Latest / Crime Stories with Nancy Grace / "Supermom" Sherri Papini Admits to Kidnapping Hoax

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"Supermom" Sherri Papini Admits to Kidnapping Hoax · Crime Stories with Nancy Grace

0:05
Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. For those of you that
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Speaker 1: have a family at home. When you walk in the
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Speaker 1: door and nobody's in the kitchen, nobody's in the dan
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Speaker 1: nobody's in the bedrooms, nobody's in the front yard, the backyard,
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Speaker 1: the back court, nothing, and suddenly you know something is very,
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Speaker 1: very wrong. That's exactly what happened to Keith Peppini when
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Speaker 1: he walked in the front door. Listen nine one one
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Speaker 1: is Hello, Can I help you? Yeah? So I just
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Speaker 1: got home from work and my wife wasn't there, which
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Speaker 1: is unusual, and my kids should have been there by now,
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Speaker 1: from like daycare. So I was like, oh, maybe she
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Speaker 1: went on a walk. I couldn't find her, so I
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Speaker 1: called the daycare to see what times she picked up
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Speaker 1: the kids. The kids were never picked up, so I
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Speaker 1: got freaked out. So I hit like to find my
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Speaker 1: phone apping and it said that her. It showed her
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Speaker 1: phone like at our end of our driveway. Who wouldn't
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Speaker 1: have really good service. Okay, not the end of our driveway,
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Speaker 1: at the end of our street, but just drove down
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Speaker 1: there and I saw her phone with her headphones because
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Speaker 1: she started running again and it's down her phone it's
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Speaker 1: got like hair ripped out of it, like in the headphones.
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Speaker 1: So I'm like totally freaking out, thinking like somebody was like,
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Speaker 1: what's her thanking? Someone grabbed her. Now take a listen
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Speaker 1: to our cut one from Channel seven k R c R.
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Speaker 1: Keith Poppini came home last Wednesday and his wife, Sherry Poppini,
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Speaker 1: was nowhere to be found. In normal days, I would
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Speaker 1: open the door and my families comes and runs and
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Speaker 1: gives me a hug. But there were no welcoming hugs.
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Speaker 1: So he searched in the house and their property, but
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Speaker 1: learned the children were still at daycare. He found Sherry's
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Speaker 1: phone down the street. That's when I knew she'd been,
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Speaker 1: in my opinion, taken or abducted. Now days later, family, friends,
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Speaker 1: the community, and law enforcement are still looking for Sherry.
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Speaker 1: It's the worst thing in the world. It's the worst
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Speaker 1: thing ever. Time going by slowly and their children don't
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Speaker 1: know their mother is missing. It's hard waiting. You know,
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Speaker 1: you're waiting. You're waiting for a phone call, You're waiting
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Speaker 1: for something to tell us. You know, this is the direction,
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Speaker 1: or this is the house, or this is the car,
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Speaker 1: and that is that is very difficult right now, but
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Speaker 1: Keith is determined to find her. She was listening and
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Speaker 1: I wanted to say that we're trying the best we
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Speaker 1: can and I'm so sorry that I'm not there. The
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Speaker 1: family believes she was abducted and has this message, bring
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Speaker 1: her home, Bring her home. Does bring her home? In
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Speaker 1: the last hour studying developments in the case of missing
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Speaker 1: moms Sherry Peppini, and we all know that Peppini was
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Speaker 1: on a very tight schedule that she never missed picking
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Speaker 1: up her children. Take a listen to her sister in law,
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Speaker 1: Sherry Peppini a cup five. There's no way she would
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Speaker 1: do anything to disrupt her children's routine, you know that,
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Speaker 1: being that the phone was found and she wasn't on
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Speaker 1: her routine there, Yeah, there's no way she wouldn't have
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Speaker 1: gone and picked up the children. They're on they're on
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Speaker 1: a very tight schedule and she's extremely close with them.
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Speaker 1: She's here with them every day gardening and doing projects,
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Speaker 1: and there's there's just no way that she would take off.
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Speaker 1: It's terrible. She's an incredible human being, best mom I've
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Speaker 1: ever seen. You're hearing the sister in law, Suzanne Peppini
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Speaker 1: speaking I mean, see, Grace, this is Crime Stories. Thank
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Speaker 1: you for being with us here at Fox Nation in
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Speaker 1: series XM one eleven. Sherry Peppini a name that echoes
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Speaker 1: and echoes and echo. She's been in the news so much.
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Speaker 1: With me and All Star panel to make sense of
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Speaker 1: what we know right now. Matthew Mangino, former prosecutor, highly
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Speaker 1: respected attorney, author of The Executioner's Toll, Doctor Angela Arnold
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Speaker 1: Saki just joining us out of the Atlanta jurisdiction at
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Speaker 1: Angela Arnold, MD dot com. Mona Kay private investigator at
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Speaker 1: Mona Kate Investigations, joining us out of Omaha. Emmy Award
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Speaker 1: winning investigative reporter Christy Missouri and special guests joining us.
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Speaker 1: Sheriff Michael Johnson the Shasta County's Sheriff's Office to Sheriff
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Speaker 1: Michael Johnson, this case has been hanging around the Sheriff's office.
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Speaker 1: Nick an Albatrosso to speak Sheriff Michael Johnson, familiar with
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Speaker 1: the extensive search for Sheriff Peppini, take a listen to
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Speaker 1: the Shasta County Sheriff pressor the deputies last night when
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Speaker 1: they responded, they conducted a search of the area in
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Speaker 1: Kanvas area with local neighbors and residents there and they
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Speaker 1: worked throughout the night and into the early morning hours
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Speaker 1: along with Shasta County Sheriff investigators as well. They were
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Speaker 1: also able to utilize the Reach helicopter as the HP
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Speaker 1: Air Operations helicopter was not available, and the Reach helicopter
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Speaker 1: came out and illuminated the area and checked to the
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Speaker 1: fields inside of the roads for her and assisting us
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Speaker 1: in the search operations last night. They also used search
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Speaker 1: canines for scent work. Local area hospitals were checked and
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Speaker 1: of course the sides of the roadways were checked as well.
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Speaker 1: Miss Peppini has been entered into a national computer permissing persons.
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Speaker 1: She is considered at risk due to the suspicious circumstances.
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Speaker 1: To Sheriff Michael Johnson joining us with Shasta County Sheriff's Office,
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Speaker 1: it's a real honor and privilege to have you with us, Sheriff.
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Speaker 1: Thank you for taking time away from your extremely busy
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Speaker 1: schedule to be with us, Sheriff. You guys went all
5:53
Speaker 1: out and your search for Sherry Peppini. Explain what your
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Speaker 1: search entailed. Yeah, Nancy, there was three really different parts
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Speaker 1: to this investigation and when you were talking about the search,
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Speaker 1: that's really like what we call the phase one of
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Speaker 1: the investigation. She went missing and immediately you heard there
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Speaker 1: was several different resources deployed to find her. The location
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Speaker 1: of Sherry Peppini was absolutely the first phase where we
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Speaker 1: just want to times never on your side when somebody
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Speaker 1: goes missing, So the sooner you can locate them or
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Speaker 1: get a lead on locating them, the better chances you
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Speaker 1: are recovering that personal lives. So there was allied agencies
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Speaker 1: asked to lend us resources and most of those resources
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Speaker 1: were and personnel. As you heard, we had dogs, we
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Speaker 1: had helicopters, we had everything and all out search and
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Speaker 1: the community a community even joined in, you know, printing
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Speaker 1: flyers and volunteer people coming out and looking for her.
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Speaker 1: It was an all would effort to find Sherry. At
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Speaker 1: the beginning, I remember exactly how this whole thing went down,
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Speaker 1: and the Sheriff's office and other agencies spared no resources
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Speaker 1: trying to find Sherry Peppini. And what I hear about
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Speaker 1: the helicopter on most people have never seen in real life,
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Speaker 1: but you've seen in the movies, the helicopter flying close
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Speaker 1: to the ground overhead, which you know, helicopters can be
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Speaker 1: a pretty risky mode of transportation, but if you've got
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Speaker 1: to do it, you gotta do it. But in a
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Speaker 1: suburban area, looking for her, flying over phone wires and
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Speaker 1: cell phone towers, looking for her at night with a
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Speaker 1: light shining down. Describe how that works, Sheriff. Yeah, it's
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Speaker 1: you know, they have infrared technology. They have a lot
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Speaker 1: of different high ends technology that goes into this, not
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Speaker 1: just in the helicopter, but on the ground as well.
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Speaker 1: There's there's efforts, there's people wearing night vision, there's everything,
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Speaker 1: all all expensive pay to locate this woman. And that's
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Speaker 1: the That's one of the keys here, Nancy, is when
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Speaker 1: when you talk about the exhausting efforts of all the
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Speaker 1: agencies into this initial search and throughout this investigation, and
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Speaker 1: the resources and time and money spent on this all
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Speaker 1: to find out in the end that it's a fraud.
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Speaker 1: It's very frustrating. And one thing I should tell you also,
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Speaker 1: and to remember that during the time Sherry Peppini went missing,
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Speaker 1: I was actually the neighboring police chief at the time,
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Speaker 1: I was not the sheriff, so I was lending resources
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Speaker 1: from my department to the Sheriff's office in the attempt
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Speaker 1: to find Sherry, so everybody was involved and now to
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Speaker 1: find out it's nothing but a big fat lie. I mean,
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Speaker 1: this woman knows no bounds and her lies. Take a
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Speaker 1: listen to our cut eight Alison Sutton, a motorist whose
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Speaker 1: spots the missing mom on the side of the road.
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Speaker 1: I saw a blonde woman standing in like that V
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Speaker 1: shaped area that gets created between the right shoulder and
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Speaker 1: the left side of an off ramp. But I wasn't
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Speaker 1: quite sure where I was when I saw her. I
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Speaker 1: just caught a glimpse of her. The area where she
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Speaker 1: was is not well lit, so I didn't actually see
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Speaker 1: her until I was right up on her, which really
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Speaker 1: startled me. And it kind of took me a few
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Speaker 1: minutes to figure out what I'd seen, and I went
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Speaker 1: a couple of miles up the road to figure out
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Speaker 1: where until I saw a road sign so I knew
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Speaker 1: where I was. And then I hold off onto the
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Speaker 1: shoulder and I called nine one one. Have you ever
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Speaker 1: done that? You've driven by that thing? And you went whoa, whoa?
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Speaker 1: What was that? That's what Alison Sutton is telling our
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Speaker 1: friend Craig Melvin take a listen hour at nine. I
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Speaker 1: saw her very very quickly. Her face looked I thought
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Speaker 1: her face was dirty, but based on what I know now,
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Speaker 1: I'm guessing that what I thought was dirt on her
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Speaker 1: face was the bruises. But it was it was very,
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Speaker 1: very dark. I did not notice restraints. It just it
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Speaker 1: was so dark. I barely barely saw her. And like
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Speaker 1: I said, it was a flash because that area is
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Speaker 1: so dark and it was four thirty in the morning.
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Speaker 1: Called ninety one. You didn't go back after that? I
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Speaker 1: did not know. I had my fourteen year old daughter
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Speaker 1: in the car with me, and we talked about going back,
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Speaker 1: but the operator had me feeling confident that law enforcement
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Speaker 1: would take care of the person that I saw, and
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Speaker 1: so we chose to get back on the road and
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Speaker 1: keep going. Time Stories with Nancy Grace bruises to the face,
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Speaker 1: her hair cut off, filthy on the side of the road.
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Speaker 1: Take a listen hour cut six of Schesta County Sheriff Pressor.
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Speaker 1: We are very ecstatic to report that Sheriff Papini has
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Speaker 1: been located and it's been reunited with her husband and family.
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Speaker 1: On this day of Thanksgiving. I'm happy to say that
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Speaker 1: Sherry is now safe and she has been treated at
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Speaker 1: a area hospital outside of Shasta County and for don
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Speaker 1: life threatening injuries. At about four thirty this morning, Chaskeny
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Speaker 1: Sheriff's Office was notified that Sherry Peppini had been located.
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Speaker 1: We learned that she was released by her captor on
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Speaker 1: a rural road near I five in Yellow County. She
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Speaker 1: was bound with restraints, who was able to summon from
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Speaker 1: a passing help from a passing motorists on I five
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Speaker 1: near County Road seventeen again in about northern Yolo County.
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Speaker 1: And what we are learning now in the last hours,
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Speaker 1: Peppini admits it's all a big lie to Christy, Missouri
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Speaker 1: joining us Emmy Award winning investigative reporter. Do you remember
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Speaker 1: everybody looking for Sherry Peppini, the grid searches, the neighbors
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Speaker 1: in fear, no woman would go for a walk by herself,
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Speaker 1: on and on, and it was all a big lie, Christy, Missurich.
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Speaker 1: It was the face scene around the world on Billboard's signs.
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Speaker 1: People were donating to go fund me sites to pay
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Speaker 1: for neighborhood searches, and now, unfortunately people are having to
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Speaker 1: deal with the grim fact that this woman has now
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Speaker 1: been deemed a master manipulator. I mean, whoa take a
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Speaker 1: listen to our cut eighteen. This is Susie Susy Bsla.
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Speaker 1: After years of sticking to her story that she was
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Speaker 1: abducted by two women, Sherry Peppini is reportedly ready now
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Speaker 1: to come clean and admit that she faked it all.
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Speaker 1: Sherry Peppini vanished from her reading home in twenty sixteen.
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Speaker 1: Weeks later, he was found wandering along the FI Freeway,
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Speaker 1: bruised and branded. Now, at that time, she told police
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Speaker 1: two women had kidnapped and tortured her, But last month,
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Speaker 1: prosecutors charged her with making it all up. They say,
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Speaker 1: instead of being abducted, she was actually hiding out with
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Speaker 1: an ex boyfriend in Costa Mesa. And now Peppini has
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Speaker 1: reached a deal with prosecutors and will admit that she
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Speaker 1: planned the entire hoax. Her lawyer says Peppini signed a
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Speaker 1: plea deal with federal prosecutors today she will plead guilty
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Speaker 1: to lying to a federal officer and to mail fraud.
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Speaker 1: You know what joining me, Sheriff Michael Johnson. It was
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Speaker 1: the Shasta County Sheriff's office and you're then jurisdiction, and
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Speaker 1: so many others that joined together. There is no way
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Speaker 1: to count the man hours spent on finding this spoiled
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Speaker 1: brat mom of two. They goes miss thing on her
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Speaker 1: stay at home day. Both of her kids are in daycare.
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Speaker 1: I don't know what she's doing all day long. She's
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Speaker 1: obviously fabricating a crime in her pink jogging suit. I
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Speaker 1: wonder if she had her hair blow dry before she
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Speaker 1: took off. But long story short, to go shack up
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Speaker 1: with her ex boyfriend for for weeks on end, starve herself,
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Speaker 1: beat herself, cut all her hair off. I'm so mad,
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Speaker 1: I could chew a nail and a half. Sheriff didn't
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Speaker 1: tell most like a supermom to me, does it to you?
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Speaker 1: Oh no it doesn't, No, it doesn't. I mean, there
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Speaker 1: are plenty of times moms feel tired. They don't want
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Speaker 1: to clean the guinea pig cage, or cook dinner or
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Speaker 1: go to work. They're exhausted. But hiding in your ex
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Speaker 1: boyfriend's apartment for several weeks leading up to Thanksgiving, having
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Speaker 1: your entire family and abject that you're dead, I mean,
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Speaker 1: and what it did to the sheriffs and the local
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Speaker 1: police out in a helicopter at night, set at home
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Speaker 1: with our own families, or solving real crimes sheriff with
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Speaker 1: real victims that are suffering. Yeah, and you've hit all
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Speaker 1: the points. It's frustrating to us that, you know, at
16:24
Speaker 1: some point we created a code, a finance code to
16:28
Speaker 1: start tracking our resources that we had into this investigation.
16:32
Speaker 1: It wasn't till well into this investigation that that was done,
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Speaker 1: and it got up to one hundred and fifty thousand
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Speaker 1: dollars for us, just as our agency. By the time
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Speaker 1: this thing concluded, I'm sure we had well more than
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Speaker 1: that into the into the investigation. And that's not even
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Speaker 1: counting all the other agencies. And that is the frustration, Nancy,
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Speaker 1: is who we put all these this effort into Sherry
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Speaker 1: Peppini and trying to recover her and do it well
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Speaker 1: rat and chasing down false suspects and oh yeah, what
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Speaker 1: if you'd actually made an arrest. She tried to blame
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Speaker 1: it on what two Hispanic females? Yes, she sure did.
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Speaker 1: And and you know what, in the meantime all this
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Speaker 1: is going on, we have other legitimate cases that are
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Speaker 1: not getting the attention that they should are being kind
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Speaker 1: of pushed to the side because the actigency of this
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Speaker 1: circumstance are so we thought. It reminds me of Jesse Smillette,
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Speaker 1: the big race faker and his FA hate crime. At
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Speaker 1: least we knew he was alive, Okay, we didn't have
17:30
Speaker 1: to worry that he was dead and that his children
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Speaker 1: would be left without a father to raise them. I mean,
17:35
Speaker 1: here's another thing. It's not just the money. Mona Ka
17:40
Speaker 1: joining me probably an investigator or Mona Ka investigation side
17:43
Speaker 1: of Omaha Mona when used or at least me. When
17:47
Speaker 1: I would work a case in the District Attorney's office,
17:52
Speaker 1: I worked it. I worked it hard, out on the
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Speaker 1: street till one two o'clock in the morning, up at
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Speaker 1: five o'clock with my investigator, are trying to find witnesses
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Speaker 1: in court at eight o'clock, trying to get my evidence
18:04
Speaker 1: lined up so there would not be any glitch in
18:07
Speaker 1: front of the jury, riding out my direct and cross examinations.
18:11
Speaker 1: My closing is my openings, getting the law to make
18:14
Speaker 1: sure my evidence got in and to keep their evidence out.
18:18
Speaker 1: Anything I could do to further justice. There was no rest,
18:22
Speaker 1: There were no dinners out, nothing it was proved the case,
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Speaker 1: investigate the case, and by the time you're in it
18:30
Speaker 1: you're so emotionally attached to it that anything other than
18:36
Speaker 1: a resolution is a personal fail. I mean that's how
18:41
Speaker 1: I looked at my cases. They were like my children
18:43
Speaker 1: at the time, very attached to finding the truth. Yeah,
18:47
Speaker 1: that's true. I mean you become very invested in the
18:50
Speaker 1: cases that you work, the people you work for, you know,
18:53
Speaker 1: her family, the community. But you work endlessly and tirelessly
18:58
Speaker 1: day and night. Trained. You track down leads, trying to
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Speaker 1: find witnesses, locate people you know, walking through the you know,
19:05
Speaker 1: the ditches the area, just looking for any signs yes,
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Speaker 1: and it's exhausting. Monique into you Sheriff Michael Johnson joining us,
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Speaker 1: the Chassa County sheriff, the elected sheriff, you know, sheriff.
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Speaker 1: It's not like on TV and movies or in one
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Speaker 1: scene you're covered in dirt and sweat and blood, the
19:27
Speaker 1: next one you're like lounging in a hot tub. It's
19:30
Speaker 1: not like that. You go days, weeks, months working a case.
19:37
Speaker 1: I've had cases where I had to go to crack
19:39
Speaker 1: houses with a bunch of crack addicts in there, got
19:43
Speaker 1: a shotgun pulled on me and somebody's front porch, exhaustive
19:47
Speaker 1: hours digging through glass shards and and syringes to try
19:55
Speaker 1: to find a projectile from a shotgun. I mean, I
20:00
Speaker 1: can't even tell you what criminal investigators, lawyers, and sheriffs
20:05
Speaker 1: like yourself go through to make a case and to
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Speaker 1: think the whole time. Sherry Peppinius propped up on the
20:13
Speaker 1: sofa at her ex boyfriend's house watching what Maury Povish,
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Speaker 1: I mean, I don't get it what she put you
20:20
Speaker 1: guys through and our own family. It's I don't get it. Sheriff.
20:27
Speaker 1: Why am I the only one angry here? You're not
20:32
Speaker 1: that I do feel I do feel sorry for her
20:35
Speaker 1: unsuspecting family, because she did do her family as well.
20:39
Speaker 1: But when you talk about this woman had a very
20:43
Speaker 1: elaborate deception scheme going to we and talking about the investigation,
20:49
Speaker 1: our investigators had to chase down so many leads and
20:52
Speaker 1: fed out so many facts across state lines at times
20:56
Speaker 1: because she had put all these other story reason and
21:00
Speaker 1: misdirections into place. That that's why it took so much
21:05
Speaker 1: time in this investigation. We didn't want to falsely accuse anybody.
21:08
Speaker 1: But as we started to unfold the mistruth to this
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Speaker 1: and her deception, we had to make sure that we
21:16
Speaker 1: betted out every single lead, and everything you're talking about
21:19
Speaker 1: is right. It's exhausting, mentally exhausting. Do you know how
21:24
Speaker 1: many times that I would comment and send out please
21:29
Speaker 1: help find Sherry Peppini and I'd read the facts. I
21:32
Speaker 1: still got pages and pages and pages of notes and analysis,
21:37
Speaker 1: and so much of it did not get together from me.
21:40
Speaker 1: For instance, the fact that her cell phone was sitting
21:43
Speaker 1: there and the earbuds were neatly folded up and just
21:48
Speaker 1: sitting on top of her phone. And I think the
21:51
Speaker 1: phone may have been found on top of a mailbox
21:54
Speaker 1: or somewhere very It wasn't like thrown into the bushes.
21:59
Speaker 1: I had so many problems with her story, But then Sheriff,
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Speaker 1: I kept thinking, well, I mean, would she goes so
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Speaker 1: far to beat herself and starve herself, break her own nose,
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Speaker 1: brand herself? Didn't she brand herself, chop off all her hair?
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Speaker 1: Was she branded? Sheriff? Yes, she was, Oh, dear Lord
22:17
Speaker 1: in heaven with what It's never been told what she
22:20
Speaker 1: was branded? What were the letters? What did it say? Yeah,
22:22
Speaker 1: it was a religious saying, and I don't really recall
22:28
Speaker 1: exactly what religious saying yeah or symbol Yes, Oh you
22:33
Speaker 1: know this is straight Matthew Mangino, former District Attorney Lawrence
22:38
Speaker 1: County now high profile lawyer, former member of the parole board,
22:43
Speaker 1: which I don't like one bit that you paroled people,
22:46
Speaker 1: and author of the executioner's toll me and Gino. It's
22:50
Speaker 1: straight out of like a fifth grade girl's novel. Being
22:55
Speaker 1: abducted and branded in your hair, chopped off a blah
22:59
Speaker 1: blah blah. It sounded pinky at the beginning, but I
23:04
Speaker 1: would not come out and say it because the woman
23:06
Speaker 1: had a broken nose, she was starved, she had cut
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Speaker 1: off all her hair, she was covered with bruises, even branded,
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Speaker 1: And I thought, okay, the facts are off, But would
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Speaker 1: she actually brand herself? Would you go through all that
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Speaker 1: break her own nose and that was the other side
23:27
Speaker 1: of the scale. Well, yeah, that's extraordinary. I mean, you know,
23:30
Speaker 1: she you know, she went to great measures to make
23:33
Speaker 1: this hoax seem real, you know, to physically harm herself,
23:39
Speaker 1: to brand herself that had her nose broken, all for
23:45
Speaker 1: the attention that she might get after she comes back
23:49
Speaker 1: twenty two days later. I mean, you know, this extravagant
23:53
Speaker 1: hoax is wrong on so many different levels. You know,
23:57
Speaker 1: it inhibits people from money to get involved in the future.
24:01
Speaker 1: When someone says they're missing, it's a diversion of police efforts.
24:07
Speaker 1: You know, it's costly to the community. Hey, hey, man Gino,
24:11
Speaker 1: I want to analyze something you just said. A diversion
24:13
Speaker 1: of police efforts. You know, that's really like putting perfume
24:18
Speaker 1: on the pig. You know, it's a little bit of
24:19
Speaker 1: a euphemism. Hey, Sheriff Michael Johnson, did you hear that,
24:23
Speaker 1: Matthew Mangino? Police efforts? Think about it. How many women
24:29
Speaker 1: were being raped at that moment, how many stores or
24:33
Speaker 1: homes were being robbed or home invaded? How many missing
24:37
Speaker 1: children were being abducted at that moment? What other crimes
24:42
Speaker 1: were happening? Were people domestic violence? People women getting beaten,
24:46
Speaker 1: children getting beaten and molested. That's what was happening when
24:50
Speaker 1: Sherry Peppini had the sheriffs up in their helicopter and
24:55
Speaker 1: doing grid searches and putting up flyers. Yeah, what about that? Mangino?
25:02
Speaker 1: All right? And I agree with you, and it goes
25:05
Speaker 1: beyond that. I mean the fear that he created in
25:07
Speaker 1: the community. Did Hey, you know this, this young woman
25:10
Speaker 1: was abducted and no one knows where she's had and
25:13
Speaker 1: then when she finally returns, there's this a racist element
25:17
Speaker 1: that she creates two gun wielding his Spanish chapter Capta
25:24
Speaker 1: for three weeks. You know, I remember when Susan Smith
25:29
Speaker 1: killed her children and blamed the black guy. Blamed the
25:33
Speaker 1: black man. All right, So I was sitting in court Jackie,
25:37
Speaker 1: with my trial partner, who helped me a great deal
25:40
Speaker 1: turn into a judge. By the way Herman sloam and
25:42
Speaker 1: the composite of the fake kidnapper of the children came
25:46
Speaker 1: out of Mike Herman. That looks a lot like you
25:49
Speaker 1: look at this, he went. Oh, I said, actually, I
25:51
Speaker 1: think you're imported with me when the children were abducted,
25:54
Speaker 1: so you know you're safe. But what he just said,
25:57
Speaker 1: Sheriff Johnson, did you hear that the element of aiming
26:00
Speaker 1: the Hispanic women. Yeah, of course. And you know what
26:03
Speaker 1: that does. You got a nerve? What that does a
26:05
Speaker 1: law enforcement is it gives us. You know, she created
26:08
Speaker 1: this these sketches, and so now we're contacting people and
26:12
Speaker 1: questioning people that even resemble that um falsely. You know,
26:17
Speaker 1: it's it's so unfair. He just gave me a flashback,
26:20
Speaker 1: Sheriff Johnson. You know the big albums of purps mug shots.
26:26
Speaker 1: I remember sitting up at like one o'clock in the morning,
26:29
Speaker 1: I found a witness and just going through page after
26:34
Speaker 1: page after page, looking to see if any of these
26:38
Speaker 1: people look familiar as the killer. It was triple homicide
26:43
Speaker 1: of my dad. But I can just see you putting
26:47
Speaker 1: together those two composites I remember them well, and showing
26:51
Speaker 1: them to this person and that person. Oh, it's so intensive,
26:57
Speaker 1: Sheriff Johnson. No, it is, you know, Sheriff Johnson, I'll
27:01
Speaker 1: still got you. We heard Matthew Mangino. I think it's
27:05
Speaker 1: a pretty good guess on his part. Two say she
27:08
Speaker 1: did it for attention? Did we ever figure out why
27:12
Speaker 1: she did it? Not? I you know, that's the That's
27:16
Speaker 1: the one thing that I was waiting for to come
27:18
Speaker 1: out in the trial. No, all I can tell you
27:21
Speaker 1: is that calculated, narcistic type of behavior that she displayed
27:27
Speaker 1: through this whole thing is all self serving right up
27:31
Speaker 1: now until the end when she enters a plea agreement.
27:34
Speaker 1: The only reason she pled in this case is because
27:38
Speaker 1: she's trying to save herself for selfish reasons. Again, And
27:42
Speaker 1: they put out this statement of remorse by her, which
27:45
Speaker 1: I'm quite sure she didn't say. It was crafted, probably
27:48
Speaker 1: by her attorney, and just don't buy any of it.
27:52
Speaker 1: So I was hoping in the trial we would get
27:55
Speaker 1: a better idea of why she did it. But if
27:57
Speaker 1: I had to guess, I'd just say it's that same
28:00
Speaker 1: typical selfish behavior, the whole thing about Oh, I'm bored,
28:05
Speaker 1: I'm bored of being a stay at home mom. You
28:08
Speaker 1: know how many working moms that have to work would
28:11
Speaker 1: love to be a stay at home mom because they're
28:14
Speaker 1: trying to be the stay at home mom and do
28:17
Speaker 1: all the things that mom does and work at the
28:20
Speaker 1: same time. I mean, it's hard, Nancy. Oh here it comes,
28:26
Speaker 1: Drew Angie Arnold, I don't get you just did it
28:30
Speaker 1: for attention. There's something else there. And don't don't tell
28:33
Speaker 1: me he's insane, because she's not. She's crazy. She's crazy
28:37
Speaker 1: like a fox. I'm telling you that. And she is
28:40
Speaker 1: also not a narcissist. She is a sociopath. She is
28:45
Speaker 1: the definition of a sociopath. She knows the difference between
28:51
Speaker 1: right and wrong, and she has no conscience because this
28:55
Speaker 1: is not the first bad thing that she's done to
28:57
Speaker 1: her family. It has escalated and escalated and now this
29:01
Speaker 1: and like you said, how selfish? And then how could
29:05
Speaker 1: you be thinking of anyone? She's not thinking of anyone.
29:10
Speaker 1: And by the way, typically sociopaths and narcissist are not
29:14
Speaker 1: really capable of love. So she's got this family, you
29:19
Speaker 1: know that she can portray. And of course she looks
29:22
Speaker 1: like the best mom in the world because she's not
29:27
Speaker 1: her entire life. Okay, you do know that just didn't
29:30
Speaker 1: make any sense at all. She looks like the best
29:33
Speaker 1: mom in the world because she's not. Okay, but but
29:38
Speaker 1: I know that didn't make any sense. Time stories with
29:54
Speaker 1: Nancy Grace. Sheriff Johnson is still with me. I'm still
30:02
Speaker 1: with you, Sheriff. Do you remember, and you don't have
30:06
Speaker 1: to or Christy jump in if you know this. There
30:09
Speaker 1: have been a lot of issues with her before this,
30:12
Speaker 1: in that she had kicked in her family home like
30:16
Speaker 1: her our original family, like mom and dad family are
30:21
Speaker 1: thanked to burglary. There have been some something in her
30:25
Speaker 1: background that's it's like a waving a big wig flag
30:29
Speaker 1: in front of a bull. I mean, you can't help
30:31
Speaker 1: but knows that what was it she had done in
30:34
Speaker 1: the past. Sheriff Johnson, Yeah, I don't recall that one.
30:38
Speaker 1: I recall it. I do. I ate Nancy rolling back
30:41
Speaker 1: from this of a sheriff rolling back from this case.
30:45
Speaker 1: She scams an ex boyfriend, telling him that her her
30:49
Speaker 1: husband is beating her and her family is not helping her.
30:54
Speaker 1: And she weaves this narrative for almost a year before
30:58
Speaker 1: she disappears. That's why he allows her to hold up
31:01
Speaker 1: in his apartment. Hey, speaking of the drama, the story
31:06
Speaker 1: she came up with, take a listen to our cut
31:09
Speaker 1: eighteen Susy SUSYBSLA. After years of sticking to her story
31:13
Speaker 1: that she was abducted by two women, Sherry Peppini is
31:16
Speaker 1: reportedly ready now to come clean and admit that she
31:20
Speaker 1: faked it all. Sherry Peppini vanished from her reading home
31:23
Speaker 1: in twenty sixteen. Weeks later, she was found wandering along
31:26
Speaker 1: the five Freeway, bruised and branded. Now. At that time,
31:30
Speaker 1: she told police two women had kidnapped and tortured her,
31:34
Speaker 1: but last month prosecutors charged her with making it all up,
31:38
Speaker 1: They say, instead of being abducted, she was actually hiding
31:41
Speaker 1: out with an ex boyfriend in Costa Mesa. And now
31:44
Speaker 1: Peppini has reached a deal with prosecutors and will admit
31:48
Speaker 1: that she planned the entire hoax. Her lawyer says Peppini
31:51
Speaker 1: signed a plea deal with federal prosecutors. Today she will
31:54
Speaker 1: plead guilty to lying to a federal officer and to
31:57
Speaker 1: mail fraud. You know, what if you had made an arrest,
32:01
Speaker 1: Sheriff Johnson, What if you actually found a Hispanic woman, or,
32:06
Speaker 1: as I believe she said, two Mexican women. What if
32:11
Speaker 1: you had actually found somebody that matched that sketch to
32:13
Speaker 1: the point that you arrested them based on what Sherry
32:17
Speaker 1: Peppini said, Well, you know what happened, then then I'd
32:19
Speaker 1: be in a lawsuit for a false arrest, A big
32:22
Speaker 1: fat lawsuit too. I found it, sheriff. Listen to this.
32:25
Speaker 1: When she was eighteen, her sister accused her of kicking
32:28
Speaker 1: in the back door of the family Shasta Lake home.
32:31
Speaker 1: The same day, her parents, Richard and Loretta, called police
32:35
Speaker 1: to document the incident as vandalism and claim she had
32:39
Speaker 1: taken off to somewhere in reading. When she was twenty one,
32:43
Speaker 1: her parents made another calle to cop saying she stole
32:45
Speaker 1: money from the father's bank account. Then the mother reported
32:50
Speaker 1: Sherry was harming herself and blaming her injuries on her
32:55
Speaker 1: the mother, and the mother was afraid that she, the
32:58
Speaker 1: mother would be get dragged into de facts Department Family
33:01
Speaker 1: Children's Services, So she called herself and went, hey, my
33:05
Speaker 1: daughter's hurting herself and blaming me. I mean, Sheriff Michael Johnson,
33:10
Speaker 1: when you don't know a horse, look at her track record. Yes, indeed,
33:15
Speaker 1: and all that was taken into consideration, and as the
33:18
Speaker 1: things started to unfold, and you know what another hard
33:21
Speaker 1: part of this was Nancy is as we started to
33:25
Speaker 1: unfold this lies that are being told by her, we
33:28
Speaker 1: had to lay silent. Why we took you know, some
33:32
Speaker 1: we took some criticism from the media, the family and
33:35
Speaker 1: everybody else. And we were knowing that this was a lie,
33:39
Speaker 1: and so we had to keep on. I hope it
33:42
Speaker 1: wasn't me. Whyet until all the facts. No, I mean
33:46
Speaker 1: at the beginning, Sheriff, I find it hard to believe
33:49
Speaker 1: I would have criticized you because I didn't say you
33:52
Speaker 1: at the beginning. I know but I always assume it's me,
33:55
Speaker 1: Sheriff Johnson, because at the beginning her story stumped. The
33:58
Speaker 1: whole thing sucked. It just wasn't right, the whole thing,
34:03
Speaker 1: and we thought, and then showing up on Thanksgiving date,
34:06
Speaker 1: what now? I said, yeah, and there was there was
34:10
Speaker 1: little and you hit on a couple of them, some
34:13
Speaker 1: of the evidence. At the front of the investigation, we
34:16
Speaker 1: were scratching her head and not thinking things were right
34:18
Speaker 1: as well. But I mean, what are you going to do?
34:21
Speaker 1: Bad mouth a victim who's had her nose broken and
34:24
Speaker 1: lost all that weight, chopped her hair off and branded herself.
34:26
Speaker 1: I mean, who would have thought? Then you've got the
34:29
Speaker 1: ex boyfriend dragged into the whole thing. Hey, another thing,
34:33
Speaker 1: Sheriff Johnson. I agree with you. Her her statement says,
34:37
Speaker 1: you know she didn't write this. I'm deeply ashamed for
34:40
Speaker 1: my behavior and so sorry for the pain I caused.
34:43
Speaker 1: I don't believe that for one minute. I don't think
34:46
Speaker 1: she's sorry she did it. She's sorry she got caught.
34:48
Speaker 1: Sheriff Yep, that's exactly right. That's what she's sorry about.
34:52
Speaker 1: She's sorry that she got caught. M It's like, I'm
34:55
Speaker 1: not sorry you did it best? Sure, I don't want
34:56
Speaker 1: to go to hell for it. Okay, So Christy Missouri
35:00
Speaker 1: blind to me what her sentence is. She pleads guilty.
35:04
Speaker 1: What's her sentence? She'll be sentenced this summer. But in
35:08
Speaker 1: signing up, I thought she already said, Oh wait, I
35:11
Speaker 1: see thirty thousand dollars. You're absolutely correct. Yeah, it's thirty
35:15
Speaker 1: thirty hundred thousand dollars in restitution. That's mandated. Yes, But
35:20
Speaker 1: what I'm saying is the thirty thousand dollars she stole
35:24
Speaker 1: from a victims compensation fund to pay off her credit cards.
35:28
Speaker 1: What lovely? Wait? Tell me that she had thirty thousand
35:31
Speaker 1: dollars a credit card debt and then paid it from
35:33
Speaker 1: the victims compensation fund, Yes, and go fund me sites.
35:37
Speaker 1: Also that family and friends had set up so when
35:41
Speaker 1: she returned back home, she had a payday. And again,
35:46
Speaker 1: her story got so insane. Her memory was hazy because
35:52
Speaker 1: her head was covered by a pillowcase. But she heard
35:54
Speaker 1: mariachi music playing. But maybe that didn't happen because she
35:59
Speaker 1: might have been hit by a stun gun. Did you
36:01
Speaker 1: just say mariachi music? I absolutely did. Oh yeah, Monica.
36:05
Speaker 1: Probably an investigator with Monica investigations. Omaha, the not just stereotypes,
36:12
Speaker 1: but the harmful and hateful stereotypes. This woman is conjuring
36:18
Speaker 1: up right now, I mean again, It makes me think
36:20
Speaker 1: of Jesse Smilett. They star an empire who conjures up
36:25
Speaker 1: hatred for Black Americans, hatred for gay people, and then
36:31
Speaker 1: claims he was attacked with bleach to make his skin
36:34
Speaker 1: white and put a noose around his neck. Some of
36:38
Speaker 1: the most hateful things just straight out of hell that
36:42
Speaker 1: you could say. And now you've got this woman claiming
36:46
Speaker 1: to quote Mexican women abduct her, beat her, torture her,
36:54
Speaker 1: and play Mariachi music. Yeah, that's right. I read that.
36:58
Speaker 1: She I believe said that she had to listen to
37:01
Speaker 1: horrible Marriotti or Hispanic music while she was being kidnapped
37:06
Speaker 1: and tortured in a closet. That was part of the torture.
37:10
Speaker 1: Was listening to that type of music. Well not everyone
37:14
Speaker 1: would think that that was torture. Take a listen our
37:16
Speaker 1: cut twenty three. This is Lila Luciano at CBS. Jerry
37:20
Speaker 1: described her assailants as two Hispanic female adults. According to
37:24
Speaker 1: the FBI, she accused the women of brutally torturing her.
37:28
Speaker 1: The hunt was on and New Fear settled and running
37:32
Speaker 1: where Ladinos were less than ten percent of the population.
37:35
Speaker 1: A lot of people would tell me, you know, and
37:37
Speaker 1: they had to be expanding and they after I said, well,
37:40
Speaker 1: that doesn't give him a good name either. But so
37:42
Speaker 1: there was shame in the community. I guess she specifically
37:46
Speaker 1: picked out a gender in a race to name us
37:49
Speaker 1: the suspects. So any Hispanic woman at that time, I'm
37:53
Speaker 1: sure it's getting the eyebrow raised and looking in they're wondering, oh,
37:56
Speaker 1: whenever she could be connected or one of the suspects.
37:58
Speaker 1: So people were being questioned and stopped and asked the
38:01
Speaker 1: question sure by law enforcement. Yes, they were afraid to
38:03
Speaker 1: go out and together in one car or a van
38:06
Speaker 1: to women who'd be suspicious, Yeah, to be suspicious, or
38:09
Speaker 1: to be stereotyped, to be insulted and take a listen
38:11
Speaker 1: to our twenty killy hard tongue. ABC Sherry Peppini says
38:15
Speaker 1: she's ashamed of her behavior and sorry for the pain
38:18
Speaker 1: she caused. Just as she gets ready to plead guilty
38:20
Speaker 1: in court. So the agencies who spent more than five
38:23
Speaker 1: years uncovering her lies, they feel some relief and closure,
38:26
Speaker 1: but also frustration because taking this plea deal means she'll
38:30
Speaker 1: likely spend months, nine years in jail. Sherry Peppini back
38:34
Speaker 1: in federal court to wave indictment, opening the door to
38:37
Speaker 1: plead guilty in her own kidnapping hopes. She had no
38:40
Speaker 1: other choice because she's caught and she knows as if
38:44
Speaker 1: this thing comes to actually goes to trial and we
38:47
Speaker 1: start parading in the witnesses and all the evidence, so
38:50
Speaker 1: we've got she's got nowhere to go. I'm very confident
38:53
Speaker 1: we would have got a conviction if that went to trial,
38:55
Speaker 1: facing trial for thirty five felony charges and the possibility
38:59
Speaker 1: of as many as twenty five years in jail, the
39:01
Speaker 1: mother of two, accepting a plea deal, her recommended sentence
39:05
Speaker 1: reduced to no more than fourteen months. Through tears in
39:08
Speaker 1: the courtroom, Peppini dabbing her eyes with a tissue, her
39:11
Speaker 1: attorney consoling her. Is she nervously answered the judge's questions
39:14
Speaker 1: to ensure she understands what happens next, dabbing her eyes
39:19
Speaker 1: in the courtroom, people are consoling her. I mean, Sherriff
39:23
Speaker 1: Johnson is the one that needs to be consoled, and
39:25
Speaker 1: everybody that's spent their time, blood, sweat and tears trying
39:28
Speaker 1: to find Sherry Peppini. Now she's like dabbing her eyes,
39:32
Speaker 1: and the courtmina, what just stop, Peppini, You've done enough.
39:37
Speaker 1: Angie Arnold say, is is this Sherry Peppini's world and
39:41
Speaker 1: we're just living in it? Is it all about her? Well,
39:44
Speaker 1: she thinks it is, and she's creating this world that
39:47
Speaker 1: she wants to live in. She feeds off of this chaos,
39:51
Speaker 1: and she creates more and more chaos to keep us
39:55
Speaker 1: all wondering, like we all are on this show, right
39:59
Speaker 1: every I'm wondering. This is terrible. This is a terrible blot.
40:03
Speaker 1: I'm going to share with you. Oh boy, go ahead,
40:05
Speaker 1: don't hold back. Now, I'm wondering how much fun her
40:09
Speaker 1: and her boyfriend were having shaving her head, giving her bruises.
40:17
Speaker 1: I mean, I wonder, Oh my gosh, we're all going,
40:20
Speaker 1: oh my god, this poor woman, her beautiful blonde hair
40:23
Speaker 1: was shaved and everything they were it was probably they
40:26
Speaker 1: were probably enjoying every minute of it. They were getting
40:30
Speaker 1: some sort of odd satisfaction out of doing this to her.
40:34
Speaker 1: On top of everything else, Christie missert. When is this folk,
40:39
Speaker 1: sir going to be sentenced and what is she facing?
40:42
Speaker 1: She's on the docket for July. And to the point,
40:46
Speaker 1: the ex boyfriend went along with her tail because she
40:51
Speaker 1: kept telling him her husband was going to do horrific
40:55
Speaker 1: things if she went back home. And she's done this
40:59
Speaker 1: in the past. And Nancy hate to bring up, you know,
41:02
Speaker 1: the stereotyping, but you and I lived through Jennifer Wilbanks,
41:07
Speaker 1: the runaway bride outside of Atlanta, when she went out
41:11
Speaker 1: for a run and she was kidnapped by a Latino
41:15
Speaker 1: man and turned up in New Mexico. Oh, I remember
41:19
Speaker 1: it really well. Take a listen to this. Police investigators
41:22
Speaker 1: made an afternoon visit to the lakefront home in Georgia
41:24
Speaker 1: where Jennifer Wilbanks is now in seclusion, last seemed publicly
41:28
Speaker 1: hiding under a blanket as she left for New Mexico.
41:31
Speaker 1: The case of the runaway broad may now lead to
41:34
Speaker 1: criminal charges and it did. I remember it really well.
41:37
Speaker 1: Christy Missouri climbing that his spanning mail sex assault at
41:41
Speaker 1: her and coincidently and grabbed her the night before her wedding.
41:45
Speaker 1: She was the runaway Brian as he ended up cutting
41:47
Speaker 1: grasp for a couple of weeks. Right the end of it,
41:50
Speaker 1: she had absolutely no guilt or remorse when we were
41:53
Speaker 1: questioning her upon her return back to Atlanta, she laughed
41:57
Speaker 1: at cameras and she based basically like this young woman.
42:01
Speaker 1: Sherry thought the whole thing was a game. Well, it's
42:05
Speaker 1: not a game, and it was no game for law
42:08
Speaker 1: enforcement that literally spent blood, sweat, and tears trying to
42:14
Speaker 1: find this mom of two, much less what this whole
42:17
Speaker 1: thing did to her family. Here is one final fact
42:20
Speaker 1: in this story. So after this lengthy investigation and all
42:25
Speaker 1: of these lies are uncovered, Keith Panini filed for divorce
42:30
Speaker 1: from Sherry and wants full custody of their kids. His
42:36
Speaker 1: thought process that Sherry was acting erratically for these past
42:41
Speaker 1: few years while telling this sordid tale of lies to
42:46
Speaker 1: her own children about her kidnapping. We wait as justice
42:51
Speaker 1: and falls Nancy Grace Crumb Stories signing off Goodbye Friendly