All the Best | EP 12

We left you on a cliffhanger at the end of
the last episode, a real time development in the story
of Laura Owens. Would she take the plea deal? The
deadline came and went and I didn't hear anything. So
I called Clayton to see if he had any news.
Don dun nothing. We have no idea. We are still
waiting for an answer.
In a shock to no one, we still don't have
an answer, at least not at the time I'm recording this.
Laura could be in plea negotiations, or she could be
doubling down and refusing to take the plea.
I mean, is it anything that we're surprised about.
I didn't really expect an answer because Laura's tactics are delayed, delay, delay,
and that's just the way that she operates. It's like,
let's drag this out as long as I can, so
we have no information, which means like from here.
I will with everybody else for a docket update.
Clayton's seen this pattern so many times he's exhausted by it.
There's thousands of loopholes in the court system. She could
do this until her face turns blue, and she will.
Laura will just go oh loophole. Ooh, no loophole. Oh no, loophol. Okay,
that's my fiftieth loophole. Let me slug this monster energy
drink and go for my fifty first. And that's what
she does, all right. Loophol one hundred, loophole one fifty,
loophole three hundred.
That's where we're at right now. We're on loophole three hundred.
Just because this plea deal expired, it doesn't mean her
window to plead guilty is closed. She can plead up
until the day of the verdict, and between now and
then there's an untold amount of loopholes. The plea deal
that expired on April thirtieth was the prosecution's first offer
and likely it's most lenient one.
If she does not take this, it's only going to
get worse for her. But with that being said, the
plea comes with the fact that she has to admit wrongdoing,
which we know Laura does not like to do so.
Again, will she take the plea?
I mean, this is in her best interest to do so,
but I don't know she's capable.
The state usually tries to avoid going to trial. It's expensive.
Only two percent of cases go to trial in Maricopa County.
I asked Clayton what he thinks is going to happen
from here. He started with a disclaimer.
I don't think I've been right about Laura once. With
every single prediction that I make, I'm always wrong. So
keep that in mind. If I had a crystal ball
and I was to tell you where we go from here,
I feel very strongly that she will not take the
plea deal, and she will go to trial, and she
will end up with worse charges and she will face
prison time, and that would be best case scenario for everybody,
including Laura.
Laura, I know you're going to listen to this. You
are trapped. Wake up.
This might be the final episode, but I promise we're
not just going to leave you hanging. I'm Stephanie Young.
This is love trapped, trapsy. There's a word we've avoided
using throughout this entire podcast.
God damn, this lady's crazy.
It's just some crazy woman, crazy crazy.
She's crazy, so crazy.
This is the crazy all you're talking about, right.
The crazy woman, The woman who brings false allegations of
sexual assault, the woman who fabricates pregnancies, the woman who
spins a victim narrative at every turn, leaving a trail
of destruction behind her. She's a kind of folk villain
in our society, and what she's done can be weaponized
against all women. Apparently these kinds of stories are pretty popular.
They can also be dangerous as women. A lot of
us remember the times we've been called crazy. I've been
called crazy. You double text, you call too many times,
you say I love you too quickly, You want to
have conversations about the future, you want to process something
that hurt your feelings. You've been gas lit and you react,
or worst of all, you've been abused and you tell
the truth, and then all of a sudden, you've been
assigned the label crazy. I've thought about this word a lot.
We've all seen it used to discredit women. I was
cautious about taking on a story where the antagonist is
such a polarizing figure. I also didn't expect the facts
to speak as loudly as they do. After just a
few weeks of reporting, I had a realization similar to
what reality Steve described.
I think it was reading the dating contract. That's when
I knew we were not dealing with a person that
was living in reality, and that was the most shocking
thing to me.
I've said this before, and I'll say it again. Fabricated
claims like the kind alleged here are incredibly rare. Since
the very start of this production, my team and I
have been talking about the larger impacts of sharing this
kind of narrative, if just retelling it perpetuates this negative
stereotype about women, and how we can minimize that. In
the end, this is what I've come to. I've reported
on the facts. I've utilized public records, many of them
submitted by Laura Owens herself. I've also relied on multiple
accounts of people who experienced this firsthand. I believe their
stories deserve to be told. I've heard this described as
a cautionary tale. I want to challenge that a bit.
I think the cautionary aspect really falls on each of us,
how we interpret it and retell it, and why it's
our responsibility to see it as what it is, one
single story. When I first talked to Clayton, I didn't
expect him to have thought about these repercussions and nuances,
but to my surprise, he had, and he brought.
It up to me.
That's the delicate balance with this whole story, which is
why I appreciate you being a woman, and why I
do appreciate the vast majority of the supporters of me
during this whole fiasco being women, because if it was
just a movement of men, then it would be seen
as misogynistic, like, oh, if you get attached to this story,
is an ichiness to it. It's a men's right activist
lead movement. It's never been that never will be anyone
that says, well, this is why we shouldn't believe women.
I never liked those comments. I never agree with them.
That's a dysfunctional mindset.
Clayton's never seen this as some broader commentary on women.
To him, it's always been about one person, Laura Owens.
Laura is one woman that has left a stain greater
than just impacting me in the previous victims. This is
going to potentially hurt women from being believed in the future.
I don't want to be associated with a movement where
we believe women less.
I don't want that.
What I want is for people to believe victims, and
that's it.
I wanted to end this series by finally hearing from
Laura Owens herself, and believe me, we've been trying on
at least five separate occasions. We've sent her or her
attorney a request for an interview, starting as far back
as May twenty five, nine months before the podcast came out.
I heard from Laura as recently as last week. We'll
talk about her emails later in this episode. And even
though we've asked, she still hasn't agreed to sit for
an interview on the record. I've been asked why we're
not hearing more from Laura's side, and it's this simple.
No one's been willing to talk for a long time.
The closest thing we had was this one website, Justicefolaura
dot com. On the home page, there's a photo of
Laura smiling. We've had a voice actor read from the
about section.
Just as for Laura exists because of a prosecution that
simply does not resemble anything we normally see in American courts.
A large coordinated faction of Clayton's fans, which came to
call itself Justice for Clayton JFC, had seized on the
story and fixated on a single claim that Laura had
faked the pregnancy and fabricated everything around it.
Actually, on June tenth, twenty twenty four, a judge ruled
that Laura was never pregnant with Clayton's twins. We don't
know who owns this website, but I have a few guesses.
I asked Reality Steve, who's been covering this for almost
three years, if he's ever talked with a friend of Laura's.
He said no, Neither him nor Dave Neil have.
For two people like Dave and myself who were coming
at her hard as we were, to never get one
thing sent to us, even if someone said, I don't
want to reveal my identity, but just no. I went
to sixth grade with Laura. She was a great girl.
I went to high school with Laura. I was a
high school boyfriend of Laura's. I knew Laura two years ago.
Somebody you would think would come to Dave and I
at some point and say something, and I never got
one email.
In episode two, I said the same thing. No one
who knew Laura would go on the record for an interview.
But that changed this week. One of Laura's childhood friends
reached out to our show. She had something to say.
She would only speak to us if we kept her
anonymous and disguised her voice. We asked for verification of
her friendship with Laura, and she sent receipts. We didn't
know what to expect, if she would defend Laura or not,
but we agreed to the interview. We're going to call
her Emily, which isn't her real name. What you're going
to hear is a voice actor replicating Emily's tape word
for word. We wanted to preserve her intention and emotionality.
We started by asking her why she reached out to us.
It just felt like some background was probably needed. There's
just no context to her anymore. She's just this rich
horse girl and she puts on this big i'd say,
almost a facade. That's just not who she was, at
least when she was a child into early adulthood.
We asked Emily to describe what Laura was like.
Back then, going back into like high school and middle school.
Laura wanted to be famous. Laura's parents were famous. She
always wanted to be in the limelight. She was a
country singer at one point in time, trying to get famous. Laura,
I would say, is best described as a keyboard cowboy.
She was very popular behind a screen, but in person
not that popular and just boy crazy.
We wanted to know if she'd ever met Laura's mom, Jan.
She had.
She and her mom were besties. Jan would drive her
around every day. Laura didn't get her driver's license until
she was like eighteen. She and her mom just spent
all day every day together and had this very strange relationship.
Laura could do no wrong. Laura did what she wanted
with full unbridled support of her parents. You want a
new horse, you get it. You want a new saddle,
you get it. You want this, just order it. I
don't think she learned how to be rejected. I don't
know if she ever really learned how to be told no.
Before Laura was publicly identified, Emily saw the headline about
a former bachelor being in a paternity dispute with an
anonymous woman.
And I was like, what a dick, Like, how rude
of this guy to knock up some chick and then
deny praternity and all this. Not that long later, I
saw Laura post some article on Facebook and I was like,
holy shit.
I read about this immediately. Emily out to her childhood
friend to check on her.
I DMed her to be like Laura, what the heck, girlfriend,
Like this is insane? Are you okay? Like I don't know,
thinking that she would be like, yeah, this is nuts.
I'm pregnant, this is hard, and she left me on Red.
That's when the puzzle pieces started coming together for Emily.
Once the initial shock wore off, of like, holy crap,
I know that person, Like I spent the night at
their home, I spent years with this person. It didn't
surprise me, Like she's so desperately wanted to be famous.
So as soon as I started following the story and
saw that it wasn't just some random person, but Clayton
had been on The Bachelor and that he was famous
per se, I was like, of course she did that,
Like she wanted to be the Bachelor's girlfriend. She wanted
that storyline, and she took it too far, like wildly
too far. But it didn't shock me at all, Like
she wanted that, and I think she's always wanted that.
When I started reporting almost a year ago, one of
my first steps was to visit Clayton Eckert in person.
We sat down at his house in Arizona and talked
for a long time. He told me the whole story
and gave me the l file. Back then, I had
no idea what I was in for. Now that I've
become fully immersed, and so have all of you, I
returned for another conversation with Clayton. I want to revisit
the pivotal moments in his story and ask some outstanding
questions of my own. So, Clayton, you and I have
talked a lot over the last year. We've done hours
of interviews, and a lot of new information has come
out since we first started this process, new indictments, a
lot of new information along the way with the investigation report.
So I kind of want to go back to the
very beginning of this story, when Laura first reached out
to you, knowing what we know now, what do you
see differently?
I cannot stress enough to you that Laura was one
of the most normal girls that I've ever met and
been and interacted with up until she snapped and the
darkness washed over her.
It did seem pretty normal until it wasn't until you
rejected her.
Yes, exactly, but until that point there was nothing. She
was intelligent. She was talking about homes, and she was
excited about buying some properties. I had no idea what
I was getting into because she was so good at
hiding it.
Did Laura change your approach to dating and how you're
looking for a relationship in the future.
Yes, And I realized that I was allowing people into
my circle that should never have access to my energy.
We saw that photo that Laura got me on. Everyone's like,
that's all it took.
Clayton's talking about the photo Laura sent him early on,
the one where she's wearing writing leggings with her back
turned to the camera. After she sent that, Clayton invited
her over.
I kind of reflected that I was like, Clayton, that's
all it took. I really had a serious conversation with myself,
and I'm like, that's all that it takes for a
woman to get access to you.
So with that, I still want to date. I still
want to settle down. I want to have a family.
I want to have a partner that I can grow
with and take on the world with. But it's like, hey,
I'm holding myself to a higher standard. Therefore I'm also
holding the people that I.
Interact with to a higher standard. That's what's changed.
One of the things that I keep thinking about with
this case, and your brother Nate actually brought it up
to me, is how different this story might have been
if you and Laura actually had sex that night of
May twentieth, twenty twenty three. Do you think we'd be
where we are today if you had had sex?
Oh my gosh, Wow, that's a hard question, Stephanie. Like
my mind's racing because I think she could have convinced
me probably, Like it's almost like, could things be different? Yes,
But ultimately, I'll tell you this much, Laura will always
find a way. So no matter the circumstances, no matter
how they played out, Laura still would.
Have found a way to get right here where she
is today.
According to Clayton, they only had oral sex. Even still,
he believed there was a small chance she could have
impregnated herself in the bathroom.
So I believe that she was potentially pregnant until I
found out about Greg. I believe that she successfully performed
that spit maneuver.
That's interesting, yeah, because now you don't believe she was pregnant.
Ever, No, I know that she wasn't pregnant now because again,
if she ever was, she would have utilized that like
she would have then went and got an ultrasound, because
you could have gotten an ultrasound and proven you were
pregnant and then just avoided the paternity test so that
you didn't have to prove it was mine.
She could have gotten pregnant by somebody else, right, and.
Then claimed it was a possibility, which was a possibility
and was something that I was concerned about.
There is this big bombshell in the investigation report, which
is that she slept with another man two weeks before
she hooked up with you, and then one week after.
But she told you that she hadn't hooked up with
anyone else in a year and over a year. How
does that make you feel.
To see that in the investigative reports? It to me
it was a bit.
It's like scary in a way because you realize or
you start to draw conclusions or make assumptions. You say,
she was slept with a guy before and after she
accused me of impregnating her, So like, what was herm there?
And again my brain leads to she was trying to
get pregnant by him so that she could then carry
out this tactic of being pregnant by the bachelor. And
she could have made it fart.
When I first met with Clayton, he described what he'd
been through as attempted trapping. It's another one of those
tropes in society, basically a woman trying to get pregnant
for money, fame, or even just for a relationship, all
while the man she's having sex with is unaware of
her goal to get pregnant. Clayton told me that during
his time as a pro athlete and in the world
of reality TV, this is a real phenomenon men are
wary of. I knew what he was talking about because
I'd worked in professional sports and saw it firsthand. It's rare,
but sometimes it actually happens. Do you still believe in
trapping or do you consider what Laura did to you
something else.
Yeah, that's what she was looking to carry out, and
she failed. But she did try to pull me into
a relationship that I did not want to be in,
and that is the definition of trapping, at least in
my eyes.
Now that we have the full picture and we know
what the state alleges and what we read in the
investigation report, they said, I'm going to read it to you.
Laura Owens, an adult female podcast host created a scheme
to elevate her notoriety and increase her commercial value by
attempting to blackmail Clayton Eckert, a television celebrity, into a
romantic relationship. So basically, the state believes that she targeted you.
The investigation report doesn't go into the details of why
they came to such a strong conclusion, but we can
imagine that the investigators have her search history, her text messages,
any other details that they probably haven't released yet. Why
do you think the state believed.
That they're right they've uncovered her motives because they have
access to more than I've ever even seen. They have
not just my exchanges with her over text and email,
they have everything her text message is probably to her mom.
They have access to all that. They confiscated all of
that information. So I would be led to believe that
they're pretty spot on with being able to uncover her motives.
I think absolutely she was looking to leverage this.
You were kind of struggling with your mental health because
you'd just come off this horrible season of The Bachelor,
You'd been dragged through the mud on the internet. You
broke up with Susie, you moved to Arizona. You were
trying to start fresh. So if she did target you,
she did pick you specifically at a low point. Have
you ever thought about it that way? And like, why
do you think she did that?
Why do I think she came after me in a
low point?
Yeah, because that was going to be her easiest prey.
She saw me as somebody that was a wound celebrity,
somebody that was a weak celebrity, right, somebody that was vulnerable,
somebody that was polarizing, and somebody that had a chink
in their armor that she could manipulate and she could
attack and win.
When Laura posted the I am the Anonymous woman thread
on Reddit, Clayton watched in horror, and so many people
immediately took Laura's side.
For those that didn't believe and were ready to pick
up their pitchforks and go after me, because there were plenty,
there were plenty. There's a lot of revisionist history out there,
people saying, well, we believe Clayt from the beginning. No,
you didn't know, you didn't. We can go back to
those early Reddit posts. You definitely did not. So let's
call it for what it is. You kind of want
me to be the villain, And why is that.
In your situation with Laura. There's a lot of people
who think that, oh, this would never happen to me.
I know better. Clayton is naive. Clayton should have known
that she was making all of this up. He should
have just stopped responding to her messages and her text messages.
He should have gone to the police on day one,
all of these things. What do you think about that
kind of response.
I've seen the comments like, well, if I was saying,
I would have just ignored her. And I'm like, that
is such an ignorant comment, because I tried. Did you
not hear me talk about thirteen phone numbers? Did you
not hear me talk about blocking the email? Did you
not hear me.
Talk about the restraining orders?
Like? Did you not hear any of this? All your
hearing is just like, well, I would have done it better.
It's triggering because I didn't.
When I look at this story as a whole, I
see two big mistakes Laura made. The first was taking
this story public. That's how Clayton found out about Greg
Gillespie and Laura's pattern of behavior without Laura sending the
story to the tabloids. The internet might have never found it.
When Clayton first saw the headline in the Sun, he
couldn't have known where we'd end up today. I asked
him to revisit that moment when the news broke.
Ah, Man, I remember, because I was sitting in a
locker room at a pickleball venue by myself, and I'm
staring at the screen. My vision got blurry. I just
remember like disassociating in that moment and thinking like, I
don't I just don't even feel like what I'm experiencing
is real. It just feels like there's a script running
or a movie playing, and I'm in the Truman Show
and I'm being watched for everyone's entertainment. This is past
the point of me making decisions and living a normal life,
Like I feel that I am meant to be this
dramatic character in this movie that I didn't sign up
for but somehow became the lead role in.
The second mistake I think Laura made was choosing Clayton.
She underestimated him.
Well, I mean, look at the outcome.
I am seeing Laura facing fourteen felony charges and everybody
knows about her previous victims. Everybody knows about her past.
She believed that there was a version of me that existed.
That she was wrong about.
She thought that knowing the version of Clayton that I
believe exists, this will crush him. And what she perceived
me as was completely on and she found out the
hard way.
This story has a way of pulling people in. It
happened to me, and I'm far from the only one.
In fact, I was late to the crowd. Dave Neil
has been following it since the day the Son article
came out.
The first time that I knew like how big this
story was show in Huntington Beach and everyone afterwards wanted
to come and talk about the case.
People just they bond over it in a weird way.
It started with Bachelor Nation fans. That's how Dave and
Reality Steve found Clayton's story to begin with, but quickly
they realized this was something much larger. Here's Reality Steve.
I was like, I think this is the biggest story
Bache Nation has ever had. There was just something about it,
And this is before we knew anything, Before we knew
about a Greg Gillespie or Mike Marriccini, and before we
knew about Laura's past. I was like, this is the
biggest thing ever I. I just couldn't think of anything else
that's ever happened to a contestant outside of this show
that was more quote unquote scandalous.
As the story grew, it became kind of a viral sensation.
Dozens more content creators started commenting on it. Thousands of
armchair detectives logged onto Reddit and YouTube. Even before the
criminal charges or the investigation report, the online community put
critical pieces of the puzzle together. Looking back on all
of their connections and discoveries, I genuinely don't know if
we'd be here today without them.
She had a video she sent us of her father
in the hospital rubbing her pregnant belly. You can clearly
see this isn't Laura Owens. The audience, they're doing mold checks,
they're matching fingernail follicles. It wasn't Laura. She's stealing from
other people and claiming as her own.
Dave and I said to each other, there is zero
chance that she is producing two babies. We guarantee she's
gonna say I had a miscarriage.
Oh my god.
We have a smoking hCG injection here that we've always
thought happened.
She could have done a million different things to get
that hCG and it wasn't until they actually investigated her
that they realized maybe she bought it and shot it herself.
It's well documented that she uses Reddit, and she had
a Reddit account.
Through reverse Google search, people were able to locate this
ultrasound photo as the one that Laura had stolen.
She had ways to do things differently, and she chose
not to. And now you fuck around, you find out.
And that's what it's come down.
To with Laura.
For two years, there's been someone behind the scenes, quietly
collecting information, cataloging it, making timelines, and tracking down legal documents.
You've heard about her, and a few months ago Clayton
finally met her in person.
I am sitting here with the infamous Schnitzel Ninja.
Schnitzel Ninja's been doing all this work anonymously out of
an abundance of caution, and she hasn't profited from it.
When Clayton met her, he was almost starstruck.
I just have to say, when you came up to
me today, it was like the big Superman reveal. I
would love to have that passion that Schnitzel Ninja has
where she's just pouring into this and not receiving a dime.
You know, I was like, I can't, I honestly can't
understand it. It's people like you that have this genuine
fascination and continue to find new things and keep people
interested that like has now brought life and has kept
it going until this point. So my question to you
is where is this interest coming from and why do
you continue to be such a passionate advocate, which, by
the way, I'm very grateful for.
I'll say that when I first got involved, I never
planned on streaming or revealing my voice or anything about me,
and I don't know that if I was told back
then this is what it would be, that I would
even believe it or necessarily be on board, because it's
a lot a lot, it's a lot of time, it's
a lot of dedication.
I am just blown away by what you've done, and
I just want you to understan that has not gone unnoticed,
and I can't thank you all enough.
He's talking about not only Schnitzel Ninja, but the whole
community who organized online support for Clayton, Greg and Mike.
One of the Day One supporters was Dave Neil. You've
heard from him throughout this series. He told me covering
this case has been one of the wildest rides of
his career.
Every day was a new twist, and that's why it's
so hard to explain this story to people. When people
ask me about the story, I always say, how much
time do you have? I will give you a ten
hour version that's just as interesting as a thirty minute
version because so much has happened. And if there's anything
anybody can take away from this, it is if you're
ever dealing with private threats, if you're ever dealing with
private bullies, or even a husband or anybody that's in
the dark treating you a certain way, air that shit
out and the communities will rally around you. I've said
it all along. Sun Light's the greatest disinfectant, and it's
led us to the truth. I'm glad that we were
able to have these conversations in a place where we
did everything we could. We got it to the finish line,
and it's kind of out of our hands.
It's one thing to report on a story, it's another
thing to experience it this past year, I got to
follow Mike Marraccini's journey in real time. When I started reporting,
Laura was already charged with seven felonies. No one expected
she would file to renew the restraining order against Mike again,
but as we all know, she did. Witnessing the emotions
in San Francisco gave me a visceral understanding of how
Laura's actions affect other people. When Laura didn't show the
first time and the judge issued a continuance, Mike and
Danielle were devastated. It happened. I sat down with Schnitze
Ninja because she was in town two. I think one
of the hardest things to hear Danielle say was I
just want to get home to my kids. I'm not
a mom, but as a mom, Like, how does that
make you feel?
I didn't know. She said that it makes me sad.
None of them deserve any of this. Laura fully intended
on not coming at all today or yesterday, and she
knew they would have to leave their kids with somebody.
The night of the DVRO renewal hearing, Mike and Danielle's
daughter noticed her parents' anxiety she's only a toddler. Danielle
remembers that evening vividly.
My daughter's very empathic and she picks up on a lot,
and she knew that something was wrong, and she would
be like, are you okay, Daddy? Are you okay? And
we actually ended up explaining it to her because we
do best and worst part of our day every day
at dinner. So I said, you know, the worst part
of my day was this woman is really mean to daddy.
And she goes, who, what's her name? Tell me her name?
And I got her name's Laura. And she's been very
mean to daddy. And she looks at Mike and she goes, Daddy,
are you okay? Did she yell at you? And then
before he could answer, she goes, well, if she ever
tries to get me and yell at me, you're going
to say something right, And I go, oh, don't you
worry if that ever happened. Yes, there would be conversations.
They had to tell their daughter about bad people in
the world. Here's Mike.
She's like the most friendly little four year old. She
opens the door for everybody ups man amson person included,
oyses waves and says thank you. And so I told her.
I was like, you cannot answer the door, that you
can't just trust everybody, like this person could be a
bad guy. It's what I have to tell.
There's one part of Mike's story we haven't talked about yet.
While he was dating Laura, Mike's own mother believed her
and empathized with her.
My mom always has like a really soft spot in
her heart for people that are struggling and especially mentally,
and she thought Laura was just going through a lot.
She replayed it to me years later, She's like, I
thought this person was going through multiple abortions. I thought
this person was going through cancer. I thought this person
was losing their father. I thought this person was struggling
with their mental health of you know, wanting to commit suicide.
And so I just thought it would be a really
low move for you to leave somebody. During that time,
I was getting pressure from not just her family, but
from my family as well to say in a relationship
with Laura.
It was really painful. Actually, I remember this. My mom
was so.
Angry with me because she believed Laura over me, and
Laura knews she can u lez my mom against me.
At the time, I'm recording this. Laura's TEDx talk about
Mike is still up. Maybe it's because that particular chapter
was run by high school students, but the online community
has been fighting to get it taken down. Here's Mike.
I wish they would take it down. I don't know
why it hasn't been taken down. I've reached out to
have them take it down. I know other individuals have
reached out to have them take it down. I know
or powerful people with a bigger influence have reached out
to have it taken down, and nothing has worked.
Before we close the chapter on Mike, there's one more
update I wish I didn't have to share. At the
end of the last episode, we heard about how the
domestic violence restraining order against him was dismissed.
I just feel really really I feel really, really good
because this has been such a long time coming. I've
been fighting for almost ten years, and I've had the
support of everybody.
That's the only reason why I've been able to get
through this.
But there's been an update. Laura didn't let it go.
She filed to appeal the dismissal. I talked with Mike's attorney,
Rachel Warrez about the news.
After the dismissal of the DVRO by the trial court,
Laura filed a notice of appeal. The purpose of a
notice of appeal is simply to indicate to the court
I will be appealing. A notice of appeal does not,
by design disclose the grounds for appeal. Subsequent to that,
there were some filings in the trial court that gave
an indication what her grounds for appeal might be.
Laura's appellet brief was due on April twenty eighth, twenty
twenty six, but a few days before Laura filed an
extension with the San Francisco Superior Court. She asked for
an additional sixty days and it was granted. It's now
due at the end of June twenty twenty six. I've
had a voice actor read from her filing.
Petitioner hereby advises this court and places respondent on formal
notice that, independent of the outcome of this application, she
intends to seek a new domestic violence protective order arising
from the respondent's recent and ongoing conduct.
Here's Rachel again.
I can't imagine for the life of me what that
conduct would be. It doesn't surprise me that she has
made that statement. It's also very consistent the sort of
putting people on notice with a threat of litigation that
hasn't come yet. This is one of her mos. She
constantly tells people, I will be sending you a cease
and assist letter, I will be suing you, I will
be charging you with something.
The conduct Laura's referencing is that Mike has been participating
in public media appearances. Laura doesn't specify which appearances in
her filing, but Mike has appeared on Inside Edition, on
interviews with YouTube content creators, and on this podcast. Laura
claims those appearances contain material falsehoods. Mike says he's just
telling the truth.
I don't believe there are any grounds here to find
that Mike's sharing his story as part of this broader
narrative that's coming out would be considered domestic violence.
It means that it's still not quite over, and it
likely won't be for a long time.
Mike is currently looking for appellet. Council appeals are a
very different animal than trial court proceedings. Even if somebody
brings a claim against you that doesn't prevail in the
trial court when they appeal the dismissal, you have to
find a new attorney and a pellet attorney, because most
trial attorneys are not also appellet attorneys. So it really
scores that even defending against a claim that ultimately ends
up to be unsuccessful can involve hundreds of thousands of dollars,
multiple attorneys, multiple different courts. So I think it's important
that simply because this appeal may not be successful, it
is still another tremendous use of resources and a significant
burden on Mike just to fight an appeal of a dismissal.
And then there's always the possibility that Laura files for
an entirely new domestic violence restraining order against Mike.
Yes, that will.
Always be on the table, the possibility of another DVRRO.
Mike and Danielle have come to accept that fact. Here's Danielle,
this is never going away.
She is never going to let this go.
Danielle told me that she and Mike will get through this,
and that she's already overcome a lot in her life.
The amount of work that I have had to do
on myself and the demons that I have had to
face are not for the faint of heart and I'm
not trying to pad myself on the back, but Laura
Owens could never be anything close to me.
I asked Danielle what she would say to Laura if
she had the opportunity.
I would want her to know how much she's hurt me,
but she did not break me that. Ultimately, the life
that she missed out on is tragic, and I do
feel bad for her to never experience the love that
I have with my husband, the love that I have
with my children, the friendships that I have worked to
keep for as long as I have. That is a shame.
That's a real shame. And ultimately, get help. All of
the men that have been involved at one point or
another had said, like if you just like take accountability
and say you're guilty and like get help, like we
would accept that. I know Clayton has said that. I
know Mike said that these men were willing to walk
away from her with just an apology and her taking
accountability and she'll just have to pay the price.
Now, we've heard from a lot of strong women in
this series, and without my prompting, so many of them
brought up one specific concern about Laura's actions.
Ultimately, the mockery that she has made of all of
these systems that serve real victims is what gets me
really fired up. She just lacks empathy is incomprehensible. The
amount that she has wasted.
Even Clayton's ex girlfriend, Susie Evans, who he met on
The Bachelor, told me that of all the things Laura's done,
this is what offends her most. When the story first
came out, Clayton told Susie what was going on, and
she believed him, but then the news broke online.
Here's Susie.
I saw so many comments saying believe women, believe women,
believe women, and ask someone that also feels that way.
I'm like, if we just believe women, so many things
would be resolved and people would be more inclined to
come forward. I've been in a position where I was
afraid to speak out about something that happened to me
on a college campus. I reported an incident that happened
and it was not taken seriously and because there's no evidence,
like nothing can be done, and to see somebody put
themselves out there and fabricate a lie, and basically I
don't want to say, said us back because I don't
want to believe that, but like, that's what it kind
of is. It feels like a total slap in the
face to women, a waste of resources, a waste of
energy and time.
Mike's attorney, Rachel Warrez, said something similar.
She used very scarce victims advocate resources attorneys that represent
victims of domestic violence who are excellent at what they do,
and it is so wonderful that they exist, but they
can't help everybody, and she took the place of somebody
who probably really needed their help. There are so many
scarce resources that are being used, and there are resources
people aren't even thinking of that she's using, and in
a resource strapped environment, it's really horrible.
It's not just about judicial resources, although that's an important part.
One of Clayton's attorneys, Deandra Arena, brought up an even
larger concern.
I think that when people come forward with false or
illegitimate claims, it detracts from all of the real victims
in those cases. So I certainly don't appreciate that as
a woman. It absolutely affects the others who have legitimate
stories and have been perpetrated against.
This story clearly strikes a nerve. Since the show began airing,
dozens of listeners have reached out to express their outrage.
I think it's because so many people have their own
traumatic personal experiences with the things Laura's claimed, like pregnancy loss,
sexual assault, or domestic violence. A few weeks ago, I
got an email in the Love Trapped in box from
a woman named Nicole Schmidt. You might not recognize that name,
but you'll probably recognize her daughters Gabby Petito. Five years ago,
Gabby was murdered by her fiance. She was only twenty two.
The case became nationwide news. I followed it every day.
Nicole used the platform to start the Gabby Petito Foundation.
According to the website, they help free others from the
dangers of intimate partner violence. Gabby Potito's mom has been
listening to this podcast. I asked her if I could
share a part of her email. Here's what she wrote.
So many real victims have to fight to be heard
and believed, and situations like this only make it harder
for others to come forward out of fear they will
not be believed. But it also leaves me asking how
do we begin to undo the damage that has been done?
By this one horrible person, because every false story does
not just mislead people, it silences the real ones who
are still trying to find the courage to speak. There's
one big question. I know everyone wants the answer to
what's wrong with Laura Owens. I am not a psychologist,
and I am not her psychologist. I've seen a lot
of comments speculating about diagnoses Laura might have, but we
can only report on what she's self identified with, and
Laura's got quite the running list. In her own court filings,
She's claimed to have epilepsy, post traumatic stress disorder, traumatic
brain injury, panic disorder, generalized anxiety disorder, anorexia, ner ROSA,
and autism spectrum disorder. She really wants the public to
know about her alleged autism diagnosis, because in December twenty
twenty four, right as the criminal investigation began closing in,
Laura published this medium blog. We've had some segments read
by a voice.
Actor over the years. I was diagnosed with depression, anxiety, ADHD,
and PTSD. Each one explained a piece of the puzzle,
but never the whole picture. Then, after my life fell
apart in ways I could never have imagined, I found
out the truth. I have high functioning autism.
The blog is titled I was just diagnosed with autism,
and it explains everything. The vast majority of the blog
isn't about autism at all. Instead, Laura tells the story
of how she's been unfairly treated by Clayton, by the courts,
and by the quote unquote JFC coult.
I'm not here to ask for your approval, and I
don't need your sympathy. But if there's one thing I
hope you take away from this, it's that you never
knew me. My reactions freezing, withdrawing, hesitating, weren't signs of
deception or manipulation. They were shaped by a developmental disorder
I didn't even know I had.
The online community had a lot of feelings about this
blog post. Here's a few of the Reddit and YouTube
comments read by voice actors.
I have a thirty four year old autistic son. I
resent the hell out of her using autism to excuse
her actions.
As a board certified psychiatrist, know.
As a special education teacher who works with many kids
on the autism spectrum, this is insulting. If she has autism,
it explains none of her behavior.
I have twelve year old autistic twins. One thing about
them is they don't like to lie or break rules.
She literally can't stop herself from offending every group of
people possible cancer, miscarriage, domestic violence, sexual assault, racism, cybraably, etc.
Now autism.
What will she pick next?
My husband got diagnosed a few months ago, and my
five year old son got diagnosed last year. Neither of
them would pull the diabolical crap that she did. This
is utterly offensive.
Like we said at the start of this episode, we
wanted to end this season by hearing from Laura directly.
I would like to ask her more about how her
alleged autism diagnosis explains everything. But Laura, much like her story,
seems to be a moving target. When Laura's been questioned
in the past, she turns to a familiar tactic, the
angry email. Most people you've heard from in this story
have received one, usually more than one, and they all
described the same feeling, a suffocating, all consuming anxiety, every
time they saw one in the inbox.
It's hard to explain to somebody how the hairs on
your neck immediately go up when you see you get
an email from Laura Owens.
She always tagged her emails with th read receipts.
Laura had a propensity to use email tracking, and she
would comment about how many times we opened her emails.
Oh, when I tell you five hundred emails. It was
just every freaking day.
You have to understand every email you'd get from Laura
would mess up your day. It was a threat. It
was like, at some point, you just don't want to
open these emails.
Laura's emails are so notorious that her usual sign off
all the Best, has become an inside joke in the
online community. There's even a website dedicated to exposing Laura's
alleged crimes. It's called all the Best Research. The content
creators told me about how personal and vitriolic her emails
can be. I sympathized, but I didn't fully understand it.
That was until Laura started emailing me. When our production
company first began developing this series, we actually had a
meeting with Laura. Our CEO Nancy Glass and executive producer
Ben Fetterman talked to her for forty three minutes on
a zoom call. They discussed her participation in a potential
podcast in documentary that was nine months before the first
episode of this podcast came out. In an email ahead
of that meeting, Laura provided a timeline of her version
of events. For background, all the emails you're about to
hear are being read by a voice actor. Let me
pull out some of the most illuminating points from Laura's
initial timeline.
I was intimate with Eckerd. I didn't want to have
sex with him, but he admits in his deposition on
February second, twenty twenty four, that he did. I alleged
non consensual sex immediately afterwards to my family and friends,
and in an email to content creators Dave Neil and
Steve Carbone, who were harassing me on October twenty third,
twenty twenty three. I also accused him of it in
my deposition on March first, twenty twenty four. My claim
has been ignored by MCAO.
MCAO stands for the Maricopa County Attorney's Office. They're the
ones who brought the criminal charges.
I strongly believe that if Eckerd were a janitor and
I were a maid, this case would have ended quietly
the moment I filed to dismiss it. The only reason
it didn't is because he's quote famous and his fans
demanded a spectacle.
In her initial email, Laura told our production company that
the investigation into her is a horrible use of taxpayer dollars.
On April eighth, twenty twenty five, my sister Sarah Owens Navare,
who lives in New York, received a call from her doorman,
who said that four MCAO detectives were at the front
desk and needed to speak with her. She was in
Mexico at the time and spoke on the phone to
a detective named It seems like a horrible use of
taxpayer dollars for MCAO to send this many detectives across
the country to talk to my sister when they didn't
even have a subpoena to speak with her. They didn't
even leave business cards with a doorman. Detectives have since
tried to call her four times, but she has not responded.
Near the end of the email, after she talks about
being indicted on seven felonies, she writes.
I am absolutely terrified of the potential jail time I
could receive, even though I have never been charged with
anything in my life.
The next day, Laura met on Zoom with our production
company Last Podcasts. Apparently it was a positive interaction. After that,
the ball was in Laura's court, but she stopped responding
about her participation. About a month later, we asked to
talk with her mother, Jan Black. We got a reply
back stating that because Jan was listed as a witness
in the criminal proceedings, she couldn't speak either. A few
months later, I emailed Laura's then criminal attorney, Joshua Coles Rudd,
requesting a statement from him or Laura.
This was his reply, Dear miss Young, thank you for
reaching out. As much as we appreciate your fair and
balanced approach, our professional rules require that we decline your
interview request. Lawyers are forbidden for making extra judicial statements
about an ongoing case and the requested format. Miss Owens
will also not be making any statements at this time.
Best regards, Joshua Callsrudd.
We reached out to Laura again before the first episode aired.
This is what I sent her on February eleventh, twenty
twenty six. Hi, Laura, I'm reaching out to follow up
on the podcast project we are producing in collaboration with iHeart,
which you previously discussed with Nancy Glass and Ben Fetterman
back in May twenty twenty five. At the time, your
former attorney, Josh Colesrudd, indicated that you wouldn't be making
a comment given the change in your legal representation. I
wanted to personally extend the invitation again to see if
your stance has changed and if you'd be interested in
sharing your perspective with us. We'd like to ask you
a few questions and give you the opportunity to speak
on your own behalf. If you would like to participate,
we need a decision by Friday, February thirteenth, at five
pm Eastern Time. If you're interested, we could schedule an
interview with the signed release on any of the following days,
Monday February sixteenth, Tuesday February seventeenth, or Wednesday, February eighteenth.
We completely understand if ongoing litigation prevents you from speaking
at this time. While we haven't reached out to your
parents or sister out of respect for their roles as
witnesses in the upcoming trial, we would welcome the opportunity
to speak with them if they are willing. Please feel
free to share my contact information with them or any
friends colleagues or representatives who might be open to an interview.
We want to ensure that we include as many relevant
voices as possible. Please let me know how you'd like
to proceed.
Thank you.
This was Laura's reply to.
Me Hi Stephanie. I hope this email finds you well.
It is very upsetting to receive a forty eight hour
deadline to respond to an interview request for a project
that has been in development for months, particularly when I
appear to be this central figure. You have known since
December that I am no longer represented by Josh, yet
only now in February are you reaching out directly and
requesting my participation on such short notice that does not
constitute a meaningful or equitable opportunity to contribute. Timing further
reinforces the appearance that one perspective has already been developed
over an extended period, while the other is being compressed
into a last minute window in an apparent attempt to
check the box that I was contacted, cover your back legally,
and push forward with a narrative that is completely out
of context with the facts.
As a reminder, Laura met with our production company about
nine months prior to discuss her potential participation in this series.
Her email went on to allege her mother reached out
to me, but that I had not replied. I have
no record of communication from her mother in my company
or personal inbox. She also said that a dear friend
of hers replied to my request for comment twice, but
I have no record of that either. Laura ended her
email by letting us know there would soon be new information.
I'm still waiting on that.
There is substantial information that will soon become public which
will materially affect how this situation is understood. Other documentary
and podcast producers have put their projects on hold while
the story plays out. If you choose to go forward
with yours, please be advised that I will aggressively pursue
appropriate legal remedies with respect to any portrayal that is
inaccurate or unfair. Warmest regards, Laura Owens.
After this email, we expected to start seeing one every week,
but it was few and far between. That was until
episode seven, when we played this teaser at the very end.
My name is Mike Peruccini. I dated Laura from March
twenty sixteen through summer of twenty seventeen.
This is when we found out Laura herself was tuning
in because after that episode, Laura sent an email subject
line formal notice regarding Love Trapped content scheduled to air
four nine twenty six.
Hello, I am writing to raise concerns about the accuracy
and fairness of the narrative being presented in Love Trapped,
including prior episodes, recent promotional materials, and information I have
obtained regarding upcoming segments involving Michael Maruccini.
It seems like Laura heard Mike's voice in the teaser
and she was upset about it. This email is about
five pages long. According to her, Mike Marraccini is misrepresenting
himself as a victim. Laura says he's lying. At the
time she sent this email, Mike's episode hadn't aired yet,
all she heard was the teaser, and she signs off
by saying.
You are now on notice of the nature of these
statements any decision to include or rely on them as
factual within your production and Carrie's corresponding legal risk. I
trust this information will be taken into account before any
further content is aired.
We received another email the following week.
To whom it may concern I am writing to place
you on formal notice that episode eight of Love Trapped
contains numerous false, defamatory, and materially misleading statements about me,
Laura Owens, as well as my parents, Ron Owens and
jan Black.
This email included five PDF attachments with a total of
twenty one pages. They were broken down into categories Iceland, Dubai,
family relationships, post relationship conduct, and my favorite category other notes.
Let me summarize these attachments. Iceland. Laura said it was
a personal trip, not a work trip. According to her,
she and Mike stayed in the same way room that
seemed particularly important to her. She again referenced Napkin Lady's
account of the events on the flight, calling it sworn
third party evidence.
Dubai.
I'll read this quote directly. The Dubai segment of the
show constructs the narrative in which mister Marraccini is portrayed
as a reluctant participant pressured into international travel. That framing
is not supported by the contemporaneous record Family Relationships. She
contradicts Mike's account that her parents pressured him into staying
in the relationship. She claims the portrayal of her parents'
involvement is false and unsubstantiated. Post relationship conduct, Laura claims
after their relationship ended, Mike was the one initiating contact
with her even following her, not the other way around.
Other notes. This is where Laura goes into detail about
quite a few grievances, big and small, but most were
about the way her relationship with Mike was portrayed. It
seemed like her biggest issue is what she calls the
trap narrative. She writes that because no baby was born quote,
a pregnancy that produces no child creates nothing that keeps
a man anywhere he does not want to be. Again.
These are all attachments full of selected excerpts from documents
and recordings.
The attached materials document specific, concrete instances in which the
episode's claims are directly contradicted by sworn deposition, testimony, contemporaneous
text message records, medical records, court filings, and third party declarations.
Then, in advance of the last episode, I reached out
one final time for a written statement from Laura. We
asked her to keep her statement to one thousand words
so we could reasonably read it on this episode. At
the last minute, she sent this reply, Stephanie, I have
been offered one thousand words at the end of more
than fifteen hours of audio constructed to destroy my reputation
and that of my family. No response I could give
in that space would begin to address the damage that
this production has done. She went on to again refute
Mike Marriuccini's claims in this series. She challenged our use
of her bankruptcy hearings in episode eleven. Those recordings are
available in full on YouTube. I wish I could say
there were more meaningful takeaways from Laura's final email, but
it's just more of the same personal digs, legal threats,
and much like in the bodycam footage, no accountability for
anything whatsoever. Laura remains adamant in her communications that we've
got the story all wrong. As we wrapped up production,
I reached out to Greg Gillespie one more time to
see if he wanted to make a comment. Greg is
the victim Laura met before Clayton. He sent me a
short statement that I'm able to share with you, Stephanie.
What we have gone through as a result of Laura's
alleged fraudulent actions and alleged criminal behavior has been nothing
short of an experience from hell. My story is vastly
different from the one being shared publicly. We will not
be satisfied until Laura Owens is in prison and restricted
from bringing further chaos into our lives. Bonus for exposing
those who assisted her alleged fraud along the way. Greg
has his own story to tell, but he's not ready
to do that yet. All three of these men are
looking forward to a day where they don't have to
think about Laura Owens anymore. As for Clayton, you don't
need to worry about him. He says he's doing better
than ever and he's got an entire community around him.
I never would have thought that this journey would lead
us to this point where there are people fighting around
the clock for me and the other victims.
But I think these people that are.
Fighting for me, Mike and Greg are really fighting for
themselves as well. They were brought into this all because
of their own trauma that likely Laura triggered when she
claimed that she went through something that they've actually went through.
And I don't think people rally around a cause if
they don't have a strong emotional poll to it, and
typically the emotional poll is they've experienced something similar.
I believe that this.
Support system has been created from trauma triggering that Laura
has done. She's triggered more than just me and another victims.
She's triggered a community. I keep saying this, but I'll
say it again. It's not even about me at this point.
It's about this community healing. So for me to be
a small part or that has been awesome.
Like we said at the beginning of the episode, there
still isn't an answer about Laura's plea deal. We don't
know yet if she's going to trial or if she'll
admit her guilt. We might not have an answer until
her pre trial hearing, which is currently scheduled for May twentieth,
twenty twenty six. That being said, we'll be back to
bring you important updates. Season one of Love Trapped will
continue when there's news to share in the criminal case
against Laura Owens, and if Laura goes to trial, I'll
be there before we end the episode. I want to
leave you with one final thought. I know it's maddening
to watch someone be confronted with the same facts over
and over again and still refuse to accept them. At
a certain point, you have to let go of the
idea that there's going to be a moment of clarity,
a confession, an explanation that makes this all make sense
for Clayton and the other men in the story. That
moment may never come.
My truth is still my truth, and it sucks and
I'm ready for it to be over.
Laura's listened to the same twelve episodes you have. She's
read the reporting, she's seen the evidence, she lived it,
and she's come to her own conclusion. You've heard the
same material. Now you have to come to yours. At
the end of the day, there's one thing that isn't
a matter of opinion. Laura Owens is facing fourteen felony indictments.
Clayton eckered is not.
Track.
Thank you so much for listening. Please be sure to
follow Love Trapped on Apple Podcasts, the iHeartRadio app, Spotify,
or wherever you get your podcasts, and please leave us
a review. A five star rating helps others find this show.
We're grateful for your support. If you would like to
reach out to the Love Trapped team, email us at
love Trapped pod at gmail dot com. That's Love Trapped
pod at gmail dot com. Love Trapped is a production
of Glass Podcasts, a division of Glass Entertainment Group, in
partnership with iHeart Podcasts. This show was executive produced by
Nancy Glass, Andrea Gunning and Ben Fetterman, Written, produced and
hosted by me Stephanie Young. Our story editor is Monique
la Boord. Producer on this episode is Sidney Glado. Additional
production support from Todd Gans. Our production manager is Kristin Melchiri.
For iHeart Podcasts, Ali Perry was our executive producer. Audio
editing and mastering by Anna McLain, Additional editing support by
Tanner Robbins and Matt Delvecchio. Thank you to our voice
actors Leslie Tolly, Trey Morgan, Leah Joblow, Tanner Robbins, Taka Zen,
Caitlin Golden, Anna McLain, Sidney Gladoo, and Todd Gans. This
podcast was developed in collaboration with Danny Passman and leb
Abramoff at cry Baby Media. The Love Trapped theme is
composed by Oliver Bains. Music library provided by Mob Music.
A special thanks to Kerrie Lieberman, Will Pearson, Jessica Crincheck,
Ali kas Enter and the entire iHeart podcast team and
For more podcasts from iHeart, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you get your podcasts.