Sherri Papini: Caught in the Lie

This documentary is classic case study of how to spot a liar. Sherri's own words and mannerisms during this interview make it pretty obvious when she is telling the truth and when she is not. Often she will start embellishing an answer that should be straight forward. Also everyone is to blame but herself. She plays the pity card well which sucks in a lot of people. I do not know where the psychiatrist featured in this film got his degree but he seems extremely gullible. This doc does a good job of challenging her on many aspects of the case. Every time she is challenged the answers just do not add up. Anyway, its up to each person to make their own assessment but from my perspective this documentary made her look even more guilty and even more of a liar.

It's like someone at HBO went "wait what if we took the opposite stance on this" just for the sake of keeping it relevant and squeezing more money out of it. The production costs are low for documentaries, so they're able to get a lot of money out of just having some people talk about stuff ad nauseam.

But I've followed this case pretty closely. I've watched the interviews with police and FBI. This documentary leaves a lot of details out just for the sake of the narrative. Which is insane. And kind of unfair to the dude she manipulated to drive all the way up to Redding from Southern California just to pick her up and entertain her dumb ideas. They left out her internet searches for like human trafficking and branding.

Anyway, the pacing and style is really good. But this is just a money grab for HBO. Don't waste your time.

I wish that you had focused on confirming or negating the allegations. But instead, this was just her blaming everyone and everything on others. You gave her a huge platform to put out her scenario and to explain away all of the lies. Even when you pressed her and caught her in lies, she was allowed to explain it all away. I have a friend who is a pathological liar. Does it come from abuse, absolutely. But it doesn't make it ok. There were many things you could have done to confirm James story, but you chose to instead let her blame him. You should have told both sides, even if he chose not to participate. This was just a whitewash of her lies.

Dear James,

I'm so sorry Sherri did this to you and that you ever got involved with her. Unfortunately you should have realized she was crazy and a liar while she was asking you to do insane things at your house for 22 days. That said, you don't deserve to be another victim in the path of her tornado.

This girl is such a narcissist that she truly believed this documentary would be good for her and force people to believe her. They can't hide their disorders and she is severely misdiagnosed. She needs money, she needs a good story to get her kids back, she needs every man in her life to be the bad guy so she can be the princess in need of saving. Who paid her money to lie some more for this?!? I'm dumber for having watched it, but I really hoped she'd tell the truth and that James would tell his side. The great thing about it is she lied some more and couldn't hide her crazy no matter how hard she tried.

Sherri is still a woman in need of serious psychological help. Her story remains full of delusion, and she is the polar opposite of convincing in this documentary. She comes off as manipulative and strangely detached from the damage she caused. The only thing that is true in this is just how unwell she continues to be. If this was meant to be a redemption arc, it's not. Sherri appears just as nutty as ever, and still entirely lost in the lies she spun. My heart goes out to Keith, who has shown remarkable strength and grace despite being dragged through the chaos, deceit, and betrayal caused by someone so void of integrity and character. I hope he continues to heal and rebuild his life far away from the dysfunction his ex-wife created. He deserves peace, honesty, and happiness. All things Sherri clearly never brought to the table.