Where Is Unknown Number Subject, Kendra Licari, Now?

Trigger warning: This piece contains mention of suicide.

Netflix’s Unknown Number: The High School Catfish documentary begins with an ominous warning: “All of the text messages in this film are real.” The texts in question were cruel messages sent to small-town Michigan teens, Lauryn Licari and her then-boyfriend Owen McKenny, over a period of nearly two years.

The anonymous texts included sexual taunts and insults about Lauryn’s body, and even urged suicide. The barrage continued after Lauryn and Owen broke up, and it wasn’t until August 2022 that authorities identified the sender: Lauryn’s own mother, Kendra Licari.

A Shocking Discovery

During her interviews in Unknown Number, Licari denied responsibility for the initial messages, claiming that she only started sending the kids texts in the hope that it could help uncover the alleged original sender’s identity. (In the doc, Lauryn doesn’t necessarily buy her mom’s explanation. “I think it might have just been her,” she said.)

Licari said she didn’t know how to stop and “was in an awful place mentally,” estimating that she sometimes spent up to eight hours a day messaging the kids. “I might have kind of picked up on some of her insecurities,” Licari acknowledged, before claiming that the hateful comments about her daughter’s appearance “weren’t really targeted at her.”

The Unknown Number subject said that she was “not scared of [Lauryn] hurting herself,” despite sending messages that encouraged just that. Licari also suggested that her own previous trauma might have played a role in her behavior. “As she started getting older, I started having things that were suppressed come forward,” she said of Lauryn, adding that she “wanted to try to control the outcome of her journey.”

Kendra Licari Today

In 2023, Licari pleaded guilty to two counts of stalking a minor, per local news station WPBN. She was sentenced to a prison sentence of 19 months to five years and was ultimately released in August 2024.

In the doc, it’s revealed that Licari hasn’t seen her daughter since being released from prison. Lauryn, for her part, said it would be a “relief” to see her — but also a challenge. “Now that she’s out, I just want her to get the help that she needs so then when we see each other, it doesn’t go back to the old ways and how it was before,” she said.

To that end, director Skye Borgman told Variety that Licari went to therapy while she was in prison. “And I believe that she’s still seeing a therapist,” she said. “She has put thought into what she did. I don’t know that she’s fully realized or recognized what it was that she did or why she did it. I guess only Kendra could really answer that.”

If you or someone you know is experiencing suicidal thoughts, call or text 988 to contact the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, which provides free 24/7 support. You can also reach out to the Trans Lifeline at 1-877-565-8860, the Trevor Lifeline at 1-866-488-7386, or to your local suicide crisis center.