face and are demonstrated liars and push liars and they're getting away with it.
[SPEAKER_06]: But what I want to establish for people that are listening that is an important potential factor of correct me from wrong because I don't want to put words in your mouth.
[SPEAKER_06]: But you go and you sign it post not, which essentially says that if you get a divorce, you get nothing and I think you don't have access to your kids.
[SPEAKER_06]: Am I correct?
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, the post-Neptual Agreement was created prior to having children, which is another factor that demonstrates that the post-Neptual Agreement agreement is null and void.
[SPEAKER_05]: Originally, when you got a post-Neptual Agreement, you're supposed to have dual representation.
[SPEAKER_05]: And what I mean by that is I'm supposed to have a lawyer.
[SPEAKER_05]: He's supposed to have a lawyer in order to make sure that it's an appropriate agreement.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't have dual representation.
[SPEAKER_05]: This was sign this post-Neptual Agreement as fast as possible or get out.
[SPEAKER_05]: And it was a way for him to have this coercive control in our marriage to take control of not only all the assets, but I mean, he states in the post-neutral agreement, all I get is like paint supplies.
[SPEAKER_05]: And the things from my crafting room, I got nothing and there was no process to edit it in the many years that happened after when we together assumed more assets and together created this life.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was a very flimsy post-neptial agreement, but when it was put into trial, I was in prison.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I didn't have the opportunity to fight it.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't need to prepare with my lethal team to get it thrown out.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's really unfortunate.
[SPEAKER_05]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: I agree that's an unfortunate post enough and to not have our presentation for yourself.
[SPEAKER_06]: Always I would never suggest that anyone does that.
[SPEAKER_06]: But what I'm trying to establish is possibly
[SPEAKER_06]: a motivation of like what people would think that you want to eventually get out of this relationship.
[SPEAKER_06]: You're starting to have emotional relationships with other people or friendships that maybe Keith doesn't approve of.
[SPEAKER_06]: By the way, Sherry, I'm not saying that any of this is wrong or things that people do not do on a daily basis.
[SPEAKER_06]: So by no means take that I'm just starting to establish that I don't, you know, in all that I have like fifteen pieces of paper in front of me.
[SPEAKER_06]: I want everyone of your documentaries.
[SPEAKER_06]: I followed this when it happened.
[SPEAKER_06]: The motivation for you to leave a fake a kidnapping, come back and still end up with your husband, didn't make sense, right?
[SPEAKER_06]: So I'm trying to establish for people that are listening, you did sign this post-nup, which would give you nothing if you left the marriage.
[SPEAKER_06]: And now here you are, how many years had you been married and had kids by the time you were abducted?
[SPEAKER_03]: like eight years.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, three years in you have two young children.
[SPEAKER_06]: You are maybe not the happiest person and don't know how to maybe get out or make it better and you start to have emotional affairs with people that
[SPEAKER_06]: as anyone who's not in a fair may know it's because they listen to you because you don't feel heard they act like they care about you they make you feel worthy they make you feel beautiful things that you may not be getting at home and again I'm not even pointing a finger at Keith it might just be where your relationship was so you tell me in your own words where was your relationship at this point before right before you got abducted
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, and I think that that's a fantastic point.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, for me, I, at the time, I was very emotionally immature, and I had this external validation rather than in internal validation, which by the way, we all have gone through.
[SPEAKER_05]: It wasn't, you know, I think that there's a misconception that I was only hiding men's names under women's names, and it's not.
[SPEAKER_05]: I wasn't allowed to have any established relationship, whether it was female or male if it didn't match his criteria.
[SPEAKER_05]: So there was a level of scrutiny that I was under when it came to
[SPEAKER_05]: This joy, like it had to be acceptable, like he.
[SPEAKER_05]: So even if I had friends from my past, if they didn't meet a certain status, I wasn't allowed to speak to them.
[SPEAKER_05]: So when we're constricted in that way, and we have this little demonstration of taking our own power back by having this secret life.
[SPEAKER_05]: which is what I was doing.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was having secret conversations with people because I was so desperate for some kind of connection.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was incredibly lonely.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, my husband had established a rule that I wasn't allowed to talk to him past six o'clock at night.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I wasn't allowed to have friends.
[SPEAKER_06]: I heard you say that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Can you explain what that meant?
[SPEAKER_06]: Like you literally weren't allowed to talk to him?
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_05]: That means when he got home from work, he didn't want to hear from me.
[SPEAKER_05]: He didn't want to have conversations.
[SPEAKER_05]: He, I thought that getting married meant being with your best friend.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, I thought that it meant having this deep connection with someone.
[SPEAKER_05]: And, you know, to be cut off all of the time and just be used for this one thing.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was
[SPEAKER_05]: It was not what I expected a marriage to be and it wasn't like I wasn't trying even in twenty sixteen when I was very emotionally mature.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was reading podcasts.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was buying books.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was trying everything I could to try and manage a relationship I was getting nothing from.
[SPEAKER_05]: and secretly trying to figure out how I could move on with my life because I had these two children and I was miserable.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was miserable being married to him and I had no idea where to go and what to do and knowing I lived in redding and that he could the snap of a finger just completely destroy my reputation and my life.
[SPEAKER_06]: And also for many people that are listening, that know this very well, you could be married, you don't have a job, you're taking care of the kids, you get, you want a divorce, but then what are you going to do?
[SPEAKER_06]: You have to go back to work, how are you going to take your kid?
[SPEAKER_06]: There's going to be an argument how you can pay for your lawyer who's going to get custody of the kids.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's going to ruin your whole life and I think people feel very stuck.
[SPEAKER_06]: I caution people to judge what you are going through at that moment because I feel like there are many women who, and I know plenty of them who are in miserable relationships or just bland.
[SPEAKER_06]: It doesn't have to be miserable because there's abuse or weird things going on.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's just their board to death and they want a love story and they don't, they do absolutely nothing with their lives because they cannot go anywhere.
[SPEAKER_06]: They don't have any skills anymore because they haven't worked forever.
[SPEAKER_06]: They don't even know how to get a job.
[SPEAKER_06]: And it's a terrible predicament to begin.
[SPEAKER_06]: So is it safe to say that in twenty sixteen in November that you were feeling like you were very trapped and that you would have liked to have found a way to leave the relationship?
[SPEAKER_05]: I opened myself up to a very dangerous predator.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was very susceptible and vulnerable and left it the door wide open for someone who really preyed on my vulnerability of my misery.
[SPEAKER_06]: What I think it's important to note is that the person that you were with for those twenty two twenty three days was someone you knew in the past trusted had a relationship with can we talk a little bit about that in your history this morning I listen to two hours of him talking about his past with you and how we knew you in his big hockey career blah blah blah I want to hear your side now
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, when James and I dated, we didn't date for very long.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was very clear that we weren't a good match.
[SPEAKER_05]: And our relationship did very abruptly.
[SPEAKER_05]: In fact, I packed my car and moved away in one day when he was late staying late at work.
[SPEAKER_05]: And when our relationship opened back up, it was because he had a brother that passed away and he contacted my mom and he found that in.
[SPEAKER_05]: And to me, that felt safe because I knew we were just texting, I knew we lived in Southern California.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so it was kind of like almost like an internet connection.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, we only talked over the phone.
[SPEAKER_05]: It wasn't like I was personally seeing him.
[SPEAKER_05]: And to me, it was like,
[SPEAKER_05]: James knew that I had to keep him secret, and he knew that I was afraid of Keith, so we had this opportunity where he just got to kind of slide in there.
[SPEAKER_05]: And when I was dating him, his behavior was completely different than the behavior that I know as of my deduction in twenty sixteen.
[SPEAKER_05]: So whatever happened to him in those years from the early two thousands, when I was in my twenties, to now, when the abduction happened in twenty sixteen, he went from like,
[SPEAKER_05]: amateur level.
[SPEAKER_05]: disturbing person to, like, next level, professional, sexual, sadism situation.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I missed all of those years.
[SPEAKER_05]: I have no idea.
[SPEAKER_05]: We do know that his Facebook posts leading up to the abduction were very dark and very disturbing.
[SPEAKER_05]: And when we spoke, he did share a little bit of things with me, but not enough for me to give really a clear indication of the danger that I was opening the door to.
[SPEAKER_06]: So at what point did you start to move your communication to those burner phones?
[SPEAKER_05]: But Keith had caught a conversation that I had and I had told James, it was done that I'd gotten caught and I was too afraid and I had to stop.
[SPEAKER_05]: And James convinced me to take the burner phones because he had a different idea and he didn't want to stop communication.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so he sent a burner phone to my mom's office and I received it.
[SPEAKER_05]: And he had continued to use these idle threats of
[SPEAKER_05]: If I don't do this, then he's just going to blow up my life.
[SPEAKER_05]: He's going to show up to writing and he's going to tell my husband about what's going on.
[SPEAKER_06]: But what was going on?
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, listen, in listening to this guy for two and a half hours speak, the guy is not that smart.
[SPEAKER_06]: He's not that sexy.
[SPEAKER_06]: There's nothing interesting about him.
[SPEAKER_06]: So girl to girl.
[SPEAKER_06]: The kind of conversations you were having with this dude.
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, that's just it, is there?
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, I think there's a lot of fixation on this emotional affair and you have to define what that means for me.
[SPEAKER_05]: I wasn't sexting.
[SPEAKER_05]: I wasn't sending him graphic photos.
[SPEAKER_05]: We weren't talking about sexual in UNDOS or anything like that.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was just...
[SPEAKER_05]: conversation.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was like having a conversation and having a friend.
[SPEAKER_05]: But that in and of itself was already completely unacceptable to Keith and he knew that he knew how afraid I was at that Keith getting even a glimpse of any engagement of a relationship with someone else.
[SPEAKER_06]: So when you say that Keith caught your first conversation or a conversation, was there anything inappropriate in the conversation that he actually caught?
[SPEAKER_06]: No.
[SPEAKER_06]: No, I was really talking to a man.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: So then you move to having these private conversations.
[SPEAKER_06]: And again, is it just like telling him about your life?
[SPEAKER_06]: Because you can't really talk to your husband.
[SPEAKER_06]: Is it very innocent things?
[SPEAKER_06]: Like what, what are, what are we talking about when you say you wanted to continue this or he wanted to continue this?
[SPEAKER_06]: What did you want to continue?
[SPEAKER_06]: Why did you feel connected to him?
[SPEAKER_05]: I was doing a lot of complaining.
[SPEAKER_05]: Really, it was someone that was listening to me.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was doing a lot of complaining about my marriage and I was doing a lot of complaining about the misery that I was suffering and how much that I was trying to figure out and navigate how I was no longer going to be married to keys.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I think to James, it was like if he could plant a flag, right, if he could establish getting his foot in the door, maybe when I broke up with Keith, I would choose him if that makes any sense.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I think it was really like this grooming process that he did not want to lose communication with me because he had an indication of my misery and an indication that I was trying to figure out how I would eventually dissolve my marriage.
[SPEAKER_06]: But was he like giving you good advice?
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, again, his guy sounds so clueless about things like this, like what kind of like why not pick a better guy that you could have an
[SPEAKER_06]: an emotional affair with who's like giving you amazing advice.
[SPEAKER_06]: Like what kind of conversations were these?
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, I mean, I wasn't able to go to Starbucks and make new friends.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was what little people I had accessibility to.
[SPEAKER_05]: James was just accessible to me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And he was someone that was a good listener and someone that was there for me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And again, I think he wanted to make sure that he could shoot his shot eventually.
[SPEAKER_05]: So it was like that, like, I'm going to shoot my shot.
[SPEAKER_05]: I know that you're really miserable and
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, maybe I can save you from your marriage.
[SPEAKER_05]: Maybe I'm gonna be that next person.
[SPEAKER_05]: So there was like this trying to convince me to leave my husband and trying to convince me that there what the grass was greener or so to speak.
[SPEAKER_06]: So was he giving you ideas of like, hey, I want to be with you.
[SPEAKER_06]: This would be amazing.
[SPEAKER_06]: You can come down and see me.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I mean, I know from seeing on this last documentary, you just said that you said you finally admitted, yeah, you were kind of planning on maybe doing it.
[SPEAKER_06]: Whether or not you were going to go through with it is a whole other story, but you were in essence leading them on, I think, right?
[SPEAKER_05]: Oh, yeah.
[SPEAKER_05]: I needed someone to talk to.
[SPEAKER_05]: So, you know, of course.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I was a very weak woman.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was a people pleaser and I was very agreeable.
[SPEAKER_05]: So, you know, for me it was him saying if you ever need a place to go.
[SPEAKER_05]: My place was available.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, if you ever needed somewhere to stay, I could absolutely help you.
[SPEAKER_05]: And, you know, there was this like, wanted to become my savior kind of complex with him.
[SPEAKER_05]: And that, to me, of course, was very enticing, but I wasn't ever going to follow through with it.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was more like I didn't know how to keep him in check.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I didn't know how to put him in place.
[SPEAKER_05]: Frankly, excuse my language, but I didn't know how to be a bitch back then.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, I think God I went to prison and I've learned a thing or two now, but I didn't know how to turn down men.
[SPEAKER_05]: Like, you know, that wasn't something I was very good at, so I was really easy prey for him for that.
[SPEAKER_06]: And then let's go back for just a second where are things that with Keith are you guys sorry to be you know just where do you guys sexually active at this point are you guys emotionally connected like.
[SPEAKER_06]: Lead me up to the day before the subduction happens who you know tell me what your relationship was actually like.
[SPEAKER_05]: So prior to.
[SPEAKER_05]: the abduction.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was trying to get my husband to come home.
[SPEAKER_05]: They released the tax messages from that day.
[SPEAKER_05]: I even tried to coax him with coming home for lunch and he blew me off.
[SPEAKER_05]: James was incredibly aggressive in the way that he was communicating that day and it was making me very uncomfortable and I wanted to delay and trying to delay seeing James because he was really aggressive in the way that he was text messaging me and so if I get my husband to come home then I could very simply text message James and say
[SPEAKER_05]: Sorry, my husband's home.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm not able to come and meet up with you.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so I was doing everything that I could to try and eliminate what I felt was going to happen with James, which was his aggressive text messaging.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah, at that point, I would say our relationship was not good with Keith and I, our marriage was not healthy.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was incredibly toxic.
[SPEAKER_06]: Well, I mean, ask him to come home for lunch for sex.
[SPEAKER_06]: Was that something you normally did?
[SPEAKER_06]: Was that something that would have been exciting for him?
[SPEAKER_06]: Or was that kind of the last straw of like, oh my God, he's paying me no attention.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, I'm gonna go have lunch with James because he's now driven up all the way up here.
[SPEAKER_05]: Sex wasn't a connection in my marriage.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was my marital duty.
[SPEAKER_05]: God.
[SPEAKER_05]: But mine it takes all the connection out of it just in the way that I say it.
[SPEAKER_05]: God.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: So, and then I think people really do need to understand that lead up because, again, listening to James.
[SPEAKER_06]: he makes it seem like this was very planned out you guys bought you know you guys had these burner phones which meant you did have this I mean you're not you're not saying you did not have this private communication you did yeah he's saying he was asked to come pick you up and and you're you're saying you did or did not ask him I mean did you guys plan on having lunch in redding that day
[SPEAKER_05]: Yes, so I knew that he was in town.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was an established meet-up.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I was starting to eliminate and gradually break off our relationships.
[SPEAKER_05]: So there was a plan for him to come in town and to meet up, but it was going to be in a public place.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was going to be in a restaurant.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was not at the end of the dirt road.
[SPEAKER_05]: And what I had done is I had text message him during his
[SPEAKER_05]: aggressive text messages and said, too, I'm gonna go for a run.
[SPEAKER_05]: You need to wait.
[SPEAKER_05]: I just dropped the kids off at daycare.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm gonna go for a run and when I get back, I'll hit you up.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I wish so much that the FBI could have found the burner phones.
[SPEAKER_05]: I think that there's such a missing piece of the evidence in this because if they would have had access to the burner phones, they would have seen that established communication and they would have seen that there was no plan to go to Southern California.
[SPEAKER_05]: or to have him appear at the end of the dirt road because we had been in communication the entire time and because he knew my running route we'd been on the phone prior to that several times he knew exactly where I was going to be and him showing up was not part of the plan and and so it was incredibly shocking we had a plan to meet up in town not to meet up on the dirt road
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, so at this point, like listen, again, I'm taking pieces from who documentaries in different documentaries and like I'm getting them all mixed up.
[SPEAKER_06]: The one thing I do remember is that there is a phone at the end of, I think it's your driveway, right?
[SPEAKER_06]: And it has a pair in the ear pods, whatever, and it's just on the ground, placed, thrown, whatever.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I know from seeing your documentary, you don't remember what happened.
[SPEAKER_06]: What do you think happened?
[SPEAKER_05]: I think that there could be a conclusion either way.
[SPEAKER_05]: I think it's likely that I didn't agree to get in the car.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I also think that it's likely that I could have gotten in the car.
[SPEAKER_05]: I wish, you know, I've been through everything I've done hypnosis and EMDR and therapy and like guided meditation.
[SPEAKER_05]: I've done everything to try and access that memory.
[SPEAKER_05]: I can tell you with certainty there was no agreement to go to Southern California.
[SPEAKER_05]: Whether or not I would have gotten in the car or not.
[SPEAKER_05]: is pretty, it's plausible either way.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I've never denied that ever.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm not trying to cover up that detail in any way.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm simply saying, I would not have gone to Southern California.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was no plan to go to Southern California.
[SPEAKER_05]: And the fact that I was drugged on the way to Southern California would demonstrate that there's no consent very simply.
[SPEAKER_06]: Why do you think you don't remember that?
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_05]: I think, you know, talking to my dad about his car accident that he got into because we had that father-daughter conversation of trying to find that as well.
[SPEAKER_05]: And he has missing fragments of that also, you know, going through that personal experience.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's kind of like,
[SPEAKER_05]: When you go under anesthesia, right, in a surgery, there's just things that you don't remember, regardless of how hard you try to seek it.
[SPEAKER_05]: That's really the best way that I can describe it is it's just not there.
[SPEAKER_06]: No, go ahead.
[SPEAKER_06]: No, you go ahead.
[SPEAKER_06]: I was going to say so it's possible that he showed up at the end of the driveway, although he swears he doesn't know your address.
[SPEAKER_06]: you said hi and you said I wasn't at the end of the driveway was that end of the so I had a mile long like route so it was at the end of like the road not the driveway sorry to correct you there no no I want you to correct me so wherever this phone was found sure so it's it's possible that he saw sees you you ran into him maybe you're calling him talking to him he picks you up and then things change
[SPEAKER_06]: as you get into the car and he says, I'm taking you with me, fuck this, we're gone.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't, you know, like now you're with me.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, who knows what was said, but it is possible.
[SPEAKER_06]: But what you are saying is you do not remember asking him to come pick you up planning on, this is the last time I'm gonna see my family and go.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, there wasn't some big, that was not a conversation.
[SPEAKER_06]: And there was no big goodbye with your kid that morning.
[SPEAKER_05]: No, no, it was very normal.
[SPEAKER_05]: I just dropped them off a daycare and went home because there was no plan.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was no plan to leave Southern California and leave my children at daycare.
[SPEAKER_05]: I would never leave my children behind.
[SPEAKER_05]: I would never do that.
[SPEAKER_05]: So there wasn't, I mean, Keith didn't even know that they were left at daycare.
[SPEAKER_06]: Right.
[SPEAKER_06]: Right.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, to me, that's the biggest thing that stands out.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm a mother.
[SPEAKER_06]: Um, I, and I saw you have dogs or you had the dog.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't know, dog is now.
[SPEAKER_06]: Who has the dog, by the way, I was thinking that Keith has the dog.
[SPEAKER_05]: I've asked him to give it back, but he, the dog's alive.
[SPEAKER_06]: I just, okay, that big, beautiful dog.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: I have three dogs and I have a daughter and I watching your stuff and I'm thinking, if I was planning my exit,
[SPEAKER_06]: I would have to have a way to, you know, I would say goodbye.
[SPEAKER_06]: I would hug them harder.
[SPEAKER_06]: I would have to plan on where who was taking care of the dogs.
[SPEAKER_06]: I would like make this plan.
[SPEAKER_06]: There would be something that was different because it would be too hard.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I think it might get happened that day.
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, not only that, but like you're a beautiful woman, right?
[SPEAKER_05]: So when you think about going out on a date with a boy, you wouldn't be in a sports bra of unwashed and not a run in jogging attire.
[SPEAKER_05]: You would be wearing makeup.
[SPEAKER_05]: You would be done up.
[SPEAKER_05]: You would have this whole, you know, I was planning on going out to lunch with him.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was
[SPEAKER_05]: No plan to meet him at the end of the dirt road.
[SPEAKER_05]: So, you know, when I didn't abandon my children at daycare, there was no plan to leave my children at a daycare center.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was, I mean, law enforcement even goes to great lengths to say she left her wallet.
[SPEAKER_05]: She left her money.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was no indication that there was any money missing.
[SPEAKER_05]: There's just no clues that would lead one to conclude that that's what happened.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, so now if you don't mind, let's talk about the captivity.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's twenty-two, twenty-three days.
[SPEAKER_06]: Twenty-two days.
[SPEAKER_06]: Twenty-two days.
[SPEAKER_06]: What do you remember from that time?
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, there's very little that I don't remember.
[SPEAKER_05]: There's very few times that I was drugged enough that I feel like I lost time.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, the disorientation of it was
[SPEAKER_05]: So difficult.
[SPEAKER_05]: Like, often times I didn't know whether it was night or it was day.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, there was boards on the windows and it was really hard to kind of establish and get grounded in the time of day that it was.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was chained to a wall.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was a bucket in a closet that I used as a bathroom.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, he would regularly leave me all day when he went to work.
[SPEAKER_05]: He would
[SPEAKER_05]: put music outside the door and leave me chained to the wall all day and it's the way that our prison system is set up now they don't do solitary confinement like that anymore because of the mental anguish that just solitary confinement does to an individual layered on top of being drugged the entire time during captivity and being starving
[SPEAKER_05]: And being starved by him and having my body mutilated and abused in the way that it was.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, it was horrifying and and to watch this documentary where my husband says that my PTSD is just all of a sudden made up like.
[SPEAKER_05]: Do you think I wish that I could just erase what happened to my body?
[SPEAKER_05]: I still have scars everywhere.
[SPEAKER_05]: It would be so much easier to just wake up and say, oh, yeah, it was all fake.
[SPEAKER_05]: I sleep great.
[SPEAKER_05]: I have no PTSD.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, it's it's infuriating to be reduced by these people that say that I did this to myself.
[SPEAKER_05]: I couldn't even consider doing these injuries to myself.
[SPEAKER_06]: Do you have a history of self-harming at all?
[SPEAKER_02]: No.
[SPEAKER_02]: No.
[SPEAKER_02]: Try to say that in his documentary, but there's absolutely no proof of that.
[SPEAKER_06]: I want to get into your background and your family in a minute, but I just want to stay where we are.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I'm really sorry that I made you cry because I don't really read back there.
[SPEAKER_06]: But I do because I feel like people don't get it.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I don't know if I get it.
[SPEAKER_06]: So I just genuinely, if it's okay, I want to keep going with these questions.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah, so it's interesting to me because again, as I've listened just today to his to James Reyes, his whole conversation and him saying what happened, you know, for people listening that don't know, this is a guy who does not sound that intelligent cannot put
[SPEAKER_06]: sentences together and you have to pull teeth to get anything out of him.
[SPEAKER_06]: But what he says is, I was helping a friend.
[SPEAKER_06]: A friend called, I didn't ask a lot of questions.
[SPEAKER_06]: She said she needed me to come.
[SPEAKER_06]: I was at work.
[SPEAKER_06]: I didn't pay attention.
[SPEAKER_06]: I just, I don't know if there was a burner phone.
[SPEAKER_06]: She had a burner phone.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't know about my burner phone.
[SPEAKER_06]: I just turned off my phone.
[SPEAKER_06]: And then I went together.
[SPEAKER_06]: And then we turned into finding out that he branded you.
[SPEAKER_06]: And he admits he branded you.
[SPEAKER_06]: You know,
[SPEAKER_06]: Not for anything.
[SPEAKER_06]: Somebody asked me to drive eight hours to get them and drive back.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm like, fuck you, get an Uber.
[SPEAKER_06]: Like, that's, that, no, I'm not doing that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Somebody asked me to brand them on top of that.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's like, what are you crazy?
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't understand.
[SPEAKER_06]: The fact that he and law enforcement are saying that you coerced him to do it because no one is really forced that questioning of like, but what kind of a person says yes to this?
[SPEAKER_06]: What kind of a person says yes?
[SPEAKER_06]: This is a good idea.
[SPEAKER_06]: And he admits he didn't really ask you about your home life.
[SPEAKER_06]: If he's going to agree to do all these things, you would think common sense would be, but there was a really good reason.
[SPEAKER_06]: And the only reason I could come up in my head that might have made sense is he thought you guys were going to have a relationship.
[SPEAKER_06]: You guys went down to try and make it work.
[SPEAKER_06]: You realize you missed your kids.
[SPEAKER_06]: You realize you weren't getting away with this.
[SPEAKER_06]: You were like, I can't tell him I was with you.
[SPEAKER_06]: So I'm going to have to fake that I was abducted and let's like get a couple injuries on me.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's going over the top to say, dude, do me a favor, brand me.
[SPEAKER_06]: Do me a favor, punch me, give me a rash on my arm, burn my arm, starve me.
[SPEAKER_06]: And by the way, I'm sorry, I'm talking to so much, because I told you I wasn't gonna do this.
[SPEAKER_06]: The wait thing is something that I don't understand.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah, people talk about how hard it is to lose weight all the time.
[SPEAKER_06]: Ozenpek is a big thing in our country.
[SPEAKER_06]: Everybody wants to get stabbed by the shot to get to get Ozenpek to lose a couple pounds.
[SPEAKER_06]: How much weight did you lose while you're around?
[SPEAKER_05]: So I was a hundred and seven and after captivity, I was eighty seven pounds.
[SPEAKER_05]: So you kind of see in these photographs, right, that you can see all of my bones.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's hard for me to lose weight because I'm already a thin person.
[SPEAKER_05]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: I just want to stop you there because I think this is a very important thing.
[SPEAKER_06]: And to me, I know the sounds crazy.
[SPEAKER_06]: Everyone listening, don't give me hate about this.
[SPEAKER_06]: How many times have we all been like, I need to lose five pounds to go to a wedding, to go to a thing, to go on a date, whatever, and we can't do it.
[SPEAKER_06]: So maybe you get a zampic, maybe you try and starve yourself to lose twenty pounds in twenty two days is almost impossible on your own.
[SPEAKER_06]: Being like, I'm going to be this tough that I'm going to starve myself.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's almost impossible unless
[SPEAKER_06]: someone else is forcing you to do it.
[SPEAKER_06]: So for me, whether or not I believe you, that is one reason where I'm like, there's no way she could have done that on her own in a way that made sense because we're all trying to lose weight.
[SPEAKER_06]: My fiance is talking about, you know, getting insurance and stuff and he's talking about why he can't lose the last three pounds.
[SPEAKER_06]: And you were away for twenty days, and lost twenty pounds.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean,
[SPEAKER_06]: It's not something you can do on your own because this guy goes to work and you're just on some burner phone looking at how famous you've gotten.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, it makes no sense.
[SPEAKER_06]: So explain, are you in and out of consciousness all day?
[SPEAKER_06]: Are you awake all twenty two days and your miserable and bored and starving and wondering if someone's going to save you?
[SPEAKER_06]: Tell me bring me into that room with you.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was twenty-two days of absolute health and torture.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, there was James, it has a proclivity for violence and it gets off on pain.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so it was like the torture that happened to my body and the injuries that occurred, it's what got him off.
[SPEAKER_05]: So it was like I was his little plaything that he chained to a wall and did whatever he wanted to.
[SPEAKER_05]: And he kept me drugged the entire time.
[SPEAKER_05]: and then manipulated the process so that he could brainwash me to get me to understand that if I did what he wanted he would let me off the chain and then I would get to eat and I would get water and I would get to use the bathroom.
[SPEAKER_05]: So it was like he set me up the entire time of like if you just do this thing then I'll get off and then he would go to sleep.
[SPEAKER_02]: And so it was like participating in all these vial acts that I had to do to survive during captivity.
[SPEAKER_02]: And then to be reduced by long forcement, like I asked for it in some way.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's horrifying.
[SPEAKER_05]: And it's like he admits on his interrogation tapes that he did it.
[SPEAKER_05]: He says that he did it.
[SPEAKER_05]: And their injuries that I could possibly do myself, he's just getting away with it because he said I wanted it.
[SPEAKER_05]: And that's never been a part of my psychological profile ever, ever.
[SPEAKER_05]: And trust me, if it wasn't what it came out already, that's no part of my life.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's never been a part of my life and the hell and the brutality that I lived to, just being reduced to, well, she asked for it.
[SPEAKER_02]: It was absolutely horrific.
[SPEAKER_06]: And he says that you, he left you all today and you were just on a phone.
[SPEAKER_06]: Were you on a phone?
[SPEAKER_06]: What did you do all day?
[SPEAKER_05]: No.
[SPEAKER_05]: No, he would come home and tell me about things.
[SPEAKER_05]: And he would tell me about the news coverage.
[SPEAKER_05]: But no, the majority of the time I was chained to a wall on a mattress on the ground.
[SPEAKER_06]: With nothing to do, no books, he says you were reading all day.
[SPEAKER_00]: No.
[SPEAKER_00]: It was like solitary confinement.
[SPEAKER_06]: You have nothing to do.
[SPEAKER_06]: You're going crazy, hoping possibly that your husband is figuring the sound coming to save you.
[SPEAKER_04]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: Did you hold hope that that would happen?
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, every day, I was hopeful, but what kept me going was getting on to my children.
[SPEAKER_05]: Every day, every day, every time I opened my eyes, I felt lucky to be alive.
[SPEAKER_05]: After captivity, I was grateful for even having this sensation of running water for such a long time.
[SPEAKER_05]: But it was just like if I could just make it through one more minute, if I could just go another thirty seconds, if I could go one more minute, then I'm closer to getting home.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I knew I was making progress with him.
[SPEAKER_05]: I knew that I was in the negotiation phases with him because I was doing everything that he wanted and I was establishing that trust.
[SPEAKER_05]: If I could make him believe that I was doing what he wanted, then I would get somewhere with him.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I think the fact that it blew up in the media was really scary, not just for him, but for his family as well.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, his family was there.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I think once that hostage negotiator got involved, I think it became very real that he was being hunted.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I used that in every way that I could.
[SPEAKER_06]: What do you mean by that?
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't know what do you mean a hostage negotiator?
[SPEAKER_05]: A hostage negotiator was implored by Keith.
[SPEAKER_05]: So this guy named Cameron Gamble was hired to create a hostage negotiation and create a phone number that the person that held me captive could call for my release and be rewarded with a certain amount of money and his family was arguing with him about it and everyone that was involved was arguing with him about it.
[SPEAKER_05]: I could hear bits of
[SPEAKER_05]: pieces of conversation as well as James was talking about it as well.
[SPEAKER_05]: And for me, it was like that out, right, if I could convince him to just let me go, then the media would die down and then it would all be over.
[SPEAKER_05]: I insured him that I would never reveal his identity.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was too afraid to tell my husband anyway, and that was part of the negotiation as well.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so I really do believe that.
[SPEAKER_06]: And to be clear, you were only a fearful to tell your husband because he would think that you asked for this.
[SPEAKER_06]: He would think you were having an affair and this would be consensual regardless.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah, and Keith knew where I was the entire time.
[SPEAKER_05]: I really, truly believe that Keith knew where I was the entire time.
[SPEAKER_05]: He told investigators that James was a primary suspect, very early on.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was maybe like four or five days into the investigation that he said that James was a primary suspect.
[SPEAKER_05]: In his documentary, he does this weird thing where he hints at, they went and staked out his house and then were called off or something like that.
[SPEAKER_05]: It makes absolutely no sense.
[SPEAKER_05]: And also, if you knew that I was there, why didn't you say that?
[SPEAKER_05]: And if you knew that James was a primary suspect and you're saying that you stayed at his house, why didn't you go inside to find me change to a wall?
[SPEAKER_05]: That part of it doesn't make.
[SPEAKER_05]: any sense, and to me, I feel it's just an out-lie, an out-lie, an out-lie.
[SPEAKER_06]: Right, I did see that, and I did see the, I guess it was a private investigator or somebody who had said, we were there for a while, and then we were told that he was no longer a suspect, and we left.
[SPEAKER_06]: I did hear from James Reyes himself in this interrogation that there are people in his family that knew that you were at his house.
[SPEAKER_06]: But he said they never came into the house.
[SPEAKER_06]: Did you ever hear voices when you were in the other room?
[SPEAKER_06]: Did you ever think someone was in the house with you?
[SPEAKER_06]: He's lying.
[SPEAKER_06]: What do you mean?
[SPEAKER_06]: He's lying.
[SPEAKER_06]: They'd come into the house on more than one occasion.
[SPEAKER_06]: Did you ever see anyone?
[SPEAKER_06]: Mm-hmm.
[SPEAKER_06]: You saw people there.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: They saw, yeah.
[SPEAKER_05]: Briefly.
[SPEAKER_05]: Briefly.
[SPEAKER_05]: Briefly.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was this sexual incident that occurred with one of the people that was watching me.
[SPEAKER_06]: Can you elaborate?
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah, I'm, I'm still pretty scared, frankly, about talking about everything.
[SPEAKER_05]: There's no charges that have been made.
[SPEAKER_06]: And so, you know, I, well, let's, let's stop right there because I want to say one thing to you, Sherry.
[SPEAKER_06]: There's no reason for you to be scared anymore.
[SPEAKER_06]: You have already had to serve time.
[SPEAKER_06]: You've already come out of this.
[SPEAKER_06]: You already are now no longer with your husband.
[SPEAKER_06]: There's no reason for you to be scared.
[SPEAKER_06]: The only thing that you should be doing if this is true and you say it's true and I want to believe that it's true is for you to be able, especially in a situation like this if you're saying somebody saw something.
[SPEAKER_06]: is to be able to talk about something because the thing that you're missing in your story is the corroboration, right?
[SPEAKER_06]: Is someone to say, okay, fine.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah, I knew it.
[SPEAKER_06]: I knew what's happening.
[SPEAKER_06]: I saw that it was happening because once you get that, it makes it impossible for him to say it didn't happen.
[SPEAKER_06]: the way that you're saying.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I'm not pushing you to saying anything, but I just want you to know that you, you are your own person.
[SPEAKER_06]: And you do not grow up like me, I get it.
[SPEAKER_06]: I am more like balls to the wall, like fuck everyone.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm gonna blow everyone's life up.
[SPEAKER_06]: I can see that you are much more calm, cool, and collect than me.
[SPEAKER_06]: But I also want to tell you, there are people that at this point now will protect you.
[SPEAKER_06]: I know two of them, you know the same two.
[SPEAKER_06]: And you need to start
[SPEAKER_06]: saying that things that you know because you have protected the wrong people for a long time.
[SPEAKER_06]: So let's go back to that question for a second.
[SPEAKER_06]: If you don't want to answer, you don't have to.
[SPEAKER_06]: But if there were people in the house and you say somebody saw you, can you talk about that a little bit?
[SPEAKER_01]: I was very dragged up that day.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was difficult to move my body at all.
[SPEAKER_05]: I could flutter my eyes open just slightly, but I was more focused on trying to get my chest to expand to breathe.
[SPEAKER_01]: I was chained to the wall and was undressed and as cousin was masturbating in the corner.
[SPEAKER_01]: Wow.
[SPEAKER_01]: So they were there.
[SPEAKER_05]: They witnessed it.
[SPEAKER_05]: This mom knew what was going on.
[SPEAKER_06]: And what they witnessed though is is the account of you being chained of you not being participating.
[SPEAKER_02]: They all knew they saw the boards on the windows as well.
[SPEAKER_02]: They saw the chain and the closet.
[SPEAKER_02]: They knew what was going on.
[SPEAKER_05]: They knew that I was high and drugged and starving.
[SPEAKER_05]: And when James was doing things to my body, but
[SPEAKER_05]: They knew, I mean, you saw the pictures I was black and blue from head to toe.
[SPEAKER_06]: I saw the pictures, but what would you say to people that say, you know, and they believe James or the police who narrated that story, you inflicted those, you asked him to inflict those.
[SPEAKER_06]: He admits in his interrogation, he inflicted that, but he's like, she asked me to, so I just did it, which by the way, I was saying to my producer, George,
[SPEAKER_06]: I should be an interrogator because those interrogators were so, they just let those answers go right by and they were like, okay, I didn't get that.
[SPEAKER_06]: If someone is saying, go ahead and, you know, did you brand her?
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah, because she asked me.
[SPEAKER_06]: They just moved on to the next question.
[SPEAKER_06]: What?
[SPEAKER_06]: What?
[SPEAKER_05]: explain there's so much ego involved in this you know there is so much ego in law enforcement because the minute they knew I was lying they knew they messed up they knew that there was holes in their interrogation and they were very angry this is my presumption I don't know for sure but I would presume that these big law enforcement officers had a lot of ego wrapped up in this case and when you find out that someone has deceived you
[SPEAKER_05]: when you attach to that ego piece to it, that's what you're fixating on.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I think for me, there was six years of building an investigation against me, an hour of listening to James interrogation, and frankly, I didn't give them any other options.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, there's this accountability piece for me, like I didn't tell them.
[SPEAKER_05]: So when they came back, knowing what happened with James, had I just had that moment of bravery to say, know it was James Reyes,
[SPEAKER_05]: They may have went back and got him.
[SPEAKER_05]: They may have went back and thoroughly investigated it, but I didn't give them that option because I was just too scared, which frankly is very normal for victims of abuse and very normal for victims of sexual assault.
[SPEAKER_05]: And again, one time to come forward.
[SPEAKER_06]: And again, to clarify for people that are not understanding, you are scared because he had threatened you, but also you are scared because of what your husband might do if he left you.
[SPEAKER_06]: Correct?
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, yes, and I'd already established lying to law enforcement officers, and I had no idea what I was up against.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't know that I was going to go to prison in that moment.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't know what my charges were going to be like.
[SPEAKER_05]: I knew that I was already lying, and I didn't know how to get out of it.
[SPEAKER_05]: To me, just saying nothing was better than facing everyone that was there to just obliterate me.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was no safety in that.
[SPEAKER_05]: So what are we thinking that I would have given them that because I think that they would have gone back and gone after James that I didn't I didn't give it to them.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah, I mean, I think listen, if the if I know that there is this thought that maybe the the police department is in a conspiracy and is out to get you because their friends with Keith and
[SPEAKER_06]: Maybe maybe not.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, listen, we've all been watching the Karen retrial.
[SPEAKER_06]: We all believe in Boston.
[SPEAKER_06]: There is a conspiracy going on with police department.
[SPEAKER_06]: So it's not unheard of that there can be some conspiracy.
[SPEAKER_06]: What I will say from spending hours listening to these tapes.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't know if there's as much as a conspiracy is that as there is
[SPEAKER_06]: They didn't get any information from you.
[SPEAKER_06]: And you, because you lied about the Hispanic women, because you didn't come forward in those couple years in the meantime and say, knock knock by the way, stop looking for these people because it's really this guy.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I don't want my husband to know.
[SPEAKER_06]: And, you know, let me just tell you, you know, because they didn't have that to go on.
[SPEAKER_06]: I think at that point, and I hear it when they're talking to James, well, she hasn't accused you of a crime.
[SPEAKER_06]: And we're going to go back to her and now tell her we found your DNA.
[SPEAKER_06]: So did you do it because she asked you or she's going to say a different story.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I know people are going to think that they
[SPEAKER_06]: that they led him and coerced him to kind of give him an alibi.
[SPEAKER_06]: At the same time, maybe, for sure, but maybe they also are only working with the fact that you never said it was him.
[SPEAKER_06]: So for them, they're like, well, maybe this is a consensual thing because, you know, it seems so odd that she wouldn't just tell us that it was him.
[SPEAKER_06]: Do you know what I'm saying?
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah, and I think that it's the piece that there's a lot of things that they missed, frankly, and the first and foremost, the piece that they missed is that I was just terrified of my husband.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, sitting right in front of them, and that that's just how interrogation is.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, if you have any domestic abuse survivor that you've spoken to ever, that's had law enforcement called to interrogate them,
[SPEAKER_05]: It's a very sticky situation because the interrogations are not set up to help the victims.
[SPEAKER_05]: They're to catch a criminal.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was suffered the same interrogation tactics that they would do with other domestic abuse survivors that don't give up what's happening at home because they're just too afraid.
[SPEAKER_05]: And for Keith, you know, there's this theory that I asked for him to be there.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was coached and prepped to say, I can't be in this interview without my husband, which you see very quickly in the very first interrogation he has with law enforcement where he needs to know everything every step of the way.
[SPEAKER_05]: He has to be in control of the investigation every step of the way.
[SPEAKER_05]: So it was like leading into these interrogations with law enforcement
[SPEAKER_05]: Keith Papini would say, I need you to tell them that you need me to be in the room the entire time.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I would say I need my husband to be in the room the entire time.
[SPEAKER_05]: So law enforcement comes back and says, well, she asked Keith to be there the entire time.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah, because I was coached to say that.
[SPEAKER_05]: I had to say that, because if I didn't say that, not only would I be thoroughly interrogated by Keith Bapini later, but I would suffer the consequences and the punishment of not having him there.
[SPEAKER_05]: So he had to be involved in every interrogation, which meant having him right next to me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And to have a private secret called with law enforcement, the manner in which I was in lockdown after captivity was far more extensive than it was prior to captivity.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't need my access to my bank account.
[SPEAKER_05]: Let alone access to my car keys or access to social media or email or anything like that.
[SPEAKER_05]: That wasn't completely thoroughly controlled by Keith opinion.
[SPEAKER_06]: So I want to get back to how you got out in a second.
[SPEAKER_06]: But while you're talking about this,
[SPEAKER_06]: You know, then we go into COVID eventually and like, you know, but the point is is you remained out of the spotlight for many years and you stayed with your husband.
[SPEAKER_06]: What was your relationship like then did did all of a sudden you.
[SPEAKER_06]: You start to trust you and you went back to being a romantic couple like what happened.
[SPEAKER_03]: No, my primary focus was the kids.
[SPEAKER_03]: And so when COVID happened, I was homeschooling my children, which I loved.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was just the best part of life for me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And being able to educate my children during COVID was an extraordinary experience.
[SPEAKER_05]: But in terms of Keith, we were just slowly growing further and further apart.
[SPEAKER_05]: And frankly, his hate for me was getting
[SPEAKER_05]: worse and worse than the way that he treated me was worse and worse.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I was just disappearing as a person.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, it was so sad to start getting into this investigation with my current lawyer and look at this timeline of photographs where you see this beautiful, confident woman
[SPEAKER_05]: who, you know, dresses in a very confident way.
[SPEAKER_05]: And you see this progression of me getting into like just wearing baggy men's clothing and just completely dissolving as a human being and being as washed out and unhealthy and meek and it's really, really sad to watch.
[SPEAKER_05]: And now now I'm healthier than I've ever been and more vibrant than I've ever been and have an opportunity for authenticity and to be who I am.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I really
[SPEAKER_05]: as destructive as my life became.
[SPEAKER_05]: I am the happiest that I've ever been.
[SPEAKER_05]: I miss my children.
[SPEAKER_05]: And when I get them back, I will be completely whole.
[SPEAKER_05]: But my life is good now.
[SPEAKER_06]: I want to, I'm very happy that your life is good.
[SPEAKER_06]: I want to go back just so we don't over step it.
[SPEAKER_06]: How did you get out?
[SPEAKER_05]: I was, okay, so this is an interesting part of the timeline.
[SPEAKER_05]: When the FBI was investigating my case, they had cut off my access to therapy.
[SPEAKER_05]: So part of my restitution is the compensation for victims assistance that paid for my therapy, right?
[SPEAKER_05]: So when they decided that I was going to be a suspect and not a victim, they cut off the access to therapy that I was desperate for.
[SPEAKER_05]: Therapy was the only place that I had the freedom to just drive to without his permission that I could freely go to.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so I was getting really sad and really hurt by not having access to therapy because Keith, again, had control of the finances and he wasn't a fan of pain for therapy.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I was just cut off and act as access to mental health.
[SPEAKER_05]: So his sister Suzanne Papini granted me access to therapy and said, I have a therapist.
[SPEAKER_05]: His name is Dr. Diggs, who is in my film.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I want you to maybe do a couple of Zoom sessions and see if you can establish therapy with him.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so I was secretly seeing this new therapist who was seeing me pro bono in the very beginning.
[SPEAKER_05]: And in fact, I had a Zoom session going.
[SPEAKER_05]: I had shut the sliding glass door in my studio where I was teaching my children and I had it locked.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't know that Keith was still home.
[SPEAKER_05]: My body had already left for work.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, I could see the kids playing in the yard in the front, but I didn't want them privy to the conversation that I was having.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I blocked the door.
[SPEAKER_05]: Keith tries the door and you can see that it's locked and he is practically breaking the door down.
[SPEAKER_05]: He's cussing and swearing and screaming at me, but what he doesn't know is that I have the laptop open and so his sister and the therapist are listening to the way that he's screaming and yelling at me and trying to bust his way through the door.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then when he found out that I had this secret established new therapist, it became completely unacceptable.
[SPEAKER_05]: I wasn't allowed to see anyone that he hadn't vetted and been present in therapy or had any type of control over.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so I was secretly seeing Dr. Dex and Dr. Dex was like, that's not okay.
[SPEAKER_05]: Like I witnessed what's happening.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's in your best interest to
[SPEAKER_05]: to try and figure out what your exit plan is here.
[SPEAKER_05]: So Dr. Diggs and I were already starting to establish an exit strategy and trying to figure out how I was going to move on with my life and get out of my marriage that I knew was no longer safe.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then I got arrested.
[SPEAKER_05]: So it was like I started this plan of like, where is my exit strategy and how am I going to break free of this person?
[SPEAKER_05]: And I got arrested.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then after my arrest, it was like everything fell apart from that in my marriage.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then after that, after I was released from prison on bail, I stayed with his sister Suzanne.
[SPEAKER_05]: And in that moment, it was like the first time that I felt really safe and I had the safety to talk about what actually happened and start to tell the truth about what happened.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then this huge incident occurred.
[SPEAKER_05]: My defense attorney gave Keith a little bit that I had been concealing, which was the burner phones, and he didn't lean to.
[SPEAKER_05]: So he called me directly, Bill Portnova, my federal attorney, and he said,
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm so sorry.
[SPEAKER_05]: I let out a bit of information Keith didn't know before.
[SPEAKER_05]: He is extremely upset.
[SPEAKER_05]: I need you to be safe and I need you to be careful, but he's on his way to you.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't know what's going to happen, but he is pissed.
[SPEAKER_05]: So out of my safety and concern, I hit record on my phone and I slid it under the bed.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then Keith proceeded to try and get me to coerce me into a very unfair agreement, giving away all of my rights, not just to my children, but to all of the asset.
[SPEAKER_05]: And when it came time to tell my story, he would have complete control over it.
[SPEAKER_05]: And if I would have signed that, then I would have been able to go home.
[SPEAKER_05]: So Keith literally said before I signed the plea agreement, we're gonna get a divorce so that I can protect our assets.
[SPEAKER_05]: But if you sign this contract, you can come home and you can have access to your children and I'll let you live in the house until I've decided that I forgive you and you've apologized to me enough and you thoroughly apologized to me enough that I feel like you're worthy enough to have the right to join me in the bedroom.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I said, no, and I wouldn't sign it.
[SPEAKER_05]: And then following directly after that, you see this very public divorce, we're keeping me as a completely different perspective, and retaliatory false allegations that happen.
[SPEAKER_05]: And if I would have just signed this contract, Rachel, I'd be home right now.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'd have access to my children.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'd have access to everything that I had.
[SPEAKER_05]: rights over.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, I would literally be able to see my kids, but I was done with him having control over everything and chose to go to prison instead.
[SPEAKER_05]: And if I would have just signed the contract, I'd have my children.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: Well, let's not feel bad that you didn't sign the contract because that contract sucked and you're going to get through this and this is going to be fine.
[SPEAKER_06]: So correct questions.
[SPEAKER_06]: What is the legal?
[SPEAKER_06]: What is what is what is the law say about you having your kids right now?
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, so to go through the custody modification, obviously he got rights to the children, both legal and physical because I went to prison.
[SPEAKER_05]: My children have never been taken from me.
[SPEAKER_05]: They've never been removed by the courts or anything.
[SPEAKER_06]: I know that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Sorry, is that because I know this well, is this a temporary situation or is full custody permanent?
[SPEAKER_05]: No, no.
[SPEAKER_05]: He was established.
[SPEAKER_05]: He had established legal and physical custody because I was incarcerated.
[SPEAKER_05]: It makes absolutely legal sense for to give him great him full, legal, full physical custody.
[SPEAKER_05]: But it was on the modification to have a change in circumstance.
[SPEAKER_05]: So my changing circumstances that I'm out of prison
[SPEAKER_05]: Keith Epini is incredibly good at manipulating the court system to cause delays.
[SPEAKER_05]: So every time we've had a little bit of forward movement, he'll delay and pull back.
[SPEAKER_05]: And every time there's a little more forward movement, he'll delay and pull back.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so that's just where we're at.
[SPEAKER_05]: The first portion of my trial for the modification of our custody happened
[SPEAKER_05]: last month, and the conclusion of that trial has been postponed until August, and then in August, the judge is able to make a ruling and a modification to the custody agreement.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, and how, when was off time you saw your kids?
[SPEAKER_05]: I just saw, I just saw them.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, so you are able to see them once in a while.
[SPEAKER_06]: Is it under supervision?
[SPEAKER_05]: I see them once a month on her supervised visitation.
[SPEAKER_05]: And you know, there's this very big misconception on why I have supervised visitation.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I appreciate you allowing me to have this clarification on it.
[SPEAKER_05]: When Keith and I split up prior to my incarceration, he was the supervisor.
[SPEAKER_05]: So he was supervising my
[SPEAKER_05]: because he had them.
[SPEAKER_05]: So we took possession of the kids and he was in charge of allowing me to see them whenever he decided that I would be allowed to see them.
[SPEAKER_05]: What that means is that means that he was following me into the bathroom.
[SPEAKER_05]: He was watching me and dressed.
[SPEAKER_05]: He was putting me in very uncomfortable situations.
[SPEAKER_06]: And so I went for what reason.
[SPEAKER_06]: You're not a drug addict.
[SPEAKER_06]: You're not like, what's the issue?
[SPEAKER_05]: Because he wanted to get his way.
[SPEAKER_05]: He wanted to get his way and he wanted an opportunity to say, if you don't do what I want, I'm ending this visit because he was the acting supervisor.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was done with that and it was infuriating that he had all of this demonstrated control.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so I went to the courts and I said, I can't do this anymore.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't want Keith Papini as my supervisor.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't want my ex husband as acting supervisor in order to see my children.
[SPEAKER_05]: The only thing that the courts could suggest is professional supervised visitation because Keith was in possession of the children and it was already established that I was going to prison because and so we didn't have the opportunity to make a modification and so it was recommended that if I wanted to see my children to have a supervisor present so I recommended that so that Keith wouldn't be there and so I wouldn't continue to
[SPEAKER_05]: suffer the abuse that I endured while seeing my children.
[SPEAKER_05]: And now I'm stuck.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't need supervised visitation and there's nothing indicating that I need supervised visitation, but there won't be a modification until the conclusion of the trial.
[SPEAKER_05]: So the judges asked
[SPEAKER_05]: for him to change.
[SPEAKER_05]: The judges asked for him to try and make some kind of reunification therapy, or let's see the kids more often, or have a non-professional supervisor.
[SPEAKER_05]: And keep a peony just keep saying, no, absolutely not.
[SPEAKER_06]: Even that won't work in his favor because I'm not.
[SPEAKER_06]: I've been through family court, which by the way is the biggest scam in the country.
[SPEAKER_06]: But I've been through that and courts do not like parents alienating and other parents.
[SPEAKER_06]: So let them do it to August and hopefully have a really good lawyer who will just show all this.
[SPEAKER_06]: And it's not like you're a drug user.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's not like, but by the way, even if you were all these crazy things, like your kids need their mother and should be able to see you and you are not a harm to your kids just because your ex-husband doesn't, you know, wants to punish you.
[SPEAKER_06]: hopeful that the court will see that and grant you what most parents should have, which is fifty fifty.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, it's just it would be the way it works out.
[SPEAKER_05]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I have, I have a cousin, for example, who is the Shasta County Foster and adopt coordinator here in in our county.
[SPEAKER_05]: And she told me that all of these horrific stories of these kids, but she gets in the foster and adopt program.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, like, just recently, she had an infant that the mom wasn't feeding and it was starving to death.
[SPEAKER_05]: She got her custody back within a month and a half because she did what she had to do.
[SPEAKER_05]: It would be far easier if I was a drug addict who have gotten custody back of my children.
[SPEAKER_06]: It is so true that you say that I've interviewed a couple people that the conversation was about foster care and adoption and the whole thing is that the courts, unfortunately, or fortunately for these people that I was interviewing, their goal is to reunify.
[SPEAKER_06]: So if your judge does not have that goal, that would be crazy.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't care what kind of a manipulator he says.
[SPEAKER_06]: And by the way, I don't know that I should say this on air, but you know, you have a really bad picker.
[SPEAKER_06]: You picked terrible mine.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, girl.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm working on that.
[SPEAKER_06]: You're scared of Keith.
[SPEAKER_06]: Keith is no one to be scared of.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, like legit.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, the fact that he has some power over you right now because he has your kids.
[SPEAKER_06]: When you get your kids back and you can establish your not a harm to them, which clearly you're not, no matter what you lied about, didn't lie about, this has nothing really to do with your children.
[SPEAKER_06]: That guy is, you know, I would, I would question anyone who's going to date him in the future because like what the hell?
[SPEAKER_06]: Like a guy who wants to keep children from your mother is a terrible person regardless of what you guys have going on in the past.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I know you have a lot to say about him.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm not really going to let you say too much about him because I don't want you to get in trouble.
[SPEAKER_06]: Number one.
[SPEAKER_06]: And number two, because I don't think you should say bad things about the father of your child.
[SPEAKER_06]: Because I know you have a lot to say, but he may have manipulated you.
[SPEAKER_06]: He may have been a bad parent.
[SPEAKER_06]: He may manipulate the cops.
[SPEAKER_06]: The guy is not that powerful.
[SPEAKER_06]: And you can meet a lot more men who you should be with.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I'm not going to let you sit in this Keith Papini stuff because he's not even worth it.
[SPEAKER_06]: James, on the other hand, same thing.
[SPEAKER_06]: Total loser, Sherry, who you let convince you is a good guy, you talk to him about God knows what and you go off with him trust him, but you don't trust him to get you in the car or drugs you whatever it is.
[SPEAKER_06]: Total fucking loser, Sherry.
[SPEAKER_06]: So, and then this new guy you dated after that everybody heard about for a little bit, the auto shop guy, whoever he was, fucking loser, okay?
[SPEAKER_06]: Like, I don't know if you're on Bumble, I don't know if you're on match.com.
[SPEAKER_06]: You have to let only select people introduce you to your next boyfriend, because clearly you are a pleaser.
[SPEAKER_06]: You pick people who are, you think are powerful.
[SPEAKER_06]: They are powerful in all the wrong ways.
[SPEAKER_06]: No, am I wrong?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: Like, we've got to get you the right type of guy.
[SPEAKER_06]: But anyways, back to your children.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, I get it.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's very emotional.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's very difficult.
[SPEAKER_06]: But it's going to work out.
[SPEAKER_06]: That part is going to work out.
[SPEAKER_06]: One thing I'm hopeful.
[SPEAKER_04]: I'm going to be hopeful that there's going to be a lot of kids.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's more than hopeful.
[SPEAKER_06]: It has to be because you have done nothing to not deserve to have to be a parent.
[SPEAKER_06]: You are a great parent from everything.
[SPEAKER_06]: Again, and I've been very neutral.
[SPEAKER_06]: You are a good parent.
[SPEAKER_06]: So I'm hoping that that will happen for you.
[SPEAKER_06]: But I want to go back for a second because we did skip over it.
[SPEAKER_06]: Just take me back to how you got released.
[SPEAKER_06]: from James because we all see you in some grainy video coming across the street chain shackled whatever it was.
[SPEAKER_06]: And this seems very dramatic and we all think it's these two Hispanic women that have let you go and you want to
[SPEAKER_06]: You know, protect this one Hispanic woman, woman blah blah blah, but how did it really work in real life?
[SPEAKER_06]: Like the day before, as you're saying, okay, I'm gonna let you go.
[SPEAKER_06]: It's Thanksgiving.
[SPEAKER_06]: I wanna let you back with your kids.
[SPEAKER_06]: Are you begging to go home?
[SPEAKER_06]: Give me the truth about what happened.
[SPEAKER_05]: I've been begging the entire time to go home.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was never a day that went by that I didn't try to infuse any conversation with you need to let me go home or I need to be back with my children or any type of like every day I try to find some way to negotiate to go home with this man.
[SPEAKER_05]: And frankly, there wasn't an established plan.
[SPEAKER_05]: I wish that there was.
[SPEAKER_05]: When I was dropped off and when he had me, like, forcefully pushed me out of the car, I had no idea where I was.
[SPEAKER_05]: I had no idea that I was in yoga County and still hours away from my home.
[SPEAKER_05]: That portion of it still doesn't even make sense to me.
[SPEAKER_05]: Why not just
[SPEAKER_05]: Take me home, even closer to where I lived.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, it was hours away from my home, from my home community, even.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I'm not sure.
[SPEAKER_05]: And in my documentary, you hear the FBI agents say, like, oh, it's convenient that it's Thanksgiving Day.
[SPEAKER_05]: I had no idea that it was Thanksgiving Day.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't know until the EMT that had me in the ambulance told me that it was Thanksgiving Day.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm not sure.
[SPEAKER_05]: I wish that there was more information about that.
[SPEAKER_05]: I just know that what leading up to it, there was the hostage negotiator that he was in a conversation with.
[SPEAKER_05]: And that day, on Thanksgiving Day, it was a very difficult day.
[SPEAKER_05]: He was very Russian.
[SPEAKER_05]: He was very aggravated.
[SPEAKER_05]: He had come in very swiftly.
[SPEAKER_05]: He had started
[SPEAKER_05]: putting hose clamps on my ankles and binding me to the chain that was around my waist and it was this very rushed or a deal and in fact he got me inside of a hockey bag so I had to get inside a bag for him to take me outside.
[SPEAKER_05]: So my tiny little body was stuffed in a bag and put over his shoulder and he carried me out to this vehicle and then
[SPEAKER_05]: Went a certain distance and then refascent me in the vehicle and I was very much under the influence and very high and Then I lost time like I kept blocking out and I couldn't stay awake during the drive I knew that I was fastened in the car But there wasn't established communication for the actual release I just know that he was getting nervous because of the
[SPEAKER_05]: the media that was out there, and I used that as much as I could to establish some way to get out.
[SPEAKER_06]: When you say hostage negotiator, because you mentioned a couple times in the center of your and I haven't heard of that before, are you saying somebody was actually talking to him about potentially if you had, if he had you in letting you go?
[SPEAKER_05]: No, it was on the news.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was a hostage negotiator that they had gotten on the local news station and broadcasted like a reward for that before, but I didn't know if he was nervous because he was talking to them.
[SPEAKER_06]: When you were in the car, did you realize you were going home?
[SPEAKER_05]: No, I was really, I kind of had an indication of that.
[SPEAKER_05]: So yes and no, I thought that that's what was going on, but I didn't really know for sure, but it was terrifying.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was especially terrifying because like I didn't know what he was doing, especially when he was like attaching those hose clamps to my ankles.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't quite understand why he did that.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't know why I was being put in a bag.
[SPEAKER_05]: I was just really scared.
[SPEAKER_05]: So to me, it could have been one thing or the other.
[SPEAKER_05]: It could have been
[SPEAKER_05]: the end to my life, or it could have been my salvation for me.
[SPEAKER_05]: The whole thing was really terrifying and emotional, and I was frozen.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, it was really scared.
[SPEAKER_06]: What did you think about the whole time that you were there?
[SPEAKER_06]: Like, were you like, oh my God, I love my husband so much.
[SPEAKER_06]: I miss him, were you like, what were your thoughts?
[SPEAKER_05]: Fear, mostly.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, just trying to stay alive.
[SPEAKER_05]: I knew that Keith was never going to stop looking for me.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't think it's for the same reason that most people think.
[SPEAKER_05]: But for me, I was just fixated on if I can survive this, I can get back to my kids.
[SPEAKER_05]: Got it.
[SPEAKER_05]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_05]: I just missed the kids.
[SPEAKER_06]: I just want to make family.
[SPEAKER_06]: Of course.
[SPEAKER_06]: And quick question, you mentioned how you felt drugged most of the time, would he actually give you a pill?
[SPEAKER_05]: There was multiple things, so there was a drink, there was something in some kind of concocted drink, and there was also something that he would put in the food.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I could tell there was like a grainy texture to the food, and other times he would just freely give it to me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so there's a, there's a lot of missing information when it comes to my case.
[SPEAKER_05]: We've tried FOIA requests, we've had lawyers try to get information, and there are things that law enforcement are just not giving us access to.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't have my rape kit results.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't have my drug results.
[SPEAKER_05]: They said that there was drugs found in my system, and I could hear law enforcement speaking in the hospital, but they haven't given us those drug results.
[SPEAKER_05]: And we don't know why we don't understand why they're not giving me my medical information and my medical results from examinations during the investigation.
[SPEAKER_06]: When you say you don't know why, like, literally why?
[SPEAKER_06]: Aren't they only supposed to give it to you?
[SPEAKER_06]: They're supposed to.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_06]: So you have a lawyer working on this, still.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah, there's been an indication from the FBI that the FOIA request is going to cost thousands of dollars and at least two to three years for them to give any information.
[SPEAKER_05]: So we've put in for everything.
[SPEAKER_05]: But even what we've asked them for, there's a lot of missing files in it and there's a lot of information that should be in there that is not.
[SPEAKER_06]: And what would be the explanation for that?
[SPEAKER_05]: There isn't.
[SPEAKER_05]: They don't answer that question.
[SPEAKER_05]: They never have.
[SPEAKER_05]: We've directly asked them that question.
[SPEAKER_05]: They've never answered that question.
[SPEAKER_06]: Your husband has suggested that your childhood plays a part in some of your history or what's gone on or the fact that maybe you're a runaway or all these things.
[SPEAKER_06]: What can you talk about your childhood a little bit?
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah, I think that there is a confirmation bias that's happening in terms of my childhood trauma or just me as a defiant teenager in general.
[SPEAKER_05]: So when I was in school, I was a straightest student.
[SPEAKER_05]: I did every sport under the sun.
[SPEAKER_05]: I did every extracurricular activity, but I was kind of a defiant child, you know, and for
[SPEAKER_05]: Someone to conclude that I was a runaway.
[SPEAKER_05]: I wasn't.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was like my parents just said, no, you can't go out and go to the movies and I'd say, yeah, I'm going anyway.
[SPEAKER_05]: And for me, all that does is it's like it just continues to establish that I had a personality disorder that was established that I could live a secret life.
[SPEAKER_05]: right so if someone wanted me to be one thing I would definitely say no I'm gonna do it anyway that's who I want to be and unfortunately it's those ass at risk teens that live kind of this defiant life that are put at the most risk for predators I have a really good friend of mine who was suffering from trauma in her childhood similarly in the way that I was and that's how she was sex trafficked she was hospitalized after an attempted suicide and her captor
[SPEAKER_05]: found an open door and was able to sex trafficker for a number of years.
[SPEAKER_05]: So there's like this established history that they're using as confirmation bias to conclude one thing that's actually the exact opposite.
[SPEAKER_05]: And all it demonstrates is that I have the capability of keeping quite a lot of secrets, which leaves you open to predators.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, it's one of the simplest way.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's what groomers look for.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's what predator look for.
[SPEAKER_05]: They look for people that are easily capable of keeping secrets from people.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I definitely certainly was one of those.
[SPEAKER_06]: Another thing I want to really understand because I think this is part of some people's issue is that you get to the point where you're arrested.
[SPEAKER_06]: They give you.
[SPEAKER_06]: Hello.
[SPEAKER_06]: Do we lose her?
[SPEAKER_03]: I'm sorry.
[SPEAKER_06]: Sorry about that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_05]: We have a little screen issue there.
[SPEAKER_05]: Sorry about that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: We get to the point where people are wondering why you would take a plea deal.
[SPEAKER_06]: Why you would go to prison and why at that point you wouldn't say, okay, everybody's stopped.
[SPEAKER_06]: I didn't lie about this.
[SPEAKER_06]: You know, why would you again agree or say in prison?
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, fine, I lied.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'll take the prison time.
[SPEAKER_05]: So, first and foremost, when I was arrested, and my case was created by the FBI, it was Sherry Papini versus the United States Federal Government.
[SPEAKER_05]: If I would have gotten a trial, Sherry Papini versus James Reyes, that would have been a very different trial, that would have been a very different option for me.
[SPEAKER_05]: But that's not what I had.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was Sherry Papini versus the United States Federal Government, and the feds don't lose.
[SPEAKER_05]: You can't, you don't beat the feds.
[SPEAKER_05]: So not only was I up against the entire United States federal government, but they make trials go on forever.
[SPEAKER_05]: They can drain you of all of your assets.
[SPEAKER_05]: They can, like I just said, they can choose not to give you access to all of the information.
[SPEAKER_05]: They can choose not to get like I.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't have access to my rape kit results.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't have access to the drugs that were in my system.
[SPEAKER_05]: Like, you can't beat a game that's already rigged.
[SPEAKER_05]: You don't beat the federal government.
[SPEAKER_05]: So for me, not only did I know that I was up against the entire United States of America, but I wanted to take accountability.
[SPEAKER_05]: I knew that lying and concealing his identity was wrong.
[SPEAKER_05]: I knew that not giving the law enforcement an opportunity to actually thoroughly investigate James Reyes was wrong.
[SPEAKER_05]: And at the end of a trial that I would have against the United States federal government, at the end of that trial, I still lied.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I was still going to face time.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I was still going to face an even harsher sentence.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I didn't have money.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't have resources.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't have
[SPEAKER_05]: the access that I have now and the the confidence that I have now to stand up for myself in that way.
[SPEAKER_05]: And frankly, to me, the demonstration of my remorse was taking accountability for the lie that I created.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so taking the plea agreement was my best option.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I'm sorry, just just to clarify the lie about the two Hispanic women.
[SPEAKER_05]: That is the lie about my captors identity.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_05]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_05]: And those two Hispanic women are real people.
[SPEAKER_05]: They were people.
[SPEAKER_05]: Like if you were to hold up the picture of James's mother next to that sketch, they're identical.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I was trying to read from law enforcement to get to James.
[SPEAKER_05]: It was never about trying to establish these completely new identities of these fake made up people.
[SPEAKER_05]: They're real people that were involved in this crime.
[SPEAKER_05]: I just couldn't say James Reyes.
[SPEAKER_05]: So the breadcrumb was that James Reyes is Hispanic.
[SPEAKER_05]: So if I could lead them to his mother in this connection, I wouldn't be directly saying on camera that it is in fact James Reyes.
[SPEAKER_06]: And by the way, for people listening, I listened to the tape of James talking to the police and he admits that his mother did know that you were at the house.
[SPEAKER_06]: Did you ever see the mother?
[SPEAKER_05]: No, there was a time where I heard someone that I think could have been considered his mother, but no, I was in the bedroom with the with the door locked.
[SPEAKER_06]: He, he does admit that his mother knew that you were there, which to me also is so crazy that these people are not held accountable.
[SPEAKER_06]: And if you were
[SPEAKER_06]: arrested for lying at all.
[SPEAKER_06]: I just don't understand why he wasn't.
[SPEAKER_06]: He spent in a two and a half hour, three hour interview.
[SPEAKER_06]: He spent a full hour lying to the cops that were there and they kept repeating it is a crime to lie and he kept doing it.
[SPEAKER_06]: And then as we all know, you're not gonna just completely come clean.
[SPEAKER_06]: Whatever you would say may have been a portion of the truth.
[SPEAKER_06]: But it was not all of the truth and it was very uncomfortable to listen to.
[SPEAKER_06]: And it was uncomfortable to listen to these
[SPEAKER_06]: The law enforcement who were talking to him and just kind of letting him say whatever he wanted to say and then moving on to the next subject.
[SPEAKER_06]: I will say that in your benefit.
[SPEAKER_05]: Thank you.
[SPEAKER_05]: And when I was in prison, I met women that were in there for conspiracy charges.
[SPEAKER_05]: And conspiracy could be something as simple as a drug deal is going down in your passenger and a car.
[SPEAKER_05]: And they got like five and six years for a conspiracy charge or for impeding an investigation.
[SPEAKER_05]: So there's real charges that could have been established, regardless of what side of the street that you're on, regardless of whether you actually believe that I did it to myself, which is still absurd, or believed that he was involved, there should have been at minimum, a conspiracy charge or impeding an investigation, and at minimum that didn't even happen.
[SPEAKER_05]: And he's not even responsible for any portion of the restitution.
[SPEAKER_05]: I am the only person that's paying a portion of the restitution and there's several other people that knew what was happening and knew the entire time and are still not responsible.
[SPEAKER_05]: I am paying the entire bill for the entire investigation.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_05]: Listen, and I spent eight, you know, my sentence was for eighteen months.
[SPEAKER_05]: The FBI was only asking for eight months.
[SPEAKER_05]: Our prosecution was only asking for seven months and the judge gave me eighteen.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, listen, again,
[SPEAKER_06]: There are many things that are very questionable and I think people want to reduce this to a headline of you created a hoax, you lied because you didn't want to be with your husband or you were possibly in love with someone else and then you faked this abduction to be able to come home and say, face, there are a lot of questions.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, if he wasn't involved, you know, I don't know
[SPEAKER_06]: why there would be some situations that were very clear on there.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't know why he wouldn't have been arrested or given some sort of slap on the rest for his involvement in it.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't know how anyone could believe that he would just do all these abusive things to a girl just because she asks him to do it for what he says is, by the way, no pussy, right?
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, some guys might laugh and be like, oh, men do a lot of crazy things for
[SPEAKER_06]: to be with a woman, he claims that you guys were not together sexually.
[SPEAKER_06]: You don't say that that's the case, correct?
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, I wouldn't say that there was sexual intercourse, but there was quite a lot of sexual instances.
[SPEAKER_05]: Like I said, James would get off with the violence that he would create with my body.
[SPEAKER_05]: And so there was sexual incidences that occurred, but I kept him out of me out of a ejaculating inside of me because I did not want to get pregnant.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I did whatever I could do to keep him out.
[SPEAKER_05]: And that means he would participate in these bile
[SPEAKER_05]: very violent acts to my body and then he would just go to sleep and he would leave me alone.
[SPEAKER_06]: Right.
[SPEAKER_06]: Did he actually sleep in the other room or he slept in the same room as you?
[SPEAKER_05]: Um, there was only one time that he slept in the same room as me after that he'd sleep on the couch where he would sleep in his second bedroom that was there.
[SPEAKER_05]: And that's to say what I could remember.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was times that I was so dragged that I didn't remember.
[SPEAKER_05]: So there's a lot of unknowns for me in that situation.
[SPEAKER_06]: Right.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, again, another thing that I think is shocking, the boards on the window.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't know how he can pretend that like if someone asked me, if I was doing a friend of favor and bringing you into my house because you were in a bad relationship and you say, you gotta put boards all over the window because I wanna sit in the dark and chain myself to a wall.
[SPEAKER_06]: That makes no sense.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't understand why cops didn't get more into that.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't understand why cops didn't.
[SPEAKER_06]: get into more of him admitting that a lot of people knew that you were there.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't understand why when we know a couple of days in that your ex has that Keith was saying that you were talking to James within, you know, the last couple of months or he had caught you talking to James.
[SPEAKER_06]: There are a lot of unanswered questions.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I do think that the cops whether or not they're mad at you for just lying about the Hispanic women portion of it
[SPEAKER_06]: to save face or whatever the reason that they want to make up that you did or didn't do it.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yes, you lied.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yes, you should take responsibility for that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, but that doesn't mean that there is truth to the situation.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I think that's what people are really missing in this piece.
[SPEAKER_06]: So, okay, so to get to this, so why are you writing the book now?
[SPEAKER_06]: Why are you talking now?
[SPEAKER_05]: Well, there's been so many versions of the story.
[SPEAKER_05]: And there's been so many people running with my story about me without me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And even in the process of making a documentary, I'm still editing.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, it's still contextual in
[SPEAKER_05]: in a documentary.
[SPEAKER_05]: And this is my voice.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's not just about me telling my side of the story.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm reclaiming my life.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, I'm establishing that that person that's been created to fit a narrative.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's not me.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's not really me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And this this book is some of my
[SPEAKER_05]: My biggest most impactful moments in my life, and it's this tremendous journey that I've been in on for self-discovery, and I think that my story is touched so many people, and there's so many people that can identify with bits and pieces of my story, and that's who I'm writing this book for, where those people that have been through the same situation as me, because what happened to me is preventable.
[SPEAKER_05]: And if I can help that in any way, if I can engage in a conversation with someone in some way that can prevent what happened to me, then I'm happy to do that.
[SPEAKER_05]: But this is really about me reclaiming my life and that person, that Sherry Papini internet unicorn, she doesn't exist.
[SPEAKER_05]: And this is my words reclaiming my story and my life and using my ability to write this book.
[SPEAKER_06]: Are you going to go back to your maiden name?
[SPEAKER_05]: No, I'm actually, well, it isn't made in name, so I'm going to my mother's maiden name.
[SPEAKER_05]: Now, my grandmother, what that my daughter was named after I'm taking curse.
[SPEAKER_06]: Oh, God, do we get to know what that name is?
[SPEAKER_06]: Or are you going to go to it?
[SPEAKER_06]: It's Louis.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay, Sherry, Louis.
[SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: What are your thoughts about how your children are going to be shaped to interact with you?
[SPEAKER_06]: Think about you.
[SPEAKER_06]: Are you worried about that?
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, I'll say for me, my daughter is thirteen.
[SPEAKER_06]: This year we had some issues with how kids got expelled for shaming her for something that happened with me as you know, fifteen years ago and bringing it up in science class going through all the pictures and then making fun of her for it.
[SPEAKER_06]: Do you worry about your kids and if I don't know what other kids will say about you and put on them?
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm so sorry that that happened to you and your daughter.
[SPEAKER_05]: How did you guys deal with that if you don't make me asking?
[SPEAKER_06]: Well, I mean, I had a conversation with the school and I found myself in tears very quickly being like, because I don't know anybody at the apologies at this point, right?
[SPEAKER_06]: Because it was between me and two other people, essentially.
[SPEAKER_06]: But I found myself saying, you know,
[SPEAKER_06]: that, you know, essentially my mistake shouldn't be something that my daughter has to pay for, and I will not allow her to be shamed for something that is on me and something that, frankly, is the parents that are putting down on their kids, right?
[SPEAKER_06]: So, and I, I said to my daughter, why it?
[SPEAKER_06]: You know, you are so smart and so lucky and you have access to me.
[SPEAKER_06]: And the thing is, there's a lot of those people are almost fearful.
[SPEAKER_06]: Because they don't get to ask you the questions that I'm asking you now.
[SPEAKER_06]: They don't get to know what they want to know.
[SPEAKER_06]: And you trigger, just like guy trigger, something in someone else's life, whether it is secrets.
[SPEAKER_06]: whether it is infidelity, whether it is, you know, bad marriage.
[SPEAKER_06]: All these things, you and I and other people trigger that and others and it creates fear.
[SPEAKER_06]: And what I ended up saying to my daughter is, you know me and I know you and I am always gonna tell you the truth and, you know, we are a team and do not let anyone share me because of something that they think I did because you know me and you can ask me any question you want but do not
[SPEAKER_06]: dare like lower your head because you're embarrassed of something that you think I did.
[SPEAKER_06]: So and she's been she's she's a strong girl and your kids will be strong and as long as you get the time with them eventually for them to know you and not harp on the past but know who you are and know that they have access to you and know you're never going away.
[SPEAKER_06]: I think probably the fear your kids have is that
[SPEAKER_06]: Let's say you get a boyfriend in the future.
[SPEAKER_06]: They don't know if you're going to, you know, not be as accessible as you are when you were in their household.
[SPEAKER_06]: Like there are so many aspects of it, but that's how I dealt with it.
[SPEAKER_06]: I just said, you know me and we are a team.
[SPEAKER_06]: And, you know, I don't have a village fighting for me.
[SPEAKER_06]: I never did.
[SPEAKER_06]: I feel like you're the same with that.
[SPEAKER_06]: And you just have to create a really small village that trusts you and that allows your kids to know what a good person you are.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah, I feel like I have that now.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, I have my mom and dad, the reason my move to where I'm at is to be closer to mom and dad.
[SPEAKER_05]: And my community is totally embraced me up here.
[SPEAKER_05]: They've been incredibly supportive.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I have a lot of friends.
[SPEAKER_05]: And frankly, I have Suzanne Keepapini's sister as well.
[SPEAKER_05]: We have a very established bond for the kids to have an open environment to ask questions and be able to have.
[SPEAKER_05]: I think right now, they have such limited access of me and they have such limited access to actual information, like the real information.
[SPEAKER_05]: You know, it's going to take some time for them and it's going to take some unraveling of the alienation that I've experienced and I look forward to doing that with the therapist.
[SPEAKER_05]: I look forward to having age-appropriate conversations with my kids, but
[SPEAKER_05]: At this point, what is important and valuable to me is that they're seeing that I continue to show up and I'm going to continue to show up.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I think right now, particularly my son is struggling in school.
[SPEAKER_05]: And frankly, Keith exploited the hell out of my kids in his film.
[SPEAKER_05]: He really did.
[SPEAKER_05]: And to release videos, emotional videos of my kids in his film, my kid got bullied about it.
[SPEAKER_05]: And that's on him.
[SPEAKER_05]: That's something that he chose to do.
[SPEAKER_05]: to exploit my children in this film.
[SPEAKER_05]: I didn't do that in mind and I've continued to try and mitigate the children's exposure in this.
[SPEAKER_05]: But I think really as soon as I regain access to my kids and they see that I'm going to continue showing up.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's a much better, more competent message, especially for my daughter, especially for my daughter.
[SPEAKER_05]: Because keeping secrets, it's not good.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's not what's best for your children and not having the ability to speak.
[SPEAKER_05]: and have your own voice.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's not what's best tonight.
[SPEAKER_05]: I know Keith Avienius personality and I know what's happening and I know that they're being very much coached and alienated away from me and we're getting there.
[SPEAKER_05]: We're so close and I have a really tight bond with my kids.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I know it's going to be okay.
[SPEAKER_05]: I just have to get them back.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm really pulling for you and I know that's going to happen.
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't even doubt that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Tell me a day in the life for you.
[SPEAKER_06]: Are you working?
[SPEAKER_06]: Are you hoping to work?
[SPEAKER_06]: What's going on?
[SPEAKER_05]: Well right now I'm on this book tour so I'm promoting the book and I'm trying to get out there as much as possible and it's been a very daunting process but it's been so incredible to not feel intimidated by the media anymore.
[SPEAKER_05]: So I was always very intimidated to engage because I was always afraid while they're just gonna spin it off and tell their own narrative anyway.
[SPEAKER_05]: And now I have this capacity to engage with them in a way that I'm just going to keep going and I have an opportunity here because frankly I'm they're asking to speak to me and I think everybody's always wanted to speak to me and I always wanted to engage with me.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I was too fixated on keeping the secret.
[SPEAKER_05]: And now I'm not afraid.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm not afraid to say that I had an emotional affair.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm not ashamed that I had an emotional affair anymore.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm not afraid to tell the truth about everything.
[SPEAKER_05]: And it's been really easy.
[SPEAKER_05]: So right now it's been promoting the book.
[SPEAKER_05]: That was an exceptional process.
[SPEAKER_05]: I worked my
[SPEAKER_05]: ass off to write the book.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, it was so hard, but it was so wonderful.
[SPEAKER_05]: Spending a lot of time with my mom and dad and preparing for this trial conclusion that we have, you know,
[SPEAKER_05]: really rebuilding my house and doing community events I just went to one the other day and the community was really engaging and I got a lot of hugs and got a lot of support from people and so yeah and working with Tim I know you we're talking to Tim's story being able to engage with Tim and figure out where my next step is and am I going to be talking to women in prison am I going to be talking to people that have been through the same things that I've been in like it's really
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm rebuilding everything and it's been really great to figure out what the next move is for me.
[SPEAKER_06]: That is really exciting.
[SPEAKER_06]: I mean, and listen, by the way, you have a book out, but the money from that book is going to your Restitution, correct?
[SPEAKER_05]: Yes.
[SPEAKER_06]: So how much do you owe?
[SPEAKER_05]: Currently, I owe a little over two hundred thousand.
[SPEAKER_05]: Every time that I get a big check, I give it to the government.
[SPEAKER_05]: And I do plan on simply suing some of the other people that were engaged in in my crime and seeing if I can get some compensation for the restitution with their culpability of the crime.
[SPEAKER_06]: Right.
[SPEAKER_06]: Okay.
[SPEAKER_06]: So you are planning on going after James.
[SPEAKER_05]: Absolutely.
[SPEAKER_05]: Now that I have the courage and the ability to, yes, absolutely.
[SPEAKER_06]: And potentially, when you go after the police department, I mean, do you have any, can you go after them?
[SPEAKER_06]: I don't know.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't really have the motivation to do that.
[SPEAKER_05]: Frankly, I think there's quite a lot of culpability on my part because I was never honest with them.
[SPEAKER_05]: I mean, they have the opportunity to talk about their mistakes and their missteps, they may.
[SPEAKER_05]: But frankly, I'd like to work with law enforcement to prevent that in the future.
[SPEAKER_05]: I don't have any motivation to harm law enforcement.
[SPEAKER_05]: I think that there's some things that can be improved on.
[SPEAKER_05]: Right.
[SPEAKER_05]: I need to work with them.
[SPEAKER_06]: But you agree that it could be it might not be necessarily conspiracy.
[SPEAKER_06]: It might just be because they were so sort of exhausted because they found out this was a big lie and then chose to not go down any other road because they just thought it was like crime wall.
[SPEAKER_06]: And it was over.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_05]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_05]: And people have said that before they've said it's like the girl that cried wolf, but even in the the legend of the girl that cried wolf, she still gets really hurt in that.
[SPEAKER_06]: Right.
[SPEAKER_06]: Oh, of course.
[SPEAKER_06]: Well, I'm not saying that you weren't her.
[SPEAKER_06]: I'm assuming that you were very hurt, but you do agree that the responsibility lies within getting James to take responsibility.
[SPEAKER_06]: And whether that means going to jail or whether it just means
[SPEAKER_06]: almost like freeing you by him saying yeah I had something to do with this and whether or not he goes to jail almost kind of doesn't seem the point it would almost free you from people thinking that there is this big lie and then you continue to tell one right yeah well yeah I think that James is
[SPEAKER_05]: I think James is quite dangerous.
[SPEAKER_05]: And for me, it's like, I am out now.
[SPEAKER_05]: I'm telling the truth now.
[SPEAKER_05]: And James is capable of doing very dangerous things.
[SPEAKER_05]: And that's terrifying.
[SPEAKER_05]: That's very terrifying.
[SPEAKER_05]: It's not just him.
[SPEAKER_05]: There was other people that were involved too.
[SPEAKER_06]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: You know, it's interesting, I was in listening to him talk.
[SPEAKER_06]: The police were asking him to call you and see if you can get you on the phone and get you to admit what went on.
[SPEAKER_06]: Do that conversation ever happen?
[SPEAKER_00]: No.
[SPEAKER_06]: And have you ever spoken to him since the day you left his house?
[SPEAKER_00]: No.
[SPEAKER_06]: And if you ever thought, I mean, he went hand in hard about how he didn't have your phone number and ridiculous conversation that went on and on and on.
[SPEAKER_06]: Have you ever thought about calling him?
[SPEAKER_05]: No, I have no desire to speak to him ever again.
[SPEAKER_06]: Got it.
[SPEAKER_05]: The only time I think I will ever speak to him again is in a courtroom.
[SPEAKER_06]: I got it.
[SPEAKER_06]: So you are actively going to proceed that?
[SPEAKER_00]: Yeah.
[SPEAKER_06]: Got it.
[SPEAKER_06]: Last thing I'll ask you, and I think you've covered it a couple times, but what do you think is the most misunderstood thing about you, Sherry?
[SPEAKER_05]: That I did it to myself, that I harmed my own body, that I'm even capable of doing anything like that.
[SPEAKER_05]: That I abandoned my children.
[SPEAKER_05]: Those are, but the big ones, the big ones are that people could actually consider that I would ever abandoned my children, and that I would harm my own body.
[SPEAKER_06]: And what would you say to James if you could say anything to him?
[SPEAKER_04]: You know what you did to me.
[SPEAKER_04]: You know what you did to me.
[SPEAKER_04]: Tell the truth to everybody.
[SPEAKER_01]: You know that you participated in the way that you participated.
[SPEAKER_01]: And it's time to tell a truth.
[SPEAKER_01]: I did.
[SPEAKER_01]: You watched me go to prison for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: You watched me lose my entire life for it.
[SPEAKER_01]: You watched me burn for it.
[SPEAKER_02]: And it's time to tell the truth to everybody about what you did to me.
[SPEAKER_02]: I kept my secret.
[SPEAKER_01]: And I kept everything a secret, but you know what you did to me.
[SPEAKER_01]: To my children, to my family, to my community.
[SPEAKER_01]: It's time to tell the truth.
[SPEAKER_06]: Sherry, thank you so much for being so open and honest today.
[SPEAKER_06]: I do wish you the best and I hope that people that are listening do realize that
[SPEAKER_06]: There are people that lie all the time, there are people that lie for reasons and you should probably look into yourself about the last time you lied and why you did it.
[SPEAKER_06]: It does not mean that you do not deserve a second chance and it does not mean that you are not capable of being truthful in the future and now.
[SPEAKER_06]: Tell people where they can get the book.
[SPEAKER_05]: You can find the book at SherryPapiniBook.com.
[SPEAKER_05]: And you can type in SherryPapini doesn't exist on Amazon.
[SPEAKER_05]: Direct links are available on SherryPapiniBook.com.
[SPEAKER_06]: I wish you the best of luck, Sherry.
[SPEAKER_06]: I can't wait to see how this story pans out.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I hope that you have some peace in your future.
[SPEAKER_06]: And I will check back in with you to make sure that you have your kids warm and cozy in your bed with you this year.
[SPEAKER_06]: Thank you for Thanksgiving.
[SPEAKER_06]: Thank you so much for listening to Ms.
[SPEAKER_06]: Understood.
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