Netflix’s Unknown Number: The High School Catfish revealed who catfished high school couple Lauryn Licari and Owen McKenny by sending them threatening and graphic text messages for nearly two years — which ultimately resulted in a prison sentence.
The documentary, which was released on Thursday, August 29, centered around Lauryn and Owen, who dated when they were 13 years old until they became victims of relentless cyberbullying. The catfish specifically harassed Lauryn over her romance with Owen, which caused them to question whether it was a fellow student or an adult in their hometown of Beal City, Michigan.
After the texts were first sent in 2020, there was a pause before the unknown number got even more persistent, sending upwards of 0 to 40 messages a week. Authorities got involved, but it wasn’t until FBI liaison Bradley Peter was brought in that they figured out that Lauryn’s mother, Kendra Licari, was to blame.
Kendra, who was interviewed in the docuseries, denied sending the initial messages. She confirmed that she harassed her daughter and Owen on social media as a way to get officials to take the original catfish seriously before it escalated.
Lauryn’s mother was then asked about the texts she sent urging her daughter to harm herself. “I can say I was not scared of her hurting herself,” Kendra said in a confessional.
Kendra was arrested and pleaded guilty to two counts of stalking a minor: one count each for Lauryn and Owen. She was sentenced to 19 months in prison and was released in August 2024. As part of her arrest, Kendra wasn’t allowed to make contact with her victims, including her daughter.
According to their individual interviews for Unknown Number, Kendra and Lauryn kept in touch while she was behind bars. They haven’t seen each other, however, for over a year and still aren’t allowed to interact despite both expressing interest in a potential reconciliation.
Owen and his mother, Jill McKenny, were also featured in the doc. They both accused Kendra of tormenting her daughter because she had a crush on Owen. Kendra, meanwhile, claimed she was raped at age 17 and her concerning behavior was a result of an undiagnosed mental illness that stemmed from her trauma.
“I didn’t want her to go through that process that I did, and I think that really led me to not know how to handle things,” Kendra said, adding that she was “scared to let [Lauryn] grow up” because of “what could happen to her.”
Owen has since graduated from high school and now attends college in Michigan. Lauryn, meanwhile, is currently dating someone new from high school and has chosen to keep her social media more private amid the renewed public interest in her mother’s legal case.
Netflix’s Unknown Number: The High School Catfish is currently streaming on Netflix.
