Appeals and Bizarre YouTube Videos

This is an IHAT podcast . Guaranteed human . When Mike Marcini ended his year and a half long entanglement with Laura Owens , he wanted to be done with her. I deleted everything on my phone . I didn't want to read her name. I didn't want to see her face. I just wanted to forget about that chapter in my life because it was really a hard time for me . But years later, Mike would find out that his experience with Laura was the beginning of a pattern , one that thousands of people online had become obsessed with. Maybe most invested of all was Dave Neil. It was almost like Laura had this dam that she was holding up with her own hands. The leaks were coming out and she was very much like a cartoon just doing her bed, duct taping this thing shut and then this laptop came out of nowhere Mike Maracini's laptop . It had been gathering dust and storage for almost five years . When I think of Mike's laptop , I just think of it like sitting alone in a giant room in a museum with just a spotlight sitting on it. Mike had no idea that all the information he'd deleted could be recovered , and that the memories he'd tried so hard to forget would soon become critical evidence. They found thousands of pages of docum ents, but more telling was just to show how damaging Laura was to Mike , they unearthed things he had forgotten actually happened I'm Stephanie Young and this is Love Trapped I'll be raising holy helm if you ever , ever , ever try In the last episode, you heard about Laura's year and a half long relationship with Mike Maracini. Laura planned a trip to Iceland . According to Mike, it was part of the radio show he'd been developing with Laura. The trip was paid for. It was lined up with like things to do the entire time we were in Iceland . So from start to finish, there was an event every single day of something to do to report back on at the end of the trip for the podcast . Today, he wonders who actually footed the bill for their trip to Iceland . After recording multiple episodes of the radio show with Laura, he asked her when he could expect to see compensation. I brought up that we were just working for free and spent like fifty plus hours on these podcasts, being part of the edits, being part of the research , and that I wasn't going to do any more work for free. After he set this boundary, he says Laura sent him some money directly. I was paid one time and I think it was like six hundred dollars from Laura . I never got paid through a station . The radio contract Mike had been waiting never came to fruition . After that, he walked away . But looking back almost ten years later , he wishes he'd never gotten on that plane to Iceland . From what he remembers, the flight there was miserable . We're like maybe two hours in the flight and she's hysterically crying, hysterically crying. And this is probably like at midnight. People around us are all turning around looking at us and she's like lifting off my headphones and saying, please talk to me . Laura has a very different version of what happened on their Iceland trip. She told her story five years later in a now infamous Tedx talk . He said that he didn't want to end our relationship, but I couldn't understand why he didn't want to when he treated me like he hated me . He said that I brought it out of him, that it was my fault , that he'd never been violent before he met me, that I was responsible for his transformation from the all American boy to American psycho. Anyone can start a TEDx chapter . The one Laura applied to speak at was something called TedX Mercer Island HS Women . HS seems to stand for high school . The chapter Laura spoke at was organized by three high school so phomores based in Seattle . On their website , the organizers say their goal was to empower women in the Seattle area . We don't know how Laura found this specific group or how she became a speaker there , especially because Laura doesn't appear to have any ties to Seattle . But once her TEDX talk was published , Laura seemed to think she was making a name for herself. She included the link to her TedX talk in her email signature . She also sent the link to Greg Woodnick, the lawyer who was representing Greg Gillespie at the time. This was her proof of her status as a public figure. Here's Woodnick . Not only was there a link to her TED talk which she was telling us about , but further down there was this curious Italian last name in one of the links also attached to the name Laura Owens That curious Italian last name was Maracini. Woodnick's team tracked Mike down and found him listed on a court docket for a restraining order case Laura had filed against him . Shortly after , Woodnick got in touch with Mike but Mike didn't want anything to do with Laura Owens . Here's what he remembers from that first phone call with Woodnick . He's like, by the way, she's got a Ted talk about you. Did you know that ? And I said about me . Did she like say my name in it? And it's like, I think you should watch it . So Mike went on YouTube and typed in Laura Owen's Ted Talk . That was the only time I had watched like the first thirty seconds of it . To this day, Mike can't bring himself to watch the whole thing. It's absolutely crazy to watch. Knowing it's about me . Yeah , it's crazy . Say the least . Even though Laura doesn't name him, Mike says he immediately recognized Laura's story is about him . When I watched, I was in such shock because I know that she's referencing me the entire time and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to put that together . Hold the views of those people that probably believed her and were against me for the longest period of time . It's a lot to take in . I had to turn it off though because it just, I mean, it was all such complete lies and I just couldn't take any more of it . In the TEDx talk, Laura presents a selfie she's taken in a hospital bed. Her face looks bruised . She claims this photo is proof of the physical abuse she'd experienced with Mike in the months after their Iceland trip. Here's where I was when I actually posted it in the hospital after my abuser and I had a particularly rough night . But here's the thing . Mike had seen this photo before or at least one that looked very similar . And when I say very similar , I mean it looks like the exact same photo . Laura sent it to him four months before their trip to Iceland , and with the photo, she texted him saying she was at the hospital in preparation for an abortion she had scheduled the following day . This is what she sent him with her text read by a voice actor. I'm at the ER, my doctor wants them to get my fluids up so we can try to do the procedure tomorrow. Can you be back tonight at my place for sure? Looking bomb AF on narcotics Even though Mike hadn't seen the Tedx talk , he was painfully aware of the allegations Laura made against him . That's because on june ninth, twenty eighteen, Laura filed a temporary restraining order against Mike Maracini . She had these two bulldog attorneys that were elite attorneys, like extremely good . And these two people took it personal with me. They thought that I was beating the crap out of Laura . According to her court records, it looks like Laura used a San Francisco based legal clinic that specializes in free legal services for survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault , and stalking. I'm not naming this clinic because I don't think they did anything wrong. Clinics like this exist for a reason . It's their job to believe their clients , even if they don't have any proof of the abuse . These kind of free legal services for survivors they can save lives. And importantly we know that falsified allegations of sexual abuse only account for about five percent of all claims . In june twenty eighteen , Mike had to give his sworn deposition to Laura's attorneys . At the time, he'd just started dating someone new, Danielle . I'm Danielle Maracini, and I am Mike Marcini's w . From the very start of their relationship , Mike was open about what he was going through with Laura Owens. I feel like most of it was told, at least the first month . I knew that she had accused him of domestic violence and I did drive him to his deposition . On the way to the deposition, Danielle remembers how nervous Mike was. He was incredibly anxious . They'd only been dating for a few months. When Mike got back in the car, he was just defeated . The deposition was much more intense than he'd expected. Mike thought he was just going there to tell the truth I do remember him just saying how they can find lies , even though he's not actively lying to frame him as this vi likeol ent guy . For example, Laura's attorneys asked him if he liked guns. He was confused and said no . Then they brought up an old social media photo where Mike is holding a rifle. He says the picture was taken while he and France had been shooting clay pigeons at a firing range. But Laura's attorneys used it to paint a picture of Mike as a violent guy who wasn't being honest about his relationship to guns. It was post the deposition where my attorney's like, if you go to court, there's a high likelihood that they're going to press for a five year restraining order or a permanent restraining order if they find valid evidence . Now there was no valid evidence. At the time, but she was throwing everything at the wall . I feel like I'm fighting a ghost . I don't have evidence to support that I didn't beat her up. I don't know how I fight this . Danielle took it all in . I definitely felt hesitant at first , I think as most women would . But ultimately , it just was this feeling that didn't track. Like the things that she was accusing him of from the very short amount of time that I had known him just didn't make sense and I thought , if this man did these egregious things, why would he be telling me about them ? She decided to proceed with caution , but her friends were alarmed . My friends did have this obligatory Heidian , those are really scary accusations . Once a domestic violence perpetrator, always a domestic violence perpetrator and rightfully so did my friends warn me about that . But Danielle Salmike is gentle, the kind of guy who repeatedly went out of his way to be there for her. Early on in their relationship , my dad passed away a little less than two months of knowing each other . Mike just said, I'm coming. Mike made a five hour journey to be by her . And he was there a few months later when Danielle received terrible news about her mom. She passed away like two months after my dad. I just remember crumpling to the floor and Mike was there . It just told me everything that I had needed to know about him very early on. This is why she believed Mike when he told her Laura's allegations were false. I'm so thankful that she gave me a chance and she stuck behind me because we're now married with two little ones. Danielle's been there with Mike through his entire legal battle with Laura Owens . After the deposition, Mike learned what he was up against , a domestic violence restraining order. I thought it was essentially like a civil restrain order, but since we were in a relationship, it was considered domestic violence . That was not really explained to me clearly when it was happening . The DVR O Laura's attorneys proposed would expire or renew after two years , and there was a mutual stipulation . Neither of them could come within three hundred feet of the other . That was appealing to Mike because he had no desire to see her or speak with her anyways . So he signed it, not fully understanding what he'd just done. He sent it to his attorney and wrote in the email quote, This was so difficult for me to sign , knowing I never laid a hand on this woman , and this will be on my record for life. When I agreed to the two year restraining order, my attorney's like, let's just hope that she moves on with her life. Let's hope she find s love. I was like, amen, sister . So that's what I thought I was signing up for. Like a two year it goes away . In retrospect , Mike wishes he fought the DVRO harder , but at the time , he believed his lawyer when she said this would be resolved in two years . After signing the DVRO, Mike and his wife Danielle tried to move on with their lives , but that document would impact them in ways they didn't expect. I noticed that when I would go through the process of getting a new job, I would make it to the final . And they were like, Hey, here's your verbal offer pending background check . The first time I was like, oh, wow, whatever, nothing's gonna show up. And then I didn't get the job I didn't realize until I pulled a background check on myself that it shows up that I have a domestic violence restraining order and it's active. I would say that was the biggest piece of how it really affected my relationship is being able to support provide for my family because we ended up getting pregnant , real pregnancy in twenty twenty . The DVRO had turned into an albatross , hanging over both of them Then, in July of twenty twenty, Danielle heard a knock at the front door . I was probably four or five months pregnant when the attorney came to our door and she was like , M Isichael Mar acini here? And I was like, Who are you? I'm not telling you yes or no, why are you here at my house? Mike came to the door and stepped outside with the attorney . It turns out the two years were up and he comes back in and he was just like, she's renewing . And I was like, no . So it really blindsided us. I just remember erupting into tears . By September of twenty twenty , Mike was back in court with Laura Owens . Mike went in person and Laura joined on the phone. I had seen her once in years. I moved away and I thought , how is this impossible? How could somebody renew when you haven't violated it? Laura said she had proof that Mike violated the DVRO. She produced a screenshot of one of Mike's Instagram stories. He says his account was private and he had Laura blocked , but somehow , she had a picture he'd posted of a smoothie he ordered at Barry's boot camp. Laura said that Barry's is less than three hundred feet from her apartment . But Mike had a rebuttal. Barry's is a franchise. He wasn't at the one next to her apartment. I said, This isn't accurate. I was thirty miles away . I was in a completely different city. This is my gym blog with my smoothie order . In the end , it didn't matter if Mike had actually violated the DVRO or not , because Laura was telling the judge she had reasonable apprehension of future abuse . In her renewal, Laura said without a restraining order, I would never feel safe again . With that With that, the court renewed the domestic violence restraining order . This time , it would stay in place for the next five years. I sat there and I said to the judge at the very end I was like, please make this a civil restraining order because this affects my livelihood of getting jobs. My wife is pregnant. I'm expecting a child here soon. I would really appreciate this could be moved to like a civil restraining order . And they essentially told me now , she still fears for her life . Danielle was devastated . This renewal came with shocking realizations. We realized that was never going to let him out of her grip and that the justice system will most likely never side with him. Later on in this series, I travel to San Francisco because at the end of twenty twenty five, Mike's DVRO was set to expire or renew once again . But before that happened, Mike was in for a surprise. He was about to discover the nightmare he'd lived through with Laura Owens was part of a viral story . And thousands of people online wanted to hear from him ? At some point , I saw M and I was like Are they talking about me Up to this point, we've been telling the story of each individual case , Clayton Eckard, Greg Gillespie, and Mike Maracini . But in the spring of twenty twenty four, in the lead up to Clayton's trial , their worlds collided . The three of them teamed up with the internet detectives like Dave Neil and Schnitzel Ninja So we're going to pick up where we left off and tell the story of how they all came together to support each other and try to get justice . In twenty twenty two, Fred Gillespie heard about Mike Marcini's experience. Greg sent him a friend request. Here's Mike. When I'm sitting there like, I do not want this back on my radar. That's the last thing I want. You trade a friend request me. And I had just gone through deleting everybody because Laura was watching me on social media . So I have I think probably like a thousand plus people in just purgatory of my social media . And never accepted his friend request . Greg's friend request went unanswered for over a year until december twenty twenty three. I was doing New Year's Resolutions with my wife who was sitting on the couch and she was asking me if there's something you could change over the last year, what would you have done differently? The answer came to Mike immediately. I should have reached out and I should have accepted Greg Gillespie's friend request, just knowing that I've gone through the same experience and just been somebody to talk with. I told her that was by far my biggest regret . And she said, why don't you change that? Here's Mike's wife, Danielle . And so he pulled it up and he accepted it. So we saw the couch for probably the next thirty minutes crafting this message together . For years, Mike thought he'd been the only one . Now, he was writing to someone who'd been through the same ring er with Laura . So I sent him a message apologizing like, hey, I'm so sorry for what you've gone through . I know what it's like to deal with this person and they're istent chaos. I'm just really, really sorry that I wasn't there for you . And he responded very quickly and said like, hey, Mike, I really appreciate it. If you ever want to set up a call to chat sometime, more than happy to . Mike thought they were a club of two. That's when Greg broke the news. He goes, You haven't heard dot dot dot . There was another guy. Same trap, same tactics . And I was like, wait, there's another guy and our eyes just popped out of our heads . And then he sends like an article and Mike and I were like , What the fuck ? It turns out the other guy was kind of famous . I was like , who's Clayton? I don't know who Clayton is. Mike had never watched The Bachelor , so he typed Clayton's name into Google. It pops up immediately . And it's like Reddit articles . There was an entire subreddit about Clayton and Laura. He started reading . At some point I saw MM and I was like , Are they talking about me ? That night , Mike and Danielle already had a date planned. Mike's mom was babysitting, so Mike and Danielle sat at a sushi restaurant and started scrolling. They had a lot of catching up to do. It was overwhelming to see the same pattern playing out a third time . And because of Clayton's fame, every small detail was public . And my wife breaks down at the restaurant, start crying she had doubted me at times when she had thought to herself like though I don't believe that you ever hit her or did things like that , but like I'm sorry for ever even doubting you . We were at the bar and I'm sure the sushi chefs were like, What is going on with these two? They haven't talked all night. They both on their phone and now they're crying. Mike thought his relationship with Laura was a traumatic one off event. But now, court documents from his case were being shared online, analyzed by YouTubers and content creators. Thousands of strangers had become incredibly invested in trying to prove Laura's lies , like the woman who goes by the username Schnitzel Ninja. I found out about Mike Marcini early on in the coverage of the case and his court documents had been obtained from the San Fran cisco courthouse and I went through those and the story just did not make sense to me . If Mike went through something similar to what Clayton was going through , he could be the key to finally exposing Laura's pattern. To find out there was this other person who'd actually dated her for a year and a half , my mind was blown . But first, someone needed to reach out and see if Mike would be willing to talk . So I sent him a fairly lengthy message just explaining who I was, why I was reaching out, that I was sorry he had been through what he had been through . And wondering if he was willing or interested in talking and I wanted to give him more information about the case if he hadn't heard yet, that was the other thing. Did he even know about Clayton? I didn't even know for sure at the time if he knew about Greg Gillespie . I reached out to him to see if he wanted to have a conversation with me, not expecting that he would, but it turned out he did. She wanted to be transparent about who she was , so she messaged from her personal account, instead of her anonymous username. I was thinking about the fact that Mike had been through this himself. He was a real person who had been through this experience. So I wanted to put that personal touch on my reaching out to him. So it wasn't just a random person behind a screen or behind a phone. The next time I looked at my phone, I saw a message from him and I couldn't believe it. They started messaging. Making contact with Mike was a turning point for Schnitzel Ninja . I started feeling more compelled to be involved when I found out about Mike Maracini . It's my opinion that she was lying about everything she claimed he did to her . Schnitzel Ninja had seen the Ted X talk , and she didn't believe Laura's story. If this were someone I cared about, I would hope that if someone had the time or the resources, whatever they had to give to help , I would hope that they would help . And I had time and I made time . So Mike was really the case that kind of drew me in further. Meanwhile, Mike was playing ketchup, reading everything he could find about Clayton and Laura's case. He couldn't believe it, and soon after he found out , Mike decided to DM Clayton. It's like, Hey, I don't even know if you're going to see this. You got a lot of followers. I'm gonna probably go into the message abyss , but I just want to say how sorry I am that you're dealing with this individual. I've dealt with her. And I'm so sorry . If you ever want to talk, I'm more than happy to chat And within two minutes he responds . And I remember it starts off. He goes, I know exactly where you are . And he wants to set up a phone call . So Mike and Clayton hopped on the phone . It was surreal at first to obviously find out that there's now another individual that went through this. But my story really paled in comparis on to Mike because Mike actually dated Laura, which was mind blowing when I found that out and to know that he had been going through this for six plus years. I mean this is an ongoing battle he was facing. And the great thing as I found out very quickly was he had incredible support from his wife that was helping him through this troubling time , but ultimately he wanted to reach out and let me know that I wasn't alone . And the beautiful thing was that story was going to help me out so much. I did ask him a question of if he had saved anything from that time with Laura, whether he had any photos or text or anything of the matter. When Mike connected with him, Clayton was preparing for his family court trial with Laura , the same one you heard about in episode seven . I told them all like I don't really have anything . Mike spent years trying to put enough space between himself and the chaos Lora created. I deleted every photo with this person. I want nothing to do with this individual. I deleted all of my text messages from my phone . I have nothing to be able to offer you guys. I can just be there as support support . In the lead up to Clayton's family court trial, he and his lawyers were looking for verifiable evidence of Laura's pattern . So Clayton pushed Mike to take a second look . I'll never forget I was talking with Clayton and he said like do you have like a laptop or anything? Like sometimes iCloud will store this information for you . So I go and I look at my storage unit and I'm like, oh, I still have this thing. It's completely dead . Mike didn't even have a charger for his old laptop . His wife Danielle had to track one down on Facebook Marketplace . I have no idea if there's anything on it, so I'm just cracking this thing open for fun . Somehow, Dave Neil heard about Mike's laptop , and he heard it might have some messages from Laura Ow en on' its. Here's Dave Ne . When I think of Mike's laptop, I just think of it like sitting alone in a giant room in a museum with just a spotlight sitting on it. Dave got in touch with Mike . And he's like, listen, I'm afraid to open it. My iCloud might delete things. I don't know what's in there, but he was like, I think I have text messages from Laura . And boy, he had no idea what was in that laptop . When they finally powered it on , it's got everything . Absolutely everything , every message that has ever been sent to and from , every photo , every single item item . Immediately, Dave Neil jumped in to help. First priority was making sure everything on that laptop was backed up. Second , if any of Mike's evidence was ever going to be used in court , it would need to be authenticated by a computer forensics expert, which would run about three thousand five hundred dollars . Dave had been covering Laura's story for about a year. He knew how Laura operated when confronted with proof . He couldn't just present an email from her. She'd say it was made up. Someone hacked in, Dog ate my homework. She's made every claim to get out of everything . So we said, we need to hire some one who's a professional that goes into court and tells other people this is real. You already know what Dave's about to do next . So we do a fundraiser Before I hit publish on the live stream, before like we went live, we already hit the three thousand five hundred bucks . With the fund secured, Mike got in the car and drove about an hour away to meet the forensic expert. Here's Mike . I felt like I was holding like a newborn baby. I was like gripping it so tight that I was just like, please do not drop this. Do not get a car accident because I had to drive it like an hour to this individual to authenticate it . When the report came back, the data was verified . The text messages Mike had from Laura were genuine and unaltered. We got the report back. It was legitimately like two thousand five hundred pages and there's just absolutely no way she can deny that this exists. That was the first moment where I really just felt like people believed in me and wanted to see my innocence be shown and like the truth would come out because I had been fighting her for so long . In helping Clayton's defense , Mike was finding validation he didn't know he needed. He was grateful for the community who believed and supported him. I'll never forget that moment . It was really, really powerful for me . And just I'm so thankful for the community for what they did. So many of the discoveries you've heard about in the last few episodes were all coming together in the two months before Clayton's trial , content creators Dave Neil and Megan Fox discovering the Fiverr logo on the ultrasound , the altered HCG test , Chase J ones , and now Mike's laptop. All of the evidence seemingly came out at the same time. It was almost like Laura had this dam that she was holding up with her own hands , the leaks were coming out and she was very much like a cartoon just doing her best, duct taping this thing shut . And then this laptop came out of nowhere . Dave was talking about the case almost every day on his podcast and YouTube channel. We always say sunlight's the greatest disinfectant. Everybody, get all the information you have, bring it to light. You might have something that looks stupid , bring it up, let the public see. There's ten thousand people watching this. Someone's gonna see something you don't see . That's exactly what happened . As the internet sleuths poured through documents , they found another man , a fourth man All they had was a first name, Matt, but journalist Meghan Fox tracked him down. I find people a lot. I can find people . Finding him was one of the toughest things that I've done as a journalist . It turns out , Matt and Laura met about two years before she met Mike Maracini. So I basically got on Instagram and I sent everybody connected to him a message asking him to contact me because of this story that was happening. He got back to Megan , or rather had his lawyer get back to Meghan. Matt said he didn't want anything to do with Laura Owens, but in Laura's deposition with Greg Woodnick , she volunteered the information that there was a fourth man . How many men have you told that you were pregnant by them? A total of four. Okay, I'm going to go through them. Mike Maracini. Correct. How many times did you tell Mike Marishini you were pregnant by him? Twice . Greg Gillespie? Once Clayton Eckard? Once. Who's the fourth man? His name was Matt. You recall what you're this was ? twenty fourteen, twenty fifteen. How did that pregnancy end? That ended with a miscarriage. How far long were you alleged ly? I was maybe six weeks . Was there ever a suggestion from Matt that the pregnancy was fabricated? Yes . Matt suggested your pregnancy was fabricated ? Yes . Four men have alleged that you have claimed to be pregnant by them and that it was a lie correct ? Correct . We've reached out to Matt for comment and didn't receive a reply. There's been a lot of online speculation about him . From what I've heard , Matt wants to stay far away from this story , which I completely understand. So out of respect for his choice , we're not going into any further details about him . A week before Clayton's family court trial, the witness list was published. As you know, Greg Gillespie and Mike Mercini were on the list. Even though Mike was subpoenaed, he still worried about what Laura would do if he showed up. He hadn't seen Laura in over five years , but she still had an active domestic violence restraining order against him. Here's Mike's wife, Danielle. He goes, what if I get arrested, Danielle? When Mike and Danielle arrived at Clayton's trial, you'll remember Laura's attorney called nine hundred and eleven and tried to report that Mike was violating his restraining order. My nervous level went through the roof . He is on the phone with nine hundred and eleven , rattling off my details of what I'm wearing, my height , what color my shirt is, what color my shoes are , so then I'm fully rattled. Clayton's lawyer Woodnick tried to reassure Mike and Danielle. I just remember Woodnick being like, We've got you . Don't worry. You have a subpoena. They cannot do anything . This is a courthouse. You have a right to be here . Woodnick was right . Mike and Danielle took a seat in the back. His heart was racing . After everything he'd been through with Laura , the last place he wanted to be , was in the same room as her. I just really am scared of her more than she's scared of me. Danielle heilld his he hand as Laura entered the courtroom . To see the man who is my protector , not just of me but of my daughters now just crumble in fear to this person is such an infuriating feeling . And when she walked in , my husband was just a shaking mess . My wife probably stared at her the entire thirty minutes she was up there, but I never made eye contact and I never laughed during her ridiculous comments . Mike didn't know if they would have time to call him to the stand because the trial was timed , but if they did , he was ready. I originally went to the june tenth hearing with full intention to testify In the end, there wasn't time in the trial to hear Mike's testimony, but when he and Danielle reflect on what happened at the trial, when I saw Laura get cross examining it completely crushed , it made my mood much much, better because they just caught her in so many different lies . When she had the balls to say that actually she had gone to a different Planned Parenthood that they didn't subpoena That was probably one of the more memorable moments sitting in there . Even though they didn't have time to call Mike in the trial, his presence there made a difference to Clayton . It was really great to have their support in the courtroom. And for me also just to have a strong individual like Mike in my corner that validated everything that I had been through and was also willing to fight alongside me . That's why it was so important for me to have him there. Mike and Danielle remember exactly where they were when they read the judge's ruling in Clayton's family court case. I felt like finally a piece of this empire that she had built had been dismantled . I was like, this judgment is not having it. Laura thought there was no re percussions . So that's why she thought she could just keep lying and getting away with it. And now she's paying the price. We're going to pick up where we left off at the end of Clayton's family court trial. After the judge's stern ruling, you might think that Laura would self reflect . Instead , she responded with indignation . She began a campaign against the family court judge who'd ruled against her, Judge Mada . It all started with a medium blog post . The day after Judge Mada's ruling, Laura published this on her medium account . It's titled When Judges Play Doctor, ignoring ninety nine point nine percent medical certainty zero point one percent doubt . We're having a voice actor read an excerpt from it. On june eighteenth, the court ruled that a pregnant woman cannot be considered pregnant unless a judge agrees she is. Yes, you read that correctly . Apparently, in a twist of medical and judicial logic, it is now up to the courts , not doctors to diagnose pregnancy. Despite medical evidence and a ninety nine point nine percent certainty from an OBGYN who has delivered more than twenty two thousand babies that I was pregnant , Judge Mada chose to believe the zero point one percent chance that my multiple positive pregnancy tests were due to something other than pregn ancy. To add insult to injury, she has referred me to the Maricopa County Attorney for prosecution. Yes, you also read that correctly. Laura's blog post goes on to quote Judge Mada's ruling , citing passages and describing why the judge got it wrong. When I found out I was pregnant, I was lost and I didn't know what to do. My depression worsened, making it nearly impossible to think clearly or make decisions . In the ruling, the judge wrote, The court finds failure to seek in person care for a high risk pregnancy to be both unreasonable and uncredible . This cold assessment ignored the severe depression I was grappling with, which made every moment of my pregnancy an emotional battlefield. In all honesty, the medical care choices I made weren't what I would have chosen in ideal circumstances. If this had been an expected pregnancy, I would have definitely sought proper care . But the circumstances were far from ideal, and the way Clayton treated me was terrible , leading to a restraining order being granted against him. The judge's opinion on what a reasonable person would have done doesn't take this into account , nor does it recognize the immense pressure I was under. Judge Mada then claimed that I have a pattern of similar if not identical behavior and referred the case to the Maricopa County Attorney's Office for review . Really? This was the first and only paternity case I have filed. The legal issues involving two of my exes were entirely different . Yes, I was pregnant by both and had abortions, but the legal matters were unrelated to paternity. A few weeks after the ruling came down , Laura and her attorney filed to have Judge Mada removed from their case They alleged that the judge was biased and prejudiced against Laura, and therefore unable to preside over the case. I asked Clayton's lawyer, Greg Woodnick about Laura's claim. Judge Matte issued a very thoughtful, very detailed, multipage ruling . After that ruling came out , there was a filing by M Ows.ens suggesting there was some sort of impropriety on the court level by the court. And that motion ended up getting addressed not by the trial court judge, but by the head of the Mericop y Superior Court Family Law Divis ion and that judge disagreed with the filing by Ms. Owens completely. That didn't stop Laura from taking it a step further . On november eleventh, twenty twenty four, she officially filed her appeal with the Arizona Court of Appeals. Briefs were filed by Laura. We filed responsive briefs. I think they filed some sort of reply to that, which they would be allowed to do at the appellate level. And then thet of Cour Appeals ruled on it, denying all of Laura's requests for relief. The decision from the Arizona Court of Appeals stated Owen's position on appeal is unreasonable. Laura wasn't happy with that . So she filed a motion for reconsideration asking the Court of Appeals again to reconsider their ruling. Again, they affirmed their denial. So the Court of Appeals essentially rejected the argument twice. They also ordered attorneys fees . Laura had already been knocked down twice , but she was still at it. Keep in mind, this was after Laura had been referred to the Maricopa County Attorney's Office . But Laura had a right, as does any litigant, to ask that the Court of Appeals decisions be reviewed by a higher court . So that's what she did. Essentially, she asked the Arizona Supreme Court to consider it, and the Arizona Supreme Court declined to consider it and also ordered attorneys fees. Multiple judges had now ruled against Laura . Each time , her bill increased . She had an attorney's fees award in the trial court, the Court of Appeals , and ultimately the Arizona Supreme Court That total came out to around one hundred ninety six thousand dollars . And at the time I'm recording this, Laura hasn't paid that balance. I don't think she ever intended on paying it anyway, and the reason I say that is I think there was a video recording of her and her attorney where they announced on a YouTube video that they produced that she had no intention of ever paying it. Here's the YouTube video when Nick is refere ncing. You'll hear Laura's attorney first . By the way, you can tell me if I'm not allowed to say this, but people are asking, When are you going to pay Clayton? Are you going to pay Clayton? I hope that you never pay Clayton. People think he's gonna put you in jail. We don't do that in America. If you have millions of dollars stashed away, he can go look for it. If you don't, he ain't getting nothing. You could file bankruptcy or you could just not. But either way , there's no legal requirement for you to post a bond. All that means is he can go after you and collect, but if you don't have the money to be collected, I don't. Yeah, well, then guess what? You get you get blood from a stone or you don't. So we're not going to post a bond for anything. You're not going to jail for non payment. That is not an option. And Clayton can just f off and do whatever he's doing. I still wish the guy well ish. I mean, I'd want him to get some therapy and figure out like why am I such a dick? In the middle of the appeal process, Laura's attorney, David Jingris started posting YouTube videos . Some of them feature Laura. You heard clips from these in episode two. I'm going to take a detour into these videos for a moment . Let's start with this one from january twenty twenty five . I am David. You are Laura. You are Laura . And we are the dynamic duo of disaster here to bring you a little bit of a post holiday treat, shall we say? You won't be surprised to learn that these videos have since been taken off YouTube , but things posted on the internet have a way of sticking around . This specific one was posted on X . Okay, so we're recording. Hello everyone. It's Douche Canu and pregnancy faker. Yeah . We have just I think you're supposed to look at the camera. See, I'm not a professional. You are. David Jingris joined Laura's case right before the trial with Clayton. According to Jingris , they didn't know each other before that . She reached out to him cold . Within less than a year, they began posting videos like these on David Jingris's YouTube channel. I feel like you and I are sort of Luke Skywalker and Princess Leia and Dave Niels, Darth Vader or other people are job of the hut, I'm not gonna say . In total, they posted about five videos together on YouTube. Jingris posted another twenty or so with just him on the mic . In this video from december twenty twenty four , he addresses why he's doing these in the first place . The YouTube comment section it's a really mixed bag of people saying, Why are you doing this? Why are you, you know, throwing more fuel or oxygen on the fire? Are you really helping Laura's interests? Are you putting Laura's interest first ? And you know, people I understand the criticism , but at the same time, you know, there's no playbook . It's a bizarre situation that we're in. I can't tell whose idea it was to make these videos . They were posted on Jingris's YouTube channel, but Laur cleara'lys an active participant. You obviously approve whatever I post and I'm doing this for you. I think I'm doing it for you. Some of the things they say are downright surreal. I was dating a guy from my high school who was my friend in high school and I dated him through pretty much the end of senior year. Is that somebody that we know about or we can keep his name out of this if I think he's known as victim zer o, although we never slept together . So well that doesn't that doesn't stop you from getting pregnant as we know bump Rim shot absolutely right In this one from december thirteenth, twenty twenty four , Jingris is wearing a Santa suit complete with a beard . Behind him is a bag of coal with a list of names on it. The first names on the list , Dave and Meghan, presumably content creators, Dave Neil, and Meghan Fox. I mean, look, it's Laura, it's Christmas time. I've got a naughty list here of people that will be getting lumps of coal . I love your naughty life. I know. It had to do it. The video is titled Bachelor Paternity Scandal. Laura confesses All to Santa . Did you ever see that movie Fatal Attraction? Glenn Close that might have been . I didn't. So again, I'm a lot older than you. So that movie was actually, you know, I don't forget what year it came out, nineteen eighty nine, ninety, something like around that time. So you were like zero , but that movie was kind of terrifying for a lot of people , you know, because Glenn Close plays this woman who's like obsessed with Michael Douglas and she stalks him. They have one hookup and then she completely stalks him and his family's married and they she winds up boiling the bunny the guy, the family bunny, they she boils it on the stove. Did you know that? No. You ever heard that phrase bunny boiler ? No. No. So it comes from that movie because Glenn Close is obsessed with Michael Douglas and he doesn,'t want to have a relationship with her because he's cheating on his wife, basically is what happened. And Glenn Close doesn't take no for an answer. So she keeps stalking him, breaking into his house or whatever, and she broke in and stole the family bunny and boiled it in a pot on the stove. I feel like people think that you're in that ballpark, okay? So let's try to talk about why you're not . Here's another clip from the Santa video . We talked about the fact that filing a paternity case if you knew that you weren't pregnant would be the dumbest thing you could do. It wouldn't work for one thing and it would guarantee you that your lie would be exposed as quickly as possible . And I've said before that it's like a drunk driver, a guy, you know that your shit phrase drunk and you deliberately go up to a cop and you say, Hey bro, can you test me ? You wouldn't ever do no person. I mean, I guess I guess if you were mentally ill or so drunk that you forgot your name, that might make sense to you. I don't see that in you, Laura. I don't see you as being a crazy person. You're a little different. I'm a little different. Everyone's a little different , but you're smart enough, I think, to know that filing a paternity case, when you know that you're not pregnant, when you know that you've faked the whole thing, when you know that there is no sonogram, when you know that there is no baby , you are literally inviting the court to test you , right? Right. You are exposing yourself to being exposed unnecessarily. The whole time, Laura is smiling and nodding along, like she and Jingris are in on the same joke. And for you to go straight to court , you're either you're either pregnant or you're crazy. It's one or the other. If you're crazy, you know, at some point we're going to figure this out. I just in eight months I haven't seen it and maybe maybe I am blind . Most attorneys advise their clients to keep quiet . In this case , Laura's attorney is actually doing most of the talking and putting it on the internet . I asked Clayton's attorney, Greg Woodnick, about these videos . It was bizarre and colleagues would say to me, you know, what the fuck? And my response was, I don't know, I've never seen anything like this before. So if your question is how common this is, the answer is never, I've never seen this before. I can tell you the chorus of communications I have received from attorneys in this community has been unanimous regarding how unique their presentation has been on social media. As you'll recall, after Judge Madda's ruling in the june tenth family court trial, she referred Laura's case to the county attorney, a woman named Rachel Mitchell. In one of these videos, Laura and Jingris address the criminal investigation and even joke about what might be on the horizon. You and I are on a journey together here. We're gonna get there. We're gonna get through, hopefully Christmas, Laura, if Rachel Mitchell comes knocking. If the journey involves a stop through Rachel Mitchell territory , that's okay . You'll come out the other side. Donald Trump has been indicted four times. He's going to the White House . You know, I mean , anyway , it's Christmas time, people. And I just think it's time to move on . You know, I hope that Rachel Mitchell doesn't give you shiny new bracelets as your Christmas present. On the next episode of Love Trapped, Laura was in for a rude awakening . She was about to find out how serious county attorney Rachel Mitchell wase. In january twenty twenty five , Laura got a knock on her door. Laura, Scott'sdale police , and it wasn't even seven o'clock in the morning. I'm on the phone with my attorney. I'll put him on the phone right now to my attorney David Jingris . My attorney David Jingris. I don't know who you guys are and it's not even seven. Do they have authority to search before seven o'clock in the morning? The police are there , you need to let them do whatever they're going to . Thank you so much for listening. Please be sure to follow Love Trapped on Apple Podcasts, the iHeart Radio app, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. And please leave us a review. A five star rating helps others find this show. We're grateful for your support . If you would like to reach out to the Love Trapped Team or have a similar story to share , email us at Love Trapped Pod at gmail. com . That's Lraovepp Ted POD at gmail. com Love Trapped is a production of Glass Podcasts, a division of glass entertainment group in partnership with IHAT podcasts. This show was executive produced by Nancy Glass, Andrea Gunning and Ben Fetterman. Written, produced and hosted by me, Stephanie Young . Our story editor is Monique LeBord. Producer on this episode is Sidney Ladu. Additional production support from Todd Gans . Our production manager is Kristen Melkiri. For IHAT podcasts, Allie Perry was our executive producer. Audio Editing and Mastering by Anna McLean, additional editing support by Tanner Robbins, and Matt Delvecchio. Thank you to our voice actor, Leslie Tolly. This podcast was developed in collaboration with Danny Passman and Leb Abramoff at Crybaby Media. The Love Trapped Theme is composed by Oliver Baines , Music Library provided by MIB Music . A special thanks to Carrie Lieberman, Will Pearson, Jessica Krinech , Ally Canter, and the entire IHAT podcast team . And for more podcasts from Iheart, visit the IHAT radio app, Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.