It’s perhaps one of the most horrifying true crime documentaries we’ve seen in recent times; Unknown Number: The High School Catfish has rocketed to the top of the Netflix charts thanks to viewers sharing their shock at this truly bizarre tale.
For those who haven’t seen it, the film follows the story of regular American highschooler, Lauryn Licari, who finds herself on the receiving end of a torrent of cyberbullying. She receives particularly cruel messages about her appearance, with some even urging her to harm herself. Her boyfriend at the time, Owen McKenny, also receives a barrage of digital hatred.
Over the course of 20 months, where numerous names of suspects are thrown into the fray, it transpired it was none other than Lauryn’s own mother, Kendra Licari, who was behind the messages.
The documentary also revealed that Kendra had been lying to her husband ( Lauryn’s father) Shawn about having work. In reality, she had lost more than one job, and was merely feigning working from home when her husband was around.
But what has changed as the dust settles in the aftermath of this twisted and tragic tale – did Lauryn Licari’s parents stay together? Cosmopolitan UK investigates.
Is Shawn still married to Kendra from Unknown Number: The High School Catfish?
Shawn and Kendra’s marriage was initially strong. The pair met while Kendra, originally from Detroit, was studying at Central Michigan University, and she later moved to Shawn’s tight-knit Beal community and into his house. The pair welcomed Lauryn in 2007.
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According to The Cut, as Shawn wasn’t part of Beal City’s ‘in crowd’, Kendra was keen to push Lauryn front and centre, coaching her so her daughter was on the softball team, and more embedded into the local community.
Shawn was close to Lauryn – but it was Kendra who was the family lynchpin that oversaw schedules and even finances, as Shawn worked out of the house as a mechanic. Kendra also took the lead in ‘fighting’ Lauryn’s cyberbully when the messages began rolling in.
While the family were initially comfortable, with Kendra working in IT at a nearby university (the family even moved to Shawn’s ‘dream’ four-bed house) cash-flow problems soon started to arise.
Sources who spoke to The Cut said Shawn had told them that the family had “missed mortgage payments”, their “bank account had been hacked” and how his van had been impounded.
The stress of these financial issues started to take its toll on the Licari’s marriage. The family were forced to move on multiple occasions, fearing a stalker as a result of Lauryn’s texts.
“Kendra and I were fighting and arguing,” Shawn says in Unknown Number: The High School Catfish.
As it transpires in the documentary, when Shawn is informed by police that Kendra had lied about still being in work, he struggles to process the news. A police officer says in the film: “He looked like a broken person”.
The film then shows Shawn asking his wife to leave the family home, telling her, “I can’t do this, Kendra. I’m sorry. We gotta get some time apart.”
As Shawn adds in the documentary: “You know, she stabbed me in the heart, shot me in the heart.”
In April 2023, Kendra pleaded guilty to two counts of stalking, receiving a 20-month prison sentence and five years of probation. She is now living with her parents and is banned from contacting Lauryn.
Shawn has since divorced Kendra, and has a closer bond with his daughter.
Speaking to Tudum, Unknown Number: The High School Catfish documentary filmmaker, Skye Borgman, said of their relationship: “It’s so wonderful to see them together… It’s just a great outcome of something so tragic and so terrible that you see this really loving, really respectful relationship that the two of them have.”
Kimberley Bond is a Multiplatform Writer for Harper’s Bazaar, focusing on the arts, culture, careers and lifestyle. She previously worked as a Features Writer for Cosmopolitan UK, and has bylines at The Telegraph, The Independent and British Vogue among countless others.
