A California woman who went missing in 2016 was arrested Thursday on charges of lying to federal agents about her own kidnapping and defrauding the state.
Sherri Papini, 39, of Redding, California, was reported missing after going for a jog and not coming back on Nov. 2, 2016. She turned up three weeks later on Thanksgiving Day near Sacramento after authorities conducted a costly search of her hometown and several nearby states following her disappearance.
CBS News reported that she was found with bindings on her body, a swollen nose, and a “brand” on her right shoulder. She told authorities at the time that she was kidnapped at gunpoint by two Hispanic women, “even providing descriptions to the FBI along with extensive details of her purported abduction. Sketches of the alleged captors were even released by the FBI.”
Turns out, Papini, who is married with two children, was with her ex-boyfriend in Southern California and beat herself up to support her fabrication, authorities said.
"When a young mother went missing in broad daylight, a community was filled with fear and concern," U.S. Attorney Phillip Talbert said in a published statement. "Ultimately, the investigation revealed that there was no kidnapping and that time and resources that could have been used to investigate actual crime, protect the community, and provide resources to victims were wasted."
CBS noted that Papini was “still lying about the kidnapping in August 2020 when she was interviewed by a federal agent and a Shasta County sheriff’s detective, the charges allege.”
Papini was reportedly reimbursed more than $30,000 by the California Victim’s Compensation Board, including money for visits to a therapist to work through anxiety and PTSD. She faces a mail fraud charge related to the reimbursement requests that could land her in prison for up to 20 years.
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The search — which lasted 22 days — and a five-year investigation, “caused the general public to be fearful of their own safety, a fear that they should not have had to endure,” Shasta County Sheriff Michael Johnson said in a statement. Johnson added that Papini had cost taxpayers more than $150,000 in resources to investigate her phony abduction.
Reportedly, Papini had both male and female DNA on her body and clothing at the time she was found. In 2020, the DNA led to her ex-boyfriend. The ex-boyfriend told investigators that Papini stayed with him at his home during the time she was “missing.” His cousin told authorities that he saw Papini at her ex-boyfriend’s apartment twice. The ex-boyfriend rented a car and drove Papini back to Northern California.
“Not only did this charade take valuable resources away from real criminal investigative matters, but in a time where there is serious human trafficking cases with legitimate victims Sherri Papini used this tragic societal phenomenon to gain notoriety and financial gain,” Johnson wrote in a statement shared on Facebook. “All of law enforcement in Shasta county was put on a national stage and subjected to scrutiny and criticism for the handling this case. It has been a long time coming and we are grateful that our federal partners for diligently pursuing justice.”
In a statement shared with ABC 7, Papino’s family said “we love Sherri and are appalled by the way in which law enforcement ambushed her (Thursday) afternoon in a dramatic and unnecessary manner in front of her children.” The family added that they believe “this could have been handled in a more appropriate way.”
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