Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Who Kidnapped 'Super Mom' Sherri Papini?

Episode Date: January 11, 2017

Nearly two months after the Thanksgiving Day miracle of Sherri Papini's release by kidnappers, her case is still unsolved. Nancy Grace and Alan Duke discuss the bizarre care of the kidnapped California 'Super Mom.' Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. Friends and family frantically searching for the woman they refer to as Supermom. I'm getting very angry and frustrated and I'm scared for my wife. This is Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. The 34-year-old was found on the side of the road near Sacramento, nearly 150 miles from where authorities believe she was taken while out jogging near her Northern California home. The sherry is now safe.

We still do not have a motive as to the reason why Mrs. Bikini was taken. Do you believe Mrs. Bupini's story? Absolutely. She reported she had been abducted. She was discovered in restraints and had been assaulted. I will confirm that the suspects did brand her. Imagine this. You come home from work.

No one greets you at the door. Instead of your spouse walking up and saying, how was your day? Your children running to you or you hear them playing in the distance. There's an eerie quiet. You call the daycare. They're still there. They've never been picked up. Your spouse doesn't answer their cell phone, and suddenly you know deep inside something is horribly, horribly wrong. That is just exactly what Keith Papini says happened to him just before Thanksgiving. And in the last hours, the first photos of his wife, Sherry Papini, the kidnapped mom, have emerged. In these photos, Sherry looks gaunt, very, very thin, frail, weak, pale. Her beautiful

long blonde hair that she wore, her crowning glory, it's unseen. It's tucked severely under a cap because according to her, her kidnappers cut off all of her hair. We're talking about Sherry Papini out of Sacramento Valley. And with me is Alan Duke. You know, Alan Duke, investigative reporter, so many people have doubted her story. Why? I've covered several sensational stories in which a person claimed to have been kidnapped,

sometimes by a person of another race, and it turned out they just ran away for whatever reasons they left. Maybe they wanted a break from the life they didn't like, or they wanted to avoid something coming up. Since it's rare for a kidnapped woman to be freed by kidnappers weeks later it triggers those suspicions when something like this happens we remember those hoaxes and we try to put this case in that box are you talking whoa whoa whoa wait are you talking about jennifer will banks the runaway bride who it was the night before her wedding and she disappeared and there was a

massive search for her and as it turned out she blamed I think she blamed a couple of Hispanic guys and gave a very vague description and said she had been assaulted and as it turned out what had really happened is she got cold feet and took a powder. She was the real runaway bride. So are you somehow, Alan, equating Sherry Papini with the runaway bride? Is that what I'm hearing? I'm exactly doing that. I covered that story very, very closely.

Of course, she was in the Atlanta area, and it was a very dramatic thing. It ended, I believe, in Albuquerque, New Mexico. She ended up taking a bus from Atlanta to Albuquerque, New Mexico. When the police found her, I think it was at a bus station in Albuquerque. I was on duty working the story at that moment. And we were so shocked when we found out what really happened, that it was, she just got cold feet and she ran and of course we call it the runaway bride well i remember that because i had been in touch with her parents with her father specifically and he was heartbroken the h e double l she put her family through but okay

we're going can we get it back in the middle of the road, Alan Duke? All right, because we're way out in the weeds right now. We're talking about Sherry Papini, the mother of two young children that disappears, but this is, this is the difference. Sherry Papini had been out ostensibly jogging. As I started, her husband comes home. The children don't run to the door. She doesn't answer the door. He can't find her. He calls the daycare. The children are still there. She had never come to pick them up. That was a first. Then he does the Find My iPhone app, and he finds her iPhone on a jogging trail with her earbuds, with her hair ostensibly wound up in the earbuds. So that's where it all starts. He immediately calls 911. It's right before Thanksgiving,

like two weeks before Thanksgiving. And can you even imagine? I remember not this, but the last Thanksgiving, my dad had just passed away. And when we all gathered, the weight of that empty chair was just overwhelming. And I imagined the pepinis, Alan Duke, at Thanksgiving, how that was going to be. But that's not the way it turned out because that day, Alan, remember this? Motorists call 911. They passed her, but they called. One motorist finally stopped, and out of nowhere comes Sherry Pepini. She's practically starved. Her hair is all cut off.

She's covered in bruises, and she has a chain around her waist, and she is bound, chained to a heavy object. Now, are you telling me that you think she staged that whole thing? No, exactly. I'm not saying that because of how we found her. When you look at all of that evidence that you just gave, it's hard to imagine that she is one of those runaway brides or one of those hoax situations because how do you self-inflict that on yourself? Well, did you just say how do you self-inflict that on yourself? Well, yeah, bad English.

Okay. It's poor English. It's poor English. Once again, we're off in Alan Duke land. Let's get back in Sherry Papini world. Here's the other thing. I'll tell you why people I think think, had a problem with it. Because statistically, it's unheard of.

She says that she is kidnapped in an area where there's very little crime by two Hispanic females. First of all, for a female to commit this kind of crime is unheard of. If you look at the methods and assessment of homicide, very, very rare that a female executes a violent crime on another female like this. She says she never saw their faces. They kept a hood on her the whole time. Although now we're hearing that one has salt and pepper straight hair and one has curly hair. One's older than the other one. So you had to see them somehow. But she said she was kept captive. I mean, statistically, Alan, 75% of violent crimes are committed by men, 20 by women. The remaining 5%, we don't know if it was a man or a woman. So this is highly unlikely. I also think that if her wounds were self-inflicted, doctors would be able to tell that. So I assume that they are not self-inflicted or there would not still be a search going on. It's odd on either side. And

that's what we're left with. You want to believe that it is not a hoax. And there's plenty of reason not to believe it is a hoax. But as you say, this is against the odds. But there are those aberrations. There are those cases where something happens that is against the norm. And this sounds like it's one of those. And people are so anxious to rush judging her and say she made the whole thing up. But let's think about it. The husband apparently took a polygraph and passed. That was reported.

So in order to think this was a hoax, what the husband was in on it, I don't believe that they would do that to their children or their families. So let's just say the husband's not in on it. Say it's all her. So what? She starved herself for almost three weeks, beat herself, branded herself and cut off her own hair. While you would expect such a kidnapping would be carried out by men, and Papini says her kidnappers were women, could it be, though, that these women were part of a group, including men, and they were just chosen to be the primary kidnappers?

But still, why would they take her, keep her for two weeks, and then set her free? Well, you know, that's another good point, Alan. And I agree with you because you've got to look at, although the state does not have to prove motive at trial, you have to look at, does this make sense? It reminds me a little bit of the JonBenet case because I always said, why would a kidnapper come in the home to steal JonBenet for ransom? And then at the last minute go, oh, you know what? I just think I'll kill her here and leave her. Forget about the ransom. Doesn't make sense. Why would two women come along, kidnap her for whatever reason, and then go, oh, you know what? Forget about that. I'm just

going to throw her out on the side of the road and be done with it. It doesn't really make sense, right? I've covered a lot of crimes that are just by the book, and the detectives sort of know they've been there, done that, got the T-shirt, and they start to expect normal patterns. But this one doesn't fit a normal pattern. Are detectives equipped to think out of the box like that? I mean, you work with them, prosecutors. How hard is it for them to think out of the box? Well, of course they are. I mean, I think that really minimizes their capacities.

They think just like we think. And they know a lot more than we know, but at a certain point, they get stumped. Well, here's the deal. She's home now. Her families are relieved. Her children have their mother back. So far, we believe he has passed the lie detector tests and in order to believe that she did this herself she'd either have to have an accomplice or she would have had to inflict these wounds

on herself and starved herself and back to the big development she's first spotted for the first time since she in public since she was kidnapped And she is emaciated looking. She's very thin, weak, pale. She's wearing a baseball cap with a hoodie over that and a jacket over that. The jacket is huge. It swallows her up. And she's with her children and her husband. So at the end of the day, miracles do happen.

Alan Duke, miracles do happen. It could be very well that that is what this is. It is a miracle. The odds of her coming back, we've seen a couple of the really sensational cases where somebody emerges after years and years after a kidnapping. A couple of weeks is pretty remarkable in itself. This is one thing I think when I see a picture like these photos that we're seeing. I'm thankful to see that she's doing okay.

But I'm wondering, are people stalking her, trying to get pictures of her, this crime victim, in order to make a little money? Now does she have to worry about that? Well, I can answer that right now. Yes, they are. They certainly are. That is something she's going to have to endure for quite a while until this case is finally put to rest. You either have to believe her or believe she could have done this all as some sort of hoax and left behind her children. And I got to tell you something, Alan, I thought I knew what love was until I had the twins

and there is nothing compared to a mother's love. And maybe I'm projecting, but I find it very hard to believe that she would willingly leave her children as part I'm projecting. But I find it very hard to believe. That she would willingly leave her children. As part of some hoax. I find it hard to believe. So just for right now Alan. Can we stop analyzing Sherry Papini. And the possibility she pulled a hoax.

And just be happy she's home. I agree with that. I'm with you on that. With that Alan Duke. I will sign off. And say goodbye friends. And thank you for being with that. I'm with you on that. With that, Alan Duke, I will sign off and say goodbye, friends, and thank you for being with us. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.