#8 - Sherri Papini
California woman Sherri Papini disappeared in the afternoon of November the 2nd of 2016, after
going for a run through the rural neighborhood surrounding her Redding residence. Papini’s
husband tracked her cell phone to a location less than a mile from their home, at the intersection
of Old Oregon Trail and Sunrise Drive, but the mother-of-two herself was nowhere to be found. The
34-year-old’s family then began to fear that she’d been kidnapped, and a massive search operation was
set into motion. Rescue crews used scent dogs and helicopters to comb the area, but, for the
first few weeks, the search failed to yield any results. Eventually, on Thanksgiving Day, Papini
was found bound with restraints on the side of the road near the city of Woodland. She’d reportedly
suffered a number of injuries, including a broken nose and a mark on her shoulder that appeared
to have been inflicted with a branding iron. In subsequent interviews with investigators,
Papini claimed to have been abducted by a pair of Spanish-speaking women on the day she’d gone
missing. Her captors had allegedly kept her chained in a closet and would periodically beat
her at gunpoint and brand her with the red-hot tool. Papini was able to provide the FBI with
detailed physical descriptions of the 2 supposed assailants, which sketch artists used to create
composite images that were then released to the public. In March of 2022, however, disturbing
details came to light regarding the true nature of Papini’s abduction. According to a Department of
Justice press release, the woman had fabricated the story of her disappearance and had actually
been voluntarily staying with her ex-boyfriend, in Costa Mesa, as her family was desperately
searching for her. Papini also reportedly went so far as to harm herself in order to support
the false statements she subsequently gave to the authorities. When federal agents confronted her
with evidence of her deception, Papini refused to recant her previous testimony, and even provided
more false details about her purported abductors. She was consequently arrested and charged
with making false statements to a federal law enforcement officer and engaging in mail fraud.
#7 - Nataleigh Schlette and Micah Risner Shortly after 9 pm, on March the 9th of 2017,
police officers in Sandusky, Ohio, rushed to a home in the 600 block of Meigs Street,
in response to reports that a homicide had occurred on the premises. Upon their arrival,
however, the officers found that the homeowners, identified as Nataleigh Schlette and Micah Risner,
had staged the former’s gruesome murder. The alarm was raised after they’d sent a picture
of her supposedly lifeless body to their family. Risner later detailed how he’d wiped ketchup all
over the bathroom after Schlette assumed a pose in the tub that made it appear as if she was dead.
After they’d shared a picture of the grisly scene with Risner's sister,
via Facebook messenger, several concerned friends, who were unaware that it was actually a hoax,
contacted the police. It subsequently emerged that the couple had come up with the stunt as
an attempt to get Risner’s sister to come to their house, with the intention of confronting
her for allegedly stealing money from them. The prank ultimately had unintended consequences for
the engaged couple, as they were charged with inducing panic in the incident’s aftermath.
#6 - Clauvino da Silva On August the 3rd of 2019,
at the end of the regularly scheduled visiting hours, guards at the Bangu jail complex’s, in
Brazil, spotted a suspicious individual attempting to leave through the front doors. Rio de Janeiro’s
deputy head of prison operations later detailed how one of the detention officers on duty quickly
realized that a woman who was walking out of the facility was actually an inmate in disguise.
The prisoner was restrained and taken back inside, at which point he was identified as
Clauvino da Silva, a drug dealer from the city of Angra dos Reis who was serving a 73-year
prison sentence. In a video released by prison authorities, da Silva was shown removing the
various components of his disguise, which included a plastic mask, a wig, glasses, and women’s
clothes. Investigators reportedly believed that the constituting elements of the elaborate facade
had been smuggled into the jail by a pregnant woman who hadn’t undergone the same rigorous
searches as other visitors. It’s a relatively widespread aspect that, in many prison systems,
has led to pregnant women being used to transport contraband. It later emerged that da Silva’s plan
had been to leave his 19-year-old daughter inside the prison in his stead. She and 7
others were reportedly arrested in connection to the ruse, while da Silva himself was transferred
to another jail unit and held in solitary confinement as punishment. A few days later,
it was reported that da Silva had been found dead in his jail cell from an apparent hanging.
#5 - Samantha Eley Texas woman Samantha Eley approached
a group of teenagers as they were playing on the swings at a Fort Worth park on October the 23rd
of 2019. Eley shouted at them to leave immediately and the ensuing confrontation was recorded by an
individual at the scene and went viral on social media in the aftermath. As was shown in the video,
Eley marched up to the teens and loudly declared that they were too old to be on the playground
equipment. The 38-year-old then tried to push one of the teenagers off the swing and unloaded
an expletive-laden rant in which she identified herself as a police officer and threatened to
arrest them. In a second video captured later that same day, Eley was shown harassing parents
in a different section of the park. She appeared to push her way through a group of adults in
order for her own child to use the equipment. The woman told the other parents that their children
were too old to be in the play area, something that she claimed to know for a fact because she
“owned” the park. While Eley maintained that children over the age of 6 were prohibited
from using the park’s rides and equipment, another parent pointed out that a nearby sign
indicated the playground was meant for those aged 5 to 12. The Fort Worth Police Department later
released a statement in which they clarified that Eley wasn’t, in fact, a police officer,
and the woman was consequently charged with one count of impersonating a public servant.
#4 - Audrey Francisquini On the morning of May the 10th of 2021,
several students at the American Senior High School in Hialeah, Florida, were approached
by an individual who was roaming the halls and distributing pamphlets that promoted her Instagram
page. She was wearing a backpack and carrying a skateboard in an attempt to portray herself as a
student but it would later emerge that the person passing out fliers was actually 28-year-old Audrey
Francisquini. A security guard approached the woman, at one point, and asked what she was doing
to which Francisquini reportedly replied that she was looking for the registration office. She then
wandered off and continued giving students her personalized literature as they entered their
classrooms. Police later detailed how she was once again questioned by security, but simply
walked away and ultimately left the grounds a short time later. After a few hours, Francisquini
was arrested by local police and charged with felony trespassing, misdemeanor interfering with
a school, and resisting arrest without violence. Subsequent reports indicated that Francisquini had
previously worked as a law enforcement officer in Georgia. She’d been fired in 2017 after allegedly
hacking into a colleague’s social media account and posting an explicit photograph of them online.
#3 - Christopher Tomberlin In 2015, authorities in Bibb County, Georgia,
issued an arrest warrant for local man Christopher Tomberlin, who was accused of biting his
girlfriend and throwing a hatchet at her during a domestic dispute at their Macon residence. He
was taken into custody on charges of aggravated assault, battery, and making threats. Reports
later surfaced that, following his release from jail on bond, Tomberlin had passed away due to an
undetermined cause, and there was even a Facebook post announcing his death. A few years later, in
May of 2021, the Oklahoma City Police Department received an anonymous tip that Tomberlin was
still alive and living in the Oklahoma City metro area under an alias. On May the 27th,
the man was located and arrested by a joint task force composed of US Marshals and local police
officers. Investigators concluded that Tomberlin had faked his own death before fleeing nearly
1,000 miles from Macon to Oklahoma City. He’d successfully remained undetected for roughly
6 years, using several different fake identities to avoid raising suspicion. It was reported that
Tomberlin was working from home as a freelance tattoo artist at the time of his capture.
Today's topic was requested by Standing Tall F**ck these culture vultures. If you have any
other topics you'd like to learn about, subscribe & let us know in the comments section below.
#2 - Paul Anthony Menchaca On September the 6th of 2018,
Paul Anthony Menchaca was taken into police custody at his parents’ house in Gilbert,
Arizona. Leading up to his arrest, investigators had spoken with 3 women who’d all testified that
Menchaca had lied to them about his medical condition to solicit their caretaking services.
The 31-year-old man reportedly used online service providers such as CareLinx and Care.com to find
workers willing to serve as his caregivers. Police reported that Menchaca would pose as his mother,
“Amy”, and claim that he had Down's syndrome, and therefore needed workers
to bathe him and change his diapers. One of the victims of his exploitative scheme claimed to have
assisted Menchaca with up to 30 diaper changes and baths during her time as his caretaker. To make
his deception as believable as possible, Menchaca also allegedly took on a childlike demeanor and
threw temper tantrums on several occasions. One of the victims eventually grew suspicious that
Menchaca’s condition was actually a fabrication, and she followed him to his parents’ house,
where he was dropped off by another caretaker. She confronted the man’s parents, who confirmed that
Menchaca didn’t have Down’s syndrome and wasn’t required to wear diapers or be assisted in the
manner in which he’d been. The man was ultimately criminally charged in connection to his predatory
ruse. Menchaca formerly served as a crossing guard for the Chandler Unified School District,
although it was reported that he’d resigned from the position in the wake of his arrest.
#1 - Josh Paler Lin and Leia Se In April of 2021, a pair of social
media influencers staged a prank video in which one of them attempted to gain
entry into an Indonesian supermarket by painting a blue surgical mask on her face
instead of actually wearing one. US-based YouTuber Josh Paler Lin and Russian Instagram influencer
Leia Se devised the stunt after they were turned away from the store for failing to comply
with the COVID-19 mask mandates set in place in the country’s Bali province. In an attempt
to trick the supermarket’s security personnel, they applied blue make-up to Se’s face to make
it appear as if she was wearing a face covering. The ploy initially worked, and the tourists filmed
themselves walking around the store, noting in the footage that very few people seemed to notice
Se’s fake mask. The stunt quickly went viral after Lin and Se posted the recording online,
and it was eventually brought to the attention of Indonesian immigration officials. The two
influencers were then taken into custody for breaching Bali’s pandemic regulations,
and they were detained in an immigration center pending their deportation from the country. Under
normal circumstances, first-time violators of Bali’s COVID-19 rules would’ve only been fined
roughly $70. However, local authorities sought to have the pair of foreigners
removed from the island immediately given the overtly deliberate nature of their infraction.
Thanks for watching! Would you rather have a bunch of fake friends that you know don’t
actually care about you or no friends at all? Let us know in the comments section below!