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33YO Woman Arrested For Pretending To Be High School Student For A Year To Heal Her Past Traumas

Shelby Hewitt, 33, allegedly pretended to be a teenager for more than a year at three different Massachusetts high schools.

Janell Lamons, a teenage student who attended the accused’s school, told NBC10 Boston, “I’m still waiting for answers from BPS because I feel like they’re not doing anything about the situation, and I also just feel like they’re playing games.”

“We are the victims, not her,” stated her mother, Robin Williams. She is the one who sat among our kids while posing as a 16- or 13-year-old student.

To enroll in the schools, the suspected scammer allegedly used many names. She developed a complex narrative of being a victim of sex trafficking while attending Jeremiah E. Burke High School as a teenage “Daniella.”

The woman used many aliases to enroll in Jeremiah E. Burke High, Brighton High, and English High using fictitious identity and documentation.

“Daniella” was a foster adolescent who was illiterate, but the real Shelby was a highly educated social worker.

Janell remarked, “We did become friends, and we exchanged phone numbers and spoke on the phone occasionally.”

She said, “She would sometimes refuse to respond because she said she was spending time with her sisters.”

Shelby led a double life while feigning to be a student, going to school, playing basketball, getting braces, and hanging out with adult acquaintances.

She went added, “I was definitely shocked to learn about the charges and stuff because I wouldn’t expect none of this to happen, because all of my friends and stuff for [sic] the same age and everything.”

As a high school student, Shelby also joined the school basketball team and got braces as part of her hoax. She did, however, manage to keep up a life outside of school, spending time with her adult friends and even taking a vacation to Colorado with them, in spite of her adolescent persona.

Andria, a friend, disclosed that Shelby was a maid of honor at her wedding in 2022. When the claimed imposter was mourning the loss of her mother, Andria had even gone with him to see a psychic.

A young student who got acquainted with the accused scammer stated, “I was definitely shocked when I found out about the charges and stuff.”

Andria disclosed that following her incarceration in 2023, Shelby had called her and told her that she had been reliving her childhood after speaking with a psychic. She stated that the psychic requested her to go back in time to her early years in order to help her heal from her past.

Three counts of forgery, two counts of forgery at common law, one crime of uttering, one count of identity fraud, one offense of theft over $1,200, and one count of making false claims to her employment were among the charges Shelby faced after her arrest.

Shelby is presently having psychiatric assessment as court processes move, since her attorney, Timothy Flaherty, insisted that she had a history of mental illness.

Shelby “has severe mental health challenges” that she has been coping with “lifelong basis,” according to attorney Timothy Flaherty.

Following a hearing last year, Timothy stated, “This young woman has severe mental health challenges and she has been dealing with them on a lifelong basis, it is well documented, and she is continuing to deal with it.”

He went on to remark, “I believe the more important question is how, and what does that say about the safeguards in place.”

The reason will be revealed, he added, but once more, as I stated in court, this young woman has serious mental health issues.

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