A Michigan woman named Kendra Gail Licari has been charged with five crimes, including stalking and computer crimes, for her alleged role in a catfishing campaign that targeted two teenagers, including her daughter. The charges also include obstruction of justice, as Licari is accused of attempting to frame another minor for her actions during the investigation. This story was originally reported by The Morning Sun.

‍The incident began when Beal City Schools received a report of cyberbullying involving Licari's daughter and a boy she was seeing. At the time, Licari was also a coach for the school's girls' basketball team.

However, she was not asked to return to her coaching position due to a coaching change at the end of the season.

School officials, including the superintendent, worked with Licari and the mother of the other student to try and identify the source of the harassment. However, they eventually had to seek assistance from law enforcement due to the complexity of the case and the fact that most of the incidents occurred off school grounds and did not involve school devices.

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While law enforcement assistance was officially requested in January, family members said that the harassing messages started early in 2021, Barberi said. Licari is accused of having used virtual private networks to mask the location she was sending messages from, Barberi said.

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When kids the age of the two traveled, she made it appear as if the messages were coming from the location they were at.

She also used a specific identity but instead tried to make them look like they were coming from the age-peers of the two teens. That included using slang and abbreviations associated with communicating by text.

Barberi said on Monday that his office compiled 349 pages of harassing text and social media messages during the course of the investigation.

The investigation eventually exhausted local computer crime resources, and local law enforcement turned to the FBI's computer crime division in mid-April, Barberi said.

Around the end of April/start of May, law enforcement notified Chilman they believed that Licari might be involved, Chilman said.

The FBI was finally able to lock down the IP addresses used to send the messages and realized they were Licari's, Barberi said Monday.



When confronted, Licari reportedly made a full confession, Barberi said. What is unknown is why Licari would have done it.

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REFERENCES

Woman Charged For Catfishing and Harassing Two Teens - Including Her .... https://www.datalounge.com/thread/32185323-woman-charged-for-catfishing-and-harassing-two-teens-including-her-daughter

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