Topics: Crime, Entertainment, Netflix, News, Parenting, TV And Film, True Crime, True Life
Warning: this article contains spoilers for Unknown Number: The High School Catfish
Lauryn Licari's father has lifted the lid on the devastating moment he found out it was his own wife who was been anonymously cyberbullying their teen daughter.
For those who aren't familiar with the chilling case, the family's story was the subject of Netflix's newest real-life documentary - Unknown Number: The High School Catfish.
To catch you up, back in 2020, 13-year-old Lauryn from Beal City, Michigan, as well as her boyfriend at the time, Owen McKenny, began receiving a slew of hateful text messages from an unknown number.
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The cyberbullying stopped for a short while but then they then picked up again in September 2021, with the teen couple being inundated with a daily barrage of vile threats and insults over the next 15 months.
She knew that the person sending the messages must've been someone who knew her in real life, due to the nature of what they were writing.
And when things began to spiral out of control, concerned parents and school officials turned to law enforcement for help.
An investigation led by Isabella County Sheriff Mike Main initially focused on Lauryn and Owen’s classmates and friends, but they had little luck of finding the real culprit.
When nothing came from this, Bradley Peter, a police officer from nearby Bay City, stepped in as liaison to the FBI, and eventually traced the messages to none other than Lauryn’s mother, Kendra Licari.
During a search of the Licari's home, Sheriff Main confronted Kendra - an encounter which was captured on his body camera and shown in real time in the documentary.
As well as Lauryn, another person who was left speechless by the truth was her dad and Kendra's husband, Shawn Licari, who had no idea what was going on.
In the documentary, the heartbroken dad says: "I just can’t believe she would do something like that to her daughter that supposedly she loved dearly.
"Just makes me sick. She stabbed me in the heart, shot me in the heart, and threw it away.”
Recalling the moment he found out the truth, he added: "I get this crazy phone call at work, and it's the sheriff saying that they figured it out. I'm like, 'sweet, finally this is gonna be over with'.
"He's like, 'I'm sorry, I gotta' tell you this... unfortunately it's your wife'."
He rushed home from work and was met with the Sheriff, who told him: "This is the deal, every time the kids received a message, her number came back.
"So that was enough for a search warrant, and that's why we're here today. So we took her phone and her computer, my detective is collecting that."
As per The Cut, Shawn divorced Kendra and received full custody of Lauryn when his wife went to jail.
The unbelievable revelation sent shock waves through the community and speaking in the doc, the mum said: "It was a very emotional day in our house. A day of confusion, unknown answers, shock, a day of not even knowing how we move forward to the next day, so it was a hard day, but at the same time, it was an end."
Speaking about why she took part in the cruel act, she added: "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."
In December 2022, Kendra was arrested and charged with multiple counts of stalking and using a computer to commit a crime.
She pleaded guilty to two counts of stalking a minor and was sentenced to 19 months to 5 years behind bars and was been released from prison on August 8, 2024.
