Sherri Papini Says Her 'Poor Mother' Was Taken 'Wildly Out of Context' in Doc: 'She Knows I Was Kidnapped'
In HBO's 'The Curious Case of Sherri Papini,' her mother Loretta Graeff is heard saying "It was not an abduction"
Papini claimed during a new episode of 'The Viall Files' podcast that the quote was edited out of context and didn't reflect her mother's true beliefs
She said her mother "definitely knows" she was kidnapped, despite Papini's 2022 guilty pleaSherri Papini — the California mom who admitted to faking her 2016 kidnapping — is pushing back on how her mother was portrayed in a new docuseries, claiming a quote that made headlines was taken "wildly out of context."
In The Curious Case of Sherri Papini, Papini's mother Loretta Graeff is shown saying: 'It was not an abduction.'
The quote appears to show Graeff doubting her daughter's version of events — a sentiment echoed by law enforcement and federal prosecutors, who ultimately revealed that Papini had orchestrated the entire disappearance herself.
But now, Papini says the scene doesn't tell the whole story.
'My poor mother… when you don't have control over your own audio and it gets cut and clipped… it can be taken wildly out of context,' Papini, 42, said during a new episode of The Viall Files podcast.
Pressed on whether her mother had changed her mind after initially expressing skepticism, Papini replied: 'Oh, no. My mom definitely knows that I was held captive and that I was kidnapped.'
She added that while things were 'very confusing in the beginning,' her mother came to understand what 'actually happened' — and that the quote used in the documentary omitted that supposed clarification.
The docuseries recounts the story that once gripped the nation: Papini disappeared while jogging near her Redding, Calif., home in November 2016. She resurfaced 22 days later on Thanksgiving morning, battered and shackled, claiming she had been abducted at gunpoint by two masked Hispanic women.
That story unraveled in 2022 when federal investigators revealed Papini had been hiding out with a former boyfriend.
She was charged with mail fraud and making false statements, later pleading guilty in a plea deal that sent her to prison for 18 months. She was released in 2023 to community confinement and remains under supervised release.
In recent interviews — including the HBO project and her podcast appearance — Papini has positioned herself less as a manipulative hoaxster and more as a woman misrepresented by a hostile media, overzealous prosecutors and edited footage.
The 42-year-old divorced mother-of-two says that her kidnapping wasn't a hoax, and that she only lied about the identity of her purported captor: her ex-boyfriend. She said she feared for her safety, and that her ex-husband Keith Papini would revoke her access to their children if she told the whole truth.
(Papini's ex-boyfriend, James Reyes, has never been charged with a crime. He declined PEOPLE's request for comment in May, around when the documentary began airing.)
Her alleged capture was preceded by a months-long emotional affair with James, she said, and she felt partially responsible for her circumstances after "leading him on," she said in the documentary.
"I agreed with James to make up that someone else did it [in exchange for my release]," Papini claims. "It wasn't the right choice and I know that... I wish I would've told the truth from the day I was in the hospital — that it was James."
Related: Why Sherri Papini's Own Mother Doesn't Believe Her New Story About Supposed Kidnapping
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She calls the HBO project a 'trial by media,' noting that she never faced a criminal trial, and describes herself as living under a 'life sentence' of judgment. She also alleges that key evidence — such as interrogation audio in which, she claims, law enforcement guided her ex-boyfriend's responses — was left out of the final cut.
Papini says she hopes her mother will publicly clarify her purported position if given the chance. 'I think given the opportunity, sure,' she said.
But for many, the words spoken on-camera in the HBO series stand in sharp contrast to Papini's revised narrative.
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9 years after her fake abduction, Sherri Papini is still making news
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