Her Shocking New Claims REAL-LIFE GONE GIRL SHERRI PAPINI

NEARLY A DECADE AFTER HER KIDNAPPING HOAX MADE HEADLINES AROUND THE WORLD, THE CALIFORNIA MOM OF TWO NOW CLAIMS SHE'S FINALLY TELLING THE TRUTH IN AN EXPLOSIVE NEW DOCUSERIES: 'I WAS ABDUCTED'

- JOHNNY DODD

A gentle rain was falling outside the house where Sherri Papini has been living in the days since her release from federal prison in 2023. Inside the home on the outskirts of Redding, Calif., the 42-year-old convicted felon stepped across the hardwood floors in black socks and tight jeans before plopping down in an overstuffed chair. For a woman who has faced years of public condemnation and ridicule, Papini cut a whimsical figure as she waved an imaginary magic wand in the air and made silly faces for a camera crew filming her for a new documentary series.

“The story that the world thinks they know is that I am a master manipulator who has fooled everyone,” she said to the camera, her expression now serious. “The Sherri Papini that’s out there, it’s not me. She’s not real. I've gone from teenage sex worker to criminal mastermind to master manipulator. I poisoned my children. [I’m a] liar, cheater, whore.... I'm so f---ing tired of keeping the secret and living the lie. Now I get to tell the truth.”

DEFENDING HERSELF "The FBI stance is that I was planning a secret hoax kidnappingwhich couldn't be further from the truth," says Sherri (right, in the new doc; left, with her family in an undated photo; center, her "missing" poster).

In the explosive new four-part docuseries Sherri Papini: Caught in the Lie—premiering on Investiga-tion Discovery on May 26 and streaming on Max—the divorced mother of two speaks publicly for the first time to tell what she now says is the real story behind the 2016 scandal surrounding her mysterious 22-day disappearance and abduction hoax. Back then Sherri made nonstop headlines after her then husband—Keith Papini, 41—reported her missing after she failed to return home from an afternoon jog near their home in Redding.