Sherri Papini, real-life 'Gone Girl' accused of faking her own kidnapping in 2016, now says it was all real

Nine years after Sherri Papini was declared missing when she didn't return home from a run in Redding, Calif., the mother of two is changing her story.

Sherri, who was dubbed a real-life “Gone Girl” in 2016, referring to the 2012 novel by Gillian Flynn, speaks out publicly for the first time in the Investigation Discovery docuseries Sherri Papini: Caught in the Lie, which premieres on Monday on HBO Max.

“Haven’t you ever lied? Have you ever lied in the history of your existence?” Sherri asks viewers in the second episode of the series. “And then has that lie been blown up and broadcasted around the world? It’s so much more complex than just pointing the finger and saying, ‘You’re a liar.’ I wish more than anything I could’ve been more truthful.”

The original story as reported in the news media

Sherri Papini re-creates the run she took before she went missing, in Sherri Papini: Caught in the Lie. (Investigation Discovery)

The Investigation Discovery docuseries reviews the original story that was reported throughout late 2016: While on a run, Sherri disappeared, and her husband, Keith, called the police. Redding police search for her, and behind the scenes Keith got the FBI involved too.

Twenty-two days later, on Thanksgiving, a passing motorist spotted Sherri running across a church parking lot with a chain around her waist and her wrists zip-tied together. Police took photos of the significant bruising across her body, alongside burn marks and a brand on the back of her shoulder blade.

At a press conference a week after Sherri’s return, the police said Sherri claimed she was taken by two Hispanic women to an unknown location.

After four years of nothing coming to light about the alleged perpetrators, the FBI connected DNA on the pair of underwear Sherri had been wearing to her ex-boyfriend James Reyes. They spoke to Reyes, and he claimed Sherri had asked for help to get away from her husband.

On March 3, 2022, five years after she was reported missing, Sherri was arrested on a charge of lying to the FBI. She pleaded guilty to faking her kidnapping and was sentenced to 18 months in prison.

What then-husband Keith Papini says happened

An undated photo of the couple, featured in Sherri Papini: Caught in the Lie. (Investigation Discovery)

Keith told police he was “blindsided” and “in shock” about his wife faking her own disappearance. In April 2022, Keith filed for divorce from Sherri and requested full custody of their son and daughter.

Keith was not interviewed in the HBO Max series. He was, however, a major voice throughout Hulu’s documentary about the case, Perfect Wife: The Mysterious Disappearance of Sherri Papini, and gave several interviews with news networks about the situation. In the Hulu documentary, he said he has not spoken directly to Sherri in years.

The media attention around Hulu’s documentary, and Keith’s assertion that Sherri intentionally staged the kidnapping to have an affair, is also referenced throughout Sherri Papini: Caught in the Lie as the “media’s version of what happened.” Hulu did not respond to Yahoo Entertainment’s request for comment.

"I wanted to get the truth out," Keith Papini told ABC news station KGO-TV in June 2024. "There's been so many lies out there and misreportings during that time, and I really wanted to land a message of 'This is what happened to my family, friends, the community.' We were all taken advantage of."

What Sherri Papini now claims actually happened

Sherri Papini speaks out about what she claims really happened to her in November 2016 in Sherri Papini: Caught in the Lie. (Investigation Discovery)

“I’m so tired of keeping this secret and living the lie,” Papini says at the beginning of the first episode of the series. “Now I get to tell the truth.”

In Sherri’s retelling, she claims she was in communication with Reyes in 2016 through burner phones but had no intention of traveling with him. She said she originally claimed two Hispanic women kidnapped her because she thought somehow it would lead police to Reyes, whose mom, Sherri thought, was Hispanic. Sherri said during the docuseries that she thought sketching a woman who, in her opinion, looked similar to Reyes’s mother could help lead the investigation toward him.

She said she was having an emotional affair with Reyes because she was scared of Keith, who was “threatening to take everything from me.” The detectives involved have not investigated Sherri’s allegations against Keith.

But Reyes, according to Sherri, kept her tied in a room that was boarded up, and she had no idea where she was for three weeks. She claimed she only lied to the FBI about being kidnapped by two Hispanic women because she was worried about how Reyes would react and whether it would impact her children.

She ultimately insists that Reyes kidnapped and abused her — that she didn’t fake a kidnapping and willingly went with him — and that Keith’s behavior had pushed her toward rekindling her previous connection with Reyes in the first place.

Sherri said she pleaded guilty in 2022 to orchestrating the hoax because she felt pressure to do so.

What’s the truth?

That’s the big question throughout the docuseries: What actually happened during these three weeks in November 2016?

The series speaks to psychologists (one of whom is Sherri’s personal therapist), police and FBI agents who were involved in the investigation and even has Sherri undergo a polygraph test while filming. The production team hires a private investigator at one point to research some of Sherri’s claims.

But as one psychologist says in the final episode of the series, “More than one thing can be true at the same time.”

“My only hope for justice is that the person who held me captive and tortured me comes forward and admits to his crime,” Sherri says in the final moments of the last episode, referring to Reyes, who has not been charged with anything related to her disappearance. “I was at rock bottom, there’s no more. There’s no more. What the f*** am I going to do? I mean, really. Do you think that this film will do more harm than good for me?”

The first episode of Sherri Papini: Caught in the Lie premieres on May 26 at 9 p.m. ET on Investigation Discovery and will be available to stream on HBO Max.