'How could someone do that?': Why everyone's talking about Netflix's new doco, The High School Catfish.

In 2020, Lauryn Licari was living what seemed like a typical teenage life in the small community of Beal City, Michigan. The 13-year-old was navigating high school, dating her boyfriend Owen, and dealing with the usual pressures that come with adolescence.

But what started as an ordinary year would soon spiral into a nightmare that has left viewers of Netflix's new documentary asking one haunting question: "How could someone do that?"

Unknown Number: The High School Catfish takes viewers inside a cyberbullying case where a girl's anonymous stalker turned out to be the last person anyone suspected.

Watch the trailer for Unknown Number: The High School Catfish. Article continues after video.

It began innocuously enough in October 2020, when Lauryn and Owen started receiving text messages from an unknown number. At first, the messages might have seemed like a prank from a classmate. But as weeks turned into months, the communications took on a far more sinister tone.

After a brief pause, the messages resumed with a vengeance in 2021. What followed was a relentless campaign of psychological terror that would leave lasting scars on everyone involved. The anonymous tormentor sent a daily barrage of threats and vile insults that cut deep into Lauryn's self-esteem.

The messages were cruel and personal. They attacked Lauryn's appearance with comments about her having a "flat ass", and made other degrading remarks about her body. The messages also became sexually explicit. But the harassment didn't end with these cruel taunts. The unknown sender escalated, and began telling the teenager to kill herself. 

What made the situation even more confusing was how well the texter seemed to know Lauryn. They knew intimate details about Lauryn's life — ones that only someone close to her could have known. It was both terrifying and confusing for Lauryn to reckon with, as she tried to work out who in her inner circle could be capable of such cruelty.

Lauryn and Owen. Image: Netflix.

As the harassment continued, concerned parents and school officials began to recognise that the situation had moved far beyond any typical teenage conflict. The nature of the abuse and the personal information being used suggested something more calculated and dangerous. It was time to involve the authorities.

When the local investigation stalled, Bradley Peter, a police officer from nearby Bay City, stepped in as a liaison to the FBI. Using advanced digital forensics techniques, investigators began the painstaking process of tracing the masked messages back to their source, but what they discovered would shock everyone.

The texts weren't coming from a jealous classmate or a troubled teenager, but to someone much closer to home: Kendra Licari, Lauryn's own mother. The revelation was so unexpected that even seasoned investigators struggled to process it. How could a mother inflict such psychological torture on her own child?

Lauryn and Kendra. Image: Netflix.

The moment of truth came during a search of Kendra's home, when Sheriff Main confronted her with the evidence. In a scene that would later be captured on his body camera and shown in real time in the documentary, Main had to deliver the devastating news to Lauryn that her mother was behind the messages that had tormented her for over a year.

The revelation sent shockwaves through the Licari family and the wider Beal City community. The motive behind Kendra's shocking betrayal remains murky, even to documentary director Skye Borgman.

"I don't know that she really knows why she did it," Borgman admits.

In the film, Kendra reveals that she was sexually assaulted around Lauryn's age, and claims that seeing her daughter grow up triggered fears that led her to send the messages as a twisted way to "keep Lauryn close."

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Some officials have compared her behaviour to a digital-age form of Munchausen syndrome by proxy — harming someone to maintain control over them. The documentary also hints at inappropriate feelings Kendra may have harboured towards Owen, adding another disturbing layer to an already incomprehensible case.

In December 2022, Kendra Licari was arrested and charged with multiple counts of stalking and using a computer to commit a crime. She later pleaded guilty to two counts of stalking a minor and was sentenced to 19 months to 5 years in prison. She was released on 8 August 2024.

The documentary raises profound questions about the nature of family relationships, the psychology of cyberbullying, and the lengths to which some people will go to inflict harm on those closest to them. For Lauryn, the discovery that her own mother was behind the messages that had caused her so much pain represents a betrayal that goes to the very heart of the parent-child relationship.

As the case continues to reverberate through the community, it serves as a stark reminder that sometimes the greatest threats to our wellbeing can come from the most unexpected sources — even from those who are supposed to love and protect us most.

You can watch Unknown Number: The High School Catfish on Netflix now.

Read more on Unknown Number: The High School Catfish here:

• Netflix's Catfish doco shocked the world. Here's where the Licari family are now.

Feature Image: Netflix.