This Is the Darkest Documentary Netflix Has Ever Released
‘Unknown Number: The High School Catfish’ will make you see red.
Netflix has released some explosive docuseries over the years but the streaming service’s latest hit, Unknown Number: The High School Catfish, has the internet fuming. Why? After the doc details the crimes committed by a cyberbully at a small town Michigan high school, it reveals the bully’s identity. And it’s absolutely sickening.
First, what happens in Unknown Number: The High School Catfish?
In fall 2021 students at Beal City High School began receiving cruel text messages from an unknown number. The texts seemed to focus on one student, 14-year-old Lauryn, and her boyfriend Owen. The messages appeared to be from another student who had a crush on Owen. Some of the texts the bully sent Lauryn include:
- “he will be with me while your lonely ugly ass is alone”
- “he wants sex, bjs n making out, he don’t want ur sry ass”
- “ur dressed like a f-cking sl-t”
- “kill yourself now b-tch”
Owen also got as many as 50 texts a day from the unknown number. After dating for two years, the couple broke up due to the anonymous bully. But the harassment didn’t stop. Lauryn continued to receive messages urging her to take her own life, saying “his life would be better if you were dead” and “DEAD #bangbang #suicide”.
So, who is the anonymous bully in Unknown Number?
Unbelievably, the investigation revealed that Lauryn’s mother, Kendra Licari, was behind the cyberbullying. Unknown Number shows the bodycam footage of Licari confessing when police serve her a warrant for her tech devices. Lauryn is also in the video and looks completely shocked.
Why did Kendra Licari bully her own daughter?
One theory is that Licari was infatuated with her daughter’s boyfriend Owen. Owen says that she behaved inappropriately with him by doing things like cutting up his steak into bite size pieces for him and attending his sports games even after he and Lauryn broke up. The documentary never confronts Kendra about this theory.
Another theory is that Licari had Munchausen syndrome by proxy. Kendra bullied her daughter in order to receive attention by “playing the hero” and comforting Lauryn’s distress. She risked Lauryn’s life by anonymously urging her to commit suicide with the hope that it would bring them closer together.
What consequences did Kendra Licari face?
When police informed Lauryn’s father that Kendra had confessed to the crime, he immediately asked that Kendra remove herself from their home while the police waited. The couple divorced and full custody was given to Lauryn’s father.
Kendra Licari pleaded guilty to two counts of stalking a minor and in 2023 she was sentenced to 19 months in prison, of which she served about a year.
Lauryn has now graduated high school and is an adult. Although she continued talking to Kendra while she was incarcerated, she has not seen her mother since she was released from prison. At the end of the documentary, Lauryn says “Now that she’s out, I just want her to get the help she needs, so when we see each other, it doesn’t go back to the old ways and the way it was before.”
Is Kendra Licari sorry?
Although Kendra Licari confessed to being the anonymous cyberbully in Unknown Number, she never really owns up to her actions or the harm she has caused. Licari claims things “just spiraled”. She distances herself from her behavior by saying things like “I was someone different…it was like I had a mask on” and blaming her own childhood trauma. She even claims it was a method to protect Lauryn, saying: “I was afraid of letting her grow up, I wanted to protect her and keep her safe.”
It seems like Licari is mostly sorry that she got caught. She also said “Realistically, a lot of us have probably broken the law at some point or another and not gotten caught. I’m sure people drove drunk, haven’t been caught.”
Unknown Number: The High School Catfish is now streaming on Netflix.
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