Keith and Sherri Papini.Photo: Courtesy Keith Papini
A lawyer forSherri Papiniis asking for minimal prison time for the California mom who claimed to have been abducted at gunpoint but later admitted it was a hoax.
In a sentencing memorandum, Papini’s attorney William Portanova urged the court to follow the recommendation of the United States Probation Office and sentence Papini to one month in custody and seven months of home detention.
The sentence “would provide a reasonable deterrent, and adequately serve the interests of justice in this case,” Portanova wrote.
“Her name is now synonymous with this awful hoax,” he added. “There is no escaping it. There is only the hard work of moving forward, however slowly, towards a balanced, open, and honest life. There seems to be little or no chance for Sherri to go backwards now. The lies are out, the guilt admitted, the shame universally seen.”
“It is hard to imagine a more brutal public revelation of a person’s broken inner self. At this point, the punishment is already intense and feels like a life sentence.”
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Sherri Papini pleaded guilty in April, 2022.Rich Pedroncelli/instagram
But after investigating her purported kidnapping, authorities found that Papini had fabricated the incident and had been hiding out with an ex-boyfriend in Southern California.
Andrew Seng/The Sacramento Bee via AP
Papini’sstaged kidnappingcost the California Victim’s Compensation Board more than $30,000 in therapy visits and an ambulance trip, and cost the United States Social Security Administration more than $127,000, which she will be required to pay back. Papini will also have to pay $148,866 to the Shasta County Sheriff’s Office, the law enforcement agency that investigated the bogus kidnapping, and $2,558 to the FBI.
Suspect sketches.FBI
Talbert wrote that the sentence would “provide just punishment, deter further crimes, and promote respect for the law.”
Papini is scheduled to be sentenced Monday morning in U.S. District Court in Sacramento.
source: people.com
