Reason why ‘obsessed’ mother stalked and catfish her own daughter for years

Warning: This article contains spoilers for Unknown Number: The High School Catfish

There is one question on everyone's minds after watching Netflix's new documentary about a mother who cruelly cyber-bullied her own daughter - why did she do it?

For those not in the loop, Unknown Number: The High School Catfish, hit screens on 29 August, telling the real-life story of a teen girl who was anonymously harassed online.

It recalls what happened to 13-year-old Lauryn Licari, who was tormented for years with texts sent by an unknown sender, attacking her relationship, looks, and everything in between.

It began while Lauryn's then-boyfriend Owen was at a Halloween party in October 2020, when she received a text from someone claiming he was going to break up with her.

The texts stopped for a period of time before continuing in September 2021, when the teens were sent 'hundreds of thousands' of abusive messages from the mystery bully.

The case has been covered in a new Netflix doc (Netflix)

The messages contained information that only someone who knew Lauryn would know, which made the situation even more worrying.

More people from their local community, Beal City, Michigan, began to get involved as concerned parents and school officials turned to law enforcement for help.

After investigating the case, the FBI dropped the bombshell news that it was actually Lauryn's mother, Kendra Licari, who was sending the horrific texts to her daughter and Owen.

She was arrested and subsequently sentenced to sentenced to 19 months to five years in prison, after she pleaded guilty to two counts of assaulting a minor.

Kendra got out of jail in August 2024 and appeared on the documentary to give her version of events.

She maintains that she didn't send the first text that sparked the frenzy, but admitted she was the one who continued it.

The mother claims she initially wanted to 'get to the bottom of who it was' by texting Lauryn and Owen to see if they'd reveal any information.

Lauryn and her then-boyfriend Owen were targeted with horrific anonymous messages (Netflix)

She said it was 'in hopes that maybe they would send back, asking "Is this somebody?" or "Is this so-and-so?" to just kind of give me something'.

Discussing what happened next, Kendra said: "I started in the thoughts of needing some answers, and then I just kept going, it was a spiral, kind of a snowball effect, I don't think I knew how to stop.

"I was somebody different in those moments. I was in an awful place mentally. It was like I had a mask on or something, I didn't even know who I was."

She continued: "I let it consume me. I think it was more of an escape. It took me kind of out of real-life, in a sense, even though it was real-life.

"So when I was doing that and I wasn't myself, it removed me from my everyday life. Just kept going and going."

The director of the doc, Skye Borgman, spoke to Netflix's Tudum about what she thinks the 'complex' reasons behind the awful act could be.

She said: "She does mention in the documentary an assault that happened [to her] when she was right around Lauryn’s age. She talks about how scary that was for her to see her only child, her little girl, growing up, and that’s what she really relates to and that’s what she believes led her to sending these text messages and trying to keep Lauryn close."

Other people involved in the case, school officials and Isabella County prosecutor David Barberi, believe Kendra's behaviour could be a kind of cyber Munchausen syndrome by proxy.

Munchausen syndrome by proxy, also known as Factitious Disorder Imposed on Another (FDIA) is a mental illness and a form of child abuse, where the caretaker of a child most often a mother, exaggerates or deliberately causes symptoms of illness in the child.

However, in this case of course, it was slightly different as it was cyberbullying rather than being illness-related - and as far as we know, Kendra has not actually been diagnosed.

Borgman said: "To give it any sort of medical foundation is a little bit problematic. … But I think that there are elements about Munchausen by proxy - about harming someone to keep them close - that definitely existed."

Unknown Number: The High School Catfish is available to stream on Netflix now.