A Northern California woman who was arrested last week for allegedly faking her own 2016 kidnapping and lying to federal agents has been released from jail.
A federal judge allowed Sherri Papini, 39, to be released after her family posted a $120,000 bond on Tuesday. Ms Papini must undergo psychiatric treatment and surrender her passport as conditions of her release.
Wearing a gray hoodie and keeping her head down, Ms Papini ran out the doors of the jail in Sacramento and, embraced by friends or family, dashed to a car past a throng of reporters and photographers shouting questions.
During a virtual detention hearing, US Magistrate Judge Jeremy D. Peterson had agreed with Ms Papini’s attorney that she wasn’t a flight risk or a threat to the community.
She was arrested last Thursday on charges of lying to federal agents about being kidnapped and defrauding the state’s victim compensation board of $30,000.
Ms Papini, then 34, had gone missing on 2 November 2016 after going for a jog near her home in Redding.
She was found three weeks later on 24 November, Thanksgiving Day, on the side of a highway in Yolo County with chains around her waist, a “brand” on her shoulder, a broken nose and other injuries.
Ms Papini told investigators she had been held at gunpoint by two Hispanic women who abducted her and held her against her will.
On the basis of the details she had given to an FBI sketch artist, law enforcement agencies were on the lookout for Hispanic women matching Ms Papini’s description.
She went on to receive more than $30,000 of aid from the California Victim’s Compensation Board between 2017 to 2021.
Five years after the purported kidnapping, an investigation by the Department of Justice found that Ms Papini made up the story and was allegedly staying with a former boyfriend in Costa Mesa, California, during those three weeks and had harmed herself to make her story convincing, authorities said.
Prosecutors and the Shasta County Sheriff´s Office say Ms Papini’s abduction hoax cost Shasta County, state and federal taxpayers, crime victims and donors more than $200,000.
In an interview with The Independent last week, Shasta County Sheriff Michael Johnson said troubling anomalies began to emerge in Ms Papini’s story from the moment she was found - as members of her community described her as a serial liar.
Sheriff Johnson also said more charges could be filed in the case as investigators do not believe Ms Papini acted alone.
In arguing against her release from jail on Tuesday, Assistant US Attorney Veronica Alegria said when FBI agents tried to arrest her last week, “she screamed ‘no’ and ran away from them and resisted arrest.” Ms Papini’s attorney claimed she was running toward her children.
