Sacramento Bee, March 2022
Last week, federal prosecutors accused Sherri Papini — the subject of an alleged kidnapping in November 2016 that drew national media attention, turning the Redding “super mom” into a celebrity — of fabricating the abduction and lying to FBI agents. In a criminal complaint, the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Sacramento charged Papini, 39, with one count each of wire fraud and lying to authorities. She was arrested last Thursday, and was granted release at a pretrial hearing in Sacramento federal court Tuesday.
The alleged abduction hoax cost Shasta County, state and federal taxpayers, crime victims and donors more than $200,000, according to prosecutors and the sheriff whose office handled the initial investigation. Here’s a timeline of the Sherri Papini saga, compiled using archived stories by The Sacramento Bee as well as court records including last week’s criminal complaint.
