Jen Shah on Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen - Season 17 Bravo/NBCU Photo Bank/Getty Images Logo text Jen Shah is speaking out for the first time since she was released from prison after serving time for her role in a nationwide telemarketing fraud scheme.
In a wide-ranging interview with People, the former Real Housewives of Salt Lake City star addressed a myriad of topics, including why she decided to plead guilty after maintaining her innocence, her interactions with Ghislaine Maxwell at a Texas federal prison camp and that she is “deeply remorseful and sorry for my actions.”
Arguably the most prolific legal scandal of the Real Housewives franchise, Shah was indicted in March 2021 on two charges, including conspiracy to commit wire fraud and conspiracy to commit money laundering. Her indictment noted that she “carried out a wide-ranging telemarketing scheme that defrauded hundreds of victims … many of whom were over age 55.”
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After vouching for her innocence on RHOSLC, she pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit wire fraud in July 2022 and was sentenced to 6.5 years in prison in early 2023. In her first post-release interview with People, Shah said that she “take[s] full responsibility” for her part in the fraud scheme.
“I was wrong,” she said. “I made wrong decisions. I should have done things differently. I should have been more diligent. And I’m deeply remorseful and sorry for my actions and for my part. I take full responsibility.”
Shah explained that it was a “long and a very complex journey that brought me to this point” and that she “made horrible business decisions and I disregarded huge red flags” in her business ventures.
“I allowed the lines to be blurred between personal friendships and ethical business practices. And in essence, I trusted the wrong people at a very vulnerable time in my life,” Shah said, specifically noting that she thought the companies she was working with were following through with their “fulfillments,” as she called them, when offering services to customers.
“What happened was down the line, people that I worked with were working with a lot of other people,” she said. “Once that initial fulfillment was happening, things were happening beyond the point of sale with that customer that I didn’t know about.”
The former Real Housewife also said that she and her husband, Sharrieff “Coach” Shah, were separated and navigating rocky times amid her “involvement in this conspiracy,” also alongside facing grief from the death of three close family members.
She added, “The reason I say all that is not as an excuse. Because it’s not like I was making good business decisions and then I woke up one morning and all of a sudden it’s like, ‘Oh, I made a bad business decision.’ This is the totality of everything that was going on and the overlapping of what I was dealing with personally. And I tried to avoid and numb all of that with alcohol and just avoid it.”
Shah said she “truly believed I was innocent,” but a wake-up call came when right before she was set to go to trial in July 2022, her legal team was sent a stack of evidence that would be used against her.
“It was like a train hit,” Shah said. “That was the first time I saw all of it: the communications, the interviews, the witnesses they were going to call — everything.”
The former RHOSLC star said that was the moment she “saw for the first time that there were people who were hurt,” adding, “That there were actual victims as a result of this conspiracy. I had never seen anything with my own eyes. That changed things for me.”
A change in her plea came about after she realized the harm that had been caused. “I would never want my family to be taken advantage of, or anybody that I know,” Shah said. “So, I put myself in these people’s shoes and I thought, ‘I can’t turn a blind eye to this. I have to take responsibility. No matter what my intentions were, the impact of the lack of my actions resulted where it impacted people negatively.’”
Throughout Shah’s prison sentence, her friendship with Elizabeth Holmes made headlines, even more so when Jeffrey Epstein co-conspiractor Maxwell was transferred to the Texas federal prison where they were housed.
The reality star said she had “limited interactions” with Maxwell, noting that she had “no remorse” for she and Epstein’s victims.
“I just feel like there should be a level of remorse for the victims,” Shah said. “And she made it very publicly known — at least to Elizabeth and I — that there’s no remorse there. She outrightly said it.” The former Housewife even recalled a specific time when the victims were speaking on television, and Maxwell “was just in complete disregard for them.”
“And this is when they are pouring their hearts out in front of Congress for those files to be released,” Shah said of Maxwell and Epstein’s victims. “To be so dismissive of that? That just didn’t sit with me the right way.”
Shah even shed light on the treatment of Maxwell behind bars, claiming that “she was treated very well there.” She explained, “She was afforded things that nobody else was afforded, like private workout sessions, special meals, bottled water. Everybody witnessed it, and I know that firsthand because I worked in [recreation] so I would have to clean things up. I was also asked for certain equipment because she was going to go work out late at night.”
Elsewhere, the original Salt Lake City Housewife confirmed that she and Holmes, who she referred to as Lizzie, are “good friends,” and that their high-profile status brought them closer.
“As another high-profile prisoner, there are just certain things you’re both dealing with, so you naturally come together in those instances,” Shah said. However, People points out that while the two bonded over their love for their families among other topics, they did not see eye to eye on “accountability.”
“I had to accept the mistakes that I made and take accountability,” Shah said. “Elizabeth, she’s continued to defend her innocence while she’s been there.”
“I said, ‘Who are you trying to prove this to?’” Shah recalled. “And she paused and said, ‘My kids. I want them to know that I’m innocent.’”
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