The Rich Utah Wives and Their Scams I Part 2

Summary

Podcast Summary — Infamous: The Rich Utah Wives and Their Scams | Part 2
Hosts: Vanessa Grigoriadis, Natalie Robehmed
Date: April 16, 2026

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Episode Overview

This gripping episode explores the rise, fall, and scandalous double life of Real Housewives of Salt Lake City star Jen Shah, focusing on her “Shah Chalet” persona and the federal investigation that ultimately exposed her alleged role in a telemarketing fraud scheme. The conversation contextualizes her story within the broader culture of Mormon Utah, the unique pressures around wealth and status, and the current explosion of scandal among Utah’s high-profile influencer wives.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Breaking News: Taylor Frankie Paul Scandal (00:35–02:43)

• Vanessa opens by recapping a dramatic turn in the Utah wives universe: TikTok star Taylor Frankie Paul’s Bachelorette opportunity halted by ABC after a damaging video, likely leaked by her ex Dakota, emerges on TMZ.
  • Quote (Vanessa, 01:51):
    “Seems like that video was probably leaked by Dakota to TMZ and now there's a really nasty custody battle. It's a pretty explosive situation.”
• Vanessa hints at a persistent theme: the manipulation of stories and images in influencer culture for personal narrative control.

2. Jen Shah’s Luxury Life: The Party That Wasn’t Hers (02:43–05:43)

• Scene-setting: Listeners are transported to a lavish party at Jen Shah’s rented “Shah Chalet,” full of extravagance, yet built on illusion.
  • Jen hosts an $80,000 birthday party for friend Meredith Marks, not herself (03:16–04:39).
  • As the narrator quips, Jen doesn’t really own this luxury:
    Quote (04:49, Jen Shah):
    “Bitches, get ready to party.”
• Quick pivot: All this outward glamour is contrasted with government allegations that Jen’s lifestyle is “a fabrication… as fake as the pleasantries exchanged between these rival women” (05:07).

3. The Roots: Jen Shah’s Early Life & Cultural Outsider Status (07:20–12:32)

• The episode backtracks to Jen’s upbringing as a Polynesian and Tongan daughter in very white, very Mormon Salt Lake City.
  • Aunt Lehua recalls Jen’s struggles with racism: Quote (Lehua Vincent, 08:48):
    “She said, I scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed and it won't come off… The kids at school are calling me dirty.”
• The concept of “fahu” (eldest daughter with motherly responsibilities) explained as Jen’s formative identity (09:41, Vanessa reads from a letter by Jen’s mother).
• Mormonism’s doctrine and its complex relationship to wealth and business, including Utah’s unique MLM culture, contextualize Jen’s later pursuits.
  • Whitney Rose on church control (10:49):
    “They make it so hard to leave… I think it's all about money and power and control.”

4. Jen & Sharif: Love, Faith, and Rebellion (11:11–12:32)

• Jen’s unconventional family life: marrying Black Muslim Sharif Shah, which alienated her conservative family.
  • Sharif’s reflection (from a letter) of not being welcome in the Mormon community.
  • Jen’s eventual conversion to Islam after realizing the church’s fraught history with race: Quote (Jen Shah, 12:04):
    “I cannot sign up for a religion that didn't accept my husband and my kids. That's the point. When I was like, okay, I'm converting to Islam. As-salaam alaikum, bitches.”

5. Reality TV Casting & Persona (13:34–17:47)

• Koa Johnson, Jen’s stylist, recounts her discovery by Utah women-in-business show producers, her initial reluctance, and eventual leap into reality TV (14:01–15:54).
  • Koa:
    “She's like, but if it's about women in business, it's Utah… I'll definitely talk to them.”
• Kate Arthur (Variety editor-at-large) joins to analyze Jen’s charisma and unique place in the Salt Lake City cast:
  • “She’s very charismatic… she had many assistants, and they would be numbered when we would see them on screen.” (17:27–17:47)

6. Assembling the “Shah Squad” & Off-screen Behavior (17:47–19:13)

• Jen’s close relationship with her “assistant” Stuart Smith, who is, according to the government, more than just an assistant:
  • Stuart “knew more than Coach knew” and helped manage both personal and (eventually) fraudulent business dealings (18:21, Jen Shah).
• Offscreen, Jen’s volatile temper intensified, with reports of her yelling at staff and throwing objects.
  • Bridget Knight (alleged victim):
    “She's actually worse off screen.” (19:13)

7. The Big Mystery: Where Did Jen’s Money Come From? (19:46–21:57)

• Sizable discrepancy between Coach Shah’s income and Jen’s extravagant spending surfaces in both public speculation and on the show.
  • Jen downplays suspicions as racial bias and claims her wealth comes from “marketing,” “lead generation,” and “data monetization.” Quote (Jen Shah, 20:34):
    “We have the algorithm behind why you're getting served that ad. I own three different marketing companies…”
  • Her favorite self-description: Quote (Jen Shah, 21:14):
    “The best way to describe it is I'm the Wizard of Oz. I'm like the one behind the curtain that nobody knows exists, but I'm the one making everything happen.”
  • Vanessa underscores the irony that the Wizard of Oz is not a hero but a figure of deception and illusion (21:57).

8. The Mechanics of the Scam: Telemarketing & Lead Generation (23:28–29:44)

• The episode unpacks the details of the telemarketing industry and “lead generation”—what Jen’s companies allegedly did.
  • Bridget Knight recounts (26:48) that she was targeted for expensive, ultimately worthless, “coaching” services after her information was sold.
  • The scam process: gathering vulnerable “leads,” selling contact info, relentless up-selling, and convincing victims to buy more and more—an “abjectly awful” hard sell (29:28).
  • Prosecutors allege Jen was texting about “getting money from victims” and managing sales floors, even as she appeared on TV.

9. Concealment, Denial, and Legal Trouble (29:44–33:14)

• Despite Jen’s public denials (“I literally was not the kingpin,” 33:29), government evidence shows her giving explicit instructions for cash payments, encrypted communication (using Telegram under the alias “Becky White”), and deleting incriminating documents.
  • Vanessa: “Jen was hiding in plain sight on a show watched by millions. And now federal agents were closing in.”
• The conversation foreshadows Jen’s eventual arrest and hints at her time spent with fellow infamous inmate Elizabeth Holmes:
  Quote (Jen Shah, 33:35):
  “Lizzie and I are good friends.”

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• (03:39, Narrator on Jen’s party):
  “Inside, shirtless waiters stand guard with champagne flutes like ornamental Chippendales while the guests greet each other with air kisses and perfumed glares.”
• (12:04, Jen Shah):
  “I cannot sign up for a religion that didn't accept my husband and my kids… as salaam alaikum, bitches.”
• (17:27, Kate Arthur):
  “She’s very charismatic. She liked to throw big parties. She was one of the central focuses of season one. She has a quick temper, let's say, and could go from 0 to 60. She had many assistants, and they would be numbered…”
• (21:14, Jen Shah):
  “I'm the Wizard of Oz. I'm like the one behind the curtain that nobody knows exists, but I'm the one making everything happen.”
• (29:28, Bridget Knight):
  “How am I supposed to go up against the Giants? How am I supposed to go up against Amazon? How am I supposed to go up against Walmart? I didn't make any money.”

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Timestamps of Important Segments

• 00:35–02:43: Taylor Frankie Paul scandal and the Bachelorette fallout
• 02:43–05:43: The illusion and projection of wealth at Jen Shah’s party
• 07:20–12:32: Jen’s early life, racial outsider status, and conversion to Islam
• 13:34–17:47: Jen's introduction into Real Housewives and her unique impact
• 17:47–21:57: Assembling the “Shah Squad” and the big question of her wealth
• 23:28–29:44: The telemarketing lead generation scam explained
• 29:44–33:14: Government case, concealment tactics, and looming legal trouble

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Tone and Takeaways

The episode’s tone blends intrigue, skepticism, and a fascination for both the personal drama and broader cultural implications driving these high-profile Utah scandals. The hosts and guests dissect how influencer culture, Mormon expectations, and the manipulative spectacle of reality TV enabled both captivating television—and serious criminal activity. “Behind every infamous news story,” the hosts remind us, is a complex tangle of ambition, performance, and the ever-elusive truth.

Listeners are left questioning the nature of authenticity in a world where illusion, projection, and actual fraud all blend together.

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End of summary.

Transcript

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

What they did to your family. You're lucky to make it out alive.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

Streaming on Peacock.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

These men are going to come after me. Taking them out. It's my only chance.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

Put a bullet in her head. From the co creator of Ozark.

[Lehua Vincent]

Looks like a family was running drugs.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

Execution style killing.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

It's rare for the Keys.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

Any leads on who they might have been running for?

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

The cartel killed my family. I'm gonna kill them. All of them.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

MIA Streaming now only on Peacock

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Campside Media.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Hello, everyone. Vanessa here. I just wanted to come on for a moment to talk about the big story that's been exploding in the Utah wives universe over this past week. And that is the story of Taylor Frankie Paul. She was cast in the Bachelorette. This was supposed to be a huge star turn for her and also for the franchise itself, which hasn't had as amazing ratings as it has in the past. You could also argue that in some ways it might have been for her a way to reset her relationship with her ex boyfriend, Dakota, which was obviously hugely toxic. Getting together, breaking up. You know, she's alleging that he was the abuser and he's alleging that she was the abuser. But none of that came to pass because at the last minute, ABC put the show on pause. They had become very uncomfortable obviously with the video that was shown on TMZ of Taylor, you know, throwing a chair when her child was there.

[Taylor Frankie Paul]

Taylor, you did this.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

That's it. Your daughter is right here.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Seems like that video was probably leaked by Dakota to tmz and now there's a really nasty custody battle. It's a pretty explosive situation. I would also argue that Taylor is trying so hard to clear her name because there might be a way in which that puts her on better standing with the network to try to get them to actually air the series that she shot, which is very valuable to her and you could argue, also valuable to them. So it's an unfolding situation. We're gonna continue talking about it and monitoring it and we are going to play the episode now.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

It's a cold, crisp night in Park City, Utah as guests arrive to a birthday party in an upper crust gated community. Dressed in sequins and fur coats, their breath fogging in the chilly air, the well heeled crowd step out of their black SUVs onto a red carpet that leads into a multi million dollar mansion with five bedrooms, a game room and a spa. Built in the style of a ski lodge, all wood beams and rich brick, this is the home of Real Housewives of Salt Lake. City star Jen Shaw.

[Jen Shah]

It is very stressful throwing a Jen Shaw party, but I love doing it.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

She has dubbed this home the Shaw Chalet and even has a wall of flowers that spell out the nickname for people to pose by.

[Jen Shah]

I love surprising everyone when they come in because they think they're going to come into, like, whatever.

[Promotional Voice]

Oh, it's a cocktail party.

[Jen Shah]

No, it's the Met Gala in Park City at the Shawski Chalet.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Inside, shirtless waiters stand guard with champagne flutes like ornamental Chippendales while the guests greet each other with air kisses and perfumed glares.

[Jen Shah]

I love your jacket. Love your cane, Love your hat. Love your hair.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Love your whole everything. But their host, Jen Shaw, is nowhere to be seen.

[Whitney Rose]

Did you already say hi to Jen?

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

I haven't seen her yet.

[Koa Johnson]

Where is she?

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Jen's still getting ready. Jen is keeping everyone waiting, letting her courtiers gather so she can make a grand entrance. Her husband, Sharif Shah, a football coach at the University of Utah, whom she refers to as Coach Shaw, is nowhere to be seen. In fact, Jen makes it sound as though she's not even told her husband about the party.

[Jen Shah]

I don't need Coach Shaw stepping up in here, asking me questions, asking me how much costs.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

This party allegedly cost Jen $80,000. And it's not even Jen's birthday. She's hosting it for her friend, fellow real housewife Meredith Marks.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Yes, it's my birthday, but the reality of it is I knew this wasn't a party for me.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Eventually, more than half an hour into the event, Jen appears.

[Jen Shah]

Bitches, get ready to party.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

She struts in wearing a pink sequin mini dress, as if she owns the place, but she doesn't own it. The Shaw Chalet is a rental because this entire party, Jen's whole life, is a projection of wealth and excess. But it is a fabrication, as fake as the pleasantries exchanged between these rival women. And in fact, the government alleges that Jen's funded her luxury lifestyle. The fancy car, the designer bags, the various cosmetic procedures with money she's gotten from fraud from Sony Music Entertainment and Campside Media. This is infamous. I'm Natalie Robomed.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

And I'm Vanessa Grigoriadis.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

And this is the Rich Utah Wives and their Scams, Part two.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

So last episode, we met Jen Shaw and one of her alleged victims, Bridget Knight. She's a 64 year old special ed teacher who lives in Las Vegas, Nevada. After getting calls from telemarketers, Bridget spent about $35,000 setting up an organizing. So what was Jen's role in that, she did ultimately take a plea deal, but she has also said publicly that she did not have a lot to do with certain telemarketing schemes. But as we know, it's hard to trust rich influencer Utah Wives Just this month, everybody's been talking about the secret lives of Mormon Wives star Frankie Taylor Paul and Dakota Mortensen, her ex boyfriend, all about if she's the one who screwed up her bachelorette deal or if he's actually the one who set the tape of her to tmz. It's all so twisted, but also one of those car crashes that you just can't stop looking at because it says so much about the culture we live in and the way that stories and images can be manipulated for ulterior motives and agendas. So this week, even though Jen declined to speak with us for this series and has disputed the government's claims that she was a kingpin in these scams, we're going to dive into Jen's role in this whole scam affair, exploring what the government thinks really happened. In a world of reality tv, where smoke and mirrors extend far beyond the boundaries of a set, everybody seems to be obfuscating something, and the truth is hard to find.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

But before we get to all that, let's go back to the beginning, when Jen Shaw was just a little girl growing up in Salt Lake City, Utah, to figure out how she became the most outrageous real housewife of all. Salt Lake City, Utah, is a sprawling suburban spread nestled at the base of the Wasatch Mountains. It's best known as the capital of Utah and the capital of Mormonism. In the winter, snow often lines the sidewalks. It's a very white city in more ways than 1. About 70% of the population is white, according to the most recent census. When Jen was growing up, her family stuck out like a sore thumb. Her father was an immigrant from a Tongan island, while her mother was of Polynesian descent from Hawaii. They met at Brigham Young University, the Mormon intellectual epicenter in Provo, Utah. Interestingly enough, both of Jen's parents were raised Christian but converted to Mormonism. They had Jen Young while they were still in College in 1973. Jen spent the first five years of her life on the balmy islands of Hawaii, being raised by her grandmother and aunts and surrounded by a whole lot of people who looked like her. But when she was 5, she moved back to Utah.

[Lehua Vincent]

Jen was introduced to a level of racism.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

That's Lehua Vincent, Jen's aunt, speaking for a hulu documentary.

[Lehua Vincent]

I remember her on one afternoon coming home from school. I noticed that her skin was just bright, had a bright, bright, bright red tint to it. And she said, I scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed and it won't come off. And I said, what are you talking about? What won't come off? And she said, the kids at school are calling me dirty and I'm trying to scrub it off.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

So Jen may have felt like an outsider in this very white, very Mormon environment, but still, like a lot of her neighbors, her her parents went on to have five more children. Her dad worked as a manager at a steel company and ran his own landscaping business. With so many younger siblings, a lot fell on Jen as the eldest daughter. According to Tonga tradition, Jen was what's known as the fahu, a term for a first daughter who acts as a pseudo mother. Jen's mom explains in a letter.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

As the fahu, Jen acts as the family matriarch and oversees her siblings, nieces and nephews. Thus, Jen holds the position of being the caretaker who is responsible for the family.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Responsibility is also a core tenet of the Mormon Church, which is technically known as the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints or lds. There's a great pressure on members to abide by very strict teachings that include not drinking alcohol or doing drugs or even drinking coffee. Another interesting thing about a lot of Mormons is, is that wealth is not seen as a hindrance to faith. Now, officially, the church doesn't teach that wealth is a sign of righteousness. In fact, the Book of Mormon says explicitly, quote, the Lord counsels the Saints not to seek for worldly riches except to do good. But it does seem that Mormons love businesses, startups, and especially their MLMs. Utah has more direct selling companies per capita than any other state. Another of the show's stars, Whitney Rose, brought up the relationship between Mormonism and wealth. Here she is talking about her decision to leave the show.

[Whitney Rose]

They make it so hard to leave because if they can keep you, you'll start paying 10% of your income again. I think it's all about money and power and control.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Jen grew up steeped in Mormon culture. Then she went to the University of Utah, which had a slightly more diverse student body. She was a freshman there when she met a man named Sharif Shah.

[Jen Shah]

We first met in college.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

We had a class together. I saw her. My heart stops immediately.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Sharif was a Los Angeles native. There on a football scholarship. The pair began dating. It got serious quick. Just like her parents, Jen fell in love with her future spouse while she was still in college, and she got pregnant quickly, too. But unlike her parents, Jen was not married. And Sharif was not a Mormon. He was Muslim and black. Here's how Sharif put it in a letter. Quote, it was not a match made in heaven. My wife's parents did not like me because I played football and I was not Polynesian or Mormon, but rather an African American Muslim man from the dirty streets of Los Angeles. End quote. Nevertheless, Jen gave birth to their first child. Sharif Jr. Got married to Sharif Sr. And dropped out of college.

[Jen Shah]

Five years into my marriage, I'm like, hey, Sharif, why don't you convert to Mormonism? And he was like, are you kidding me? They didn't accept black people into the Mormon church until, like, 1970. Something. That's when I started questioning, you know what? I cannot sign up for a religion that didn't accept my husband and my kids. That's the point. When I was like, okay, I'm converting to Islam as salaam alaikum, bitches.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

But one apparent tenet of Mormonism followed her, and that was the pursuit of wealth.

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[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

By the time Jen Shaw landed on our screens, she was apparently outrageously wealthy. She'd been a working woman for a long time before she was offered an invitation to the Housewives show. Here's what her stylist, Koa Johnson, said in an interview with the Roxanne and Chantel podcast. He's talking at first about Heather Gay, the brassy blonde real housewife whose book you may have read. Bad Mormon.

[Koa Johnson]

So I used to work for Heather. She got asked to start, like, doing a pilot, and there was this production company that was really interested in doing a show about women in business here in Utah. And at this time, I was working for Beauty Lab. They were interviewing everyone that went there, and they almost kind of felt like they lost track of what they wanted to do with the show. And mind you, when a production company decides to pitch a show to the network, they go through all these interviews and stuff, and then they film a pilot. And from that pilot is when they sell it to Bravo. So they were trying to figure out something to do. Interviewed Beauty lab employees, clients, all sorts of people. Like I said, it felt like they were kind of lost as to what they were really trying to do. And on the side, I was friends with Jen, and I had ran into her out in the city, and I was like, oh, my gosh, you should come to beauty lab and come get some service done. And she's like, okay, I'll for sure come.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

So that's how Koa says Heather found out about Jen and how outrageous she was when she came into beauty Lab and laser. And it just seemed like Jen was perfect for this supposed women in business show.

[Koa Johnson]

Heather heard about Jen from the other employees and how fabulous she was, and she asked me, do you think Jen would be interested in, you know, talking to producers? And I was like, honestly, I don't think so. She doesn't even have social media. I don't think that's gonna be her thing. But I'm happy to ask. So I asked. I reached out, asked Jen. At first, she was hesitant. She's like, I don't really want anything to do with the show if it's gonna be like Housewives, which is.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Whoa.

[Koa Johnson]

She's like, but if it's about women in business, it's Utah. Like, that's. Women in business is already a minority. And then her being, you know, Tongan Hawaiian, that also adds to it. So she's like, I'll definitely talk to them.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Obviously, that chant went well because she was soon cast in the Real Housewives show. I guess she decided she was willing to do it. The show was an almost immediate hit. We talked to Kate Arthur, the exceptionally conversant in reality tv, editor at large at Variety, who watched the show from the beginning.

[Kate Arthur]

The Real Housewives of Salt Lake city premiered fall 2020. Deep lockdown Covid. And it was very different from any of the other franchises. Religion is not something that the housewives have ever really put at the forefront in this franchise.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Mormonism and religion loomed large, almost like another cast member.

[Kate Arthur]

Two of the members of the cast were in the process of leaving the Mormon church. There were a couple of Jews, one of whom had converted to being Mormon. You have Jen Shah, who had grown up in the Mormon faith, but then met her husband, Sharif Shah, and she converted. She's Muslim.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Kate says even among a very interesting cast of characters, Jen stood out.

[Kate Arthur]

She's very charismatic. She liked to throw big parties. She was one of the central focuses of season one. She has a quick temper, let's say, and could go from 0 to 60. She had many assistants, and they would be numbered when we would see them on screen.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

So usually a housewife storyline includes a family member or two. And Jen had family, but she also had her assistant number one, a man named Stuart Smith.

[Jen Shah]

Stuart was always still in my life because we were so close. So when he was like my first assistant, he truly was my first assistant in life.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Stewart was often seen and not heard, but he stood out among Jen's other majority female or gay male staff members. He seemed too old to be an assistant, for one thing, and yet Jen relied on him.

[Jen Shah]

He literally knew more than Coach knew as far as, like, you know what? You should get her this for her birthday. Or Jen likes these tampons. Not those tampons.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Here's Heather quizzing Jen about Stuart.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Is he your business partner? No, he's not. Is he your assistant?

[Jen Shah]

He's not my business partner. I mean, we're not partners in any business.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

It was Stuart and also Koa, the stylist we just heard from. They were some of the Shah squad. Koa worked closely with Jen, who very quickly made an impression on fans.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

There's that old saying that someone brought a knife to a gunfight. It seems like Jen Shaw always brought a nuclear missile to a gunfight. Like, it was always just so much more of a crazy reaction than the situation really needed.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

But according to Koa, who is actually very loyal to Jen, this behavior wasn't limited to on screen.

[Bridget Knight]

She's actually worse off screen.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

In fact, audio leaked of her yelling at Koa.

[Taylor Frankie Paul]

Okay, well, guess what? Do I blame you and say, oh, it's your fault? Hey, bravo. It's Koa's fault, huh? It's his fault? No, it's mine.

[Advertisement Voice]

She threw a chili ball at me

[Unidentified Speaker (possibly Stuart Smith or another involved party)]

and then stormed out of frame, like, walked off of the secret videotape.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Beyond Jen's erratic behavior on screen, there were other questions too. Like, where did she get her money from?

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

There seems to be a discrepancy with Jen Shah and her lifestyle and the

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

amount of money that her and Coach

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Shah could possibly be making.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

We've got what we are told is a two income family. Sharif is a highly successful coach at the University of Utah.

[Unidentified Speaker (possibly Stuart Smith or another involved party)]

As an assistant coach, he could make a nice, you know, reasonable six figure figure salary, but $50,000 a month. You don't get that from that salary.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Jen addressed the speculation on an Access Hollywood podcast.

[Jen Shah]

A lot of the ladies are like, oh my gosh, where does Jen get all her money? And I think part of it is like, here in Utah. The ladies are like, oh my gosh, how does the brown girl and the black husband have all this money? They're like, that's weird. No, it's not weird.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Jen told People instead that she made her money in marketing.

[Jen Shah]

When you're shopping online or on the Internet, we have the algorithm behind why you're getting served that ad. I own three different marketing companies and we do lead generation, data monetization.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

So it's customer acquisition, lead generation, data monetization, customer acquisition. If those words make your eyes gloss over, you're not alone. It's supposed to sound both boring and complicated, maybe to make you look the other way and not think too much about it. But the way Gen summed up what she did, that was, to me, the most telling of all.

[Jen Shah]

The best way to describe it is I'm the Wizard of Oz. I'm like the one behind the curtain that nobody knows exists, but I'm the one making everything happen.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

The wizard of Oz. You know, the delightful song that has everyone prancing down the yellow brick road to meet him?

[Taylor Frankie Paul]

You're off to see the wizard, the wonderful wizard of Oz.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

The wizard of Oz is the ruler of the Emerald City, but really, he's a character to be feared, a regular man who rules with deception and illusion. And this wasn't the only time Jens described herself as the wizard of Oz.

[Jen Shah]

The emeralds are 8.85 carats. It makes makes me feel like the wizard of Oz.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Basically, it's like she's gotten distracted by the green outfit and forgotten what the story is actually about. Because the wizard of Oz is not the hero at all. It's Toto, the little unassuming dog who pulls back the curtain that the wizard is hiding behind.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

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[Narrator/Documentary Host]

So I want to zoom out for a second and talk about what Bridget experienced last episode Telemarketing do you remember telemarketing calls? These days our smartphones flag them as spam. But there was a time not that long ago when if you were anything like me, you might have picked up that call from an unknown number. And then you'd find yourself talking to some chipper sounding person asking you to buy solar panels or life insurance or a subscription to some random magazine and quickly hanging up on them. But there's so much more to telemarketing, starting with the people on the other end of the line, the ones making those calls.

[Kate Arthur]

What we do is we call up

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

people and chisel them out of money. That's a clip from the HBO docu series Telemarketers. It's a darkly funny look at a telemarketing company founded in the early 90s called Civic Development Group, or CDG, and the drug fueled team who worked there.

[Narrator/Promotional Voice]

CDG came up with a tremendous idea. They would be the fundraising company for a lot of charitable organizations. They told me that my job would be to make calls on behalf of charitable police groups.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Hi, this is Sabrina and I'm calling on behalf of the New Jersey State Law Enforcement Officers Association. CDG was eventually shut down by the ftc, the Federal Trade Commission, which goes after businesses with unfair or deceptive practices like scams or false advertising. They discovered that CDG misled consumers by claiming to raise money for charities when only a small slice of donations actually ever went to them. Jen didn't have anything to do with CDG or with raising money for charitable groups. But that documentary did a wonderful job pulling back the curtain on the people making those calls, the ways they followed scripts and the techniques they used to close the deal. But there's a step that happens before anyone picks up the phone and that is what's known as lead generation. Remember that phrase? It's what Jen said her companies did.

[Jen Shah]

We do lead generation, data monetization. So it's customer acquisition.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Lead generation is a fancy name for finding Targets generating a lead that you can convert into a customer. In most cases, it usually means getting someone's contact information, their name, phone number, or email. And the thing is, this is happening all the time, often without you realizing it. Like if you go on a website to buy a new bra and there's a coupon for $20 off if you enter your email so you go ahead and type in your address, congratulations, you are now a lead. Your email might be sold off to companies interested in leads for other products. Women like you might buy more bras. Retinol serums, a cute matching workout set in legitimate businesses. Lead generation is all about identifying likely customers, people who might genuinely want to buy your products. In a scam, it means finding the people most likely to fall for it. People like Bridget, the Las Vegas special ed teacher and grieving widow who was wanting a new way to make money. Back in 2017, I was just minding

[Bridget Knight]

my own business and just. I received a phone call. And that phone call was life changing.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

This is what Jen Shah allegedly did. According to the government, she sold leads, meaning she sold the contact information for people like Bridget. Potential victims who had been identified as susceptible to falling for the lie that they could make a bunch of money online if they set up a website. The government alleges that Jen sold those leads to sales floors that then carried out the telemarketing scheme. Meaning Jen sold the contact information information, and then other people called up Bridget to convince her to pay $10,000 to set up a website and take coaching classes and all the rest of it. The government also alleges that later on, Jen actually owned and operated one of the sales floors that called up people like Bridget. I can just picture it. A whole call center filled with workers wearing those little headsets, sitting in front of computer screens, dialing up unsuspecting victims. In fact, if you read the sentencing memo from the government about Jen Shaw, they say they have a text from her getting mad that some of the telemarketers weren't doing a good enough job getting money from victims. And she allegedly texted her employees, I'm coming in to set appointments for these guys tomorrow. Please get my 24 karat gold headset with diamond encrusted mouthpiece ready. Poppy needs money for the weekend and a co conspirator needs baby mama money. So, yeah, the telemarketers are on the phone telling victims they could make a bunch of money by creating an online business that sold whatever they wanted, which in Bridget's case was organizational supplies.

[Bridget Knight]

My domain name was called Bridge Over Clutter.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

Remember how Bridget said she spent thousands of dollars on coaching sessions? Well, according to the government, Jen worked at two companies that sold information to floors that convinced victims to buy coaching sessions. These coaching sessions didn't have any real value. Instead, they worked to convince the victims that in order to make their businesses succeed, they needed to buy more services. The government alleges that at Jen's direction, victim information was passed to the so called tax floor, which would convince people to purchase tax prep services and business entity setup. After that, while victims were still receiving coaching sessions, they would allegedly be contacted at Jen's direction by an upsell floor which would convince the victims to purchase even more products and services like the marketing sessions Bridget bought. It just seems so cruel, so abjectly awful to be hard selling stuff to people that won't ever make them any money.

[Bridget Knight]

How am I supposed to go up against the Giants? How am I supposed to go up against Amazon? How am I supposed to go up against Walmart? I didn't make any money. I made a few dollars selling on ebay. That was it. Stuff that I already had.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

And according to the prosecution, Jen herself was also involved in defrauding Bridget. And we posed these questions to Jen, but she didn't respond when Bridget voiced concerns over her investments. In late 2017, Jen allegedly instructed her employees, including her supposed assistant, Stuart Smith, to have Bridget called by another employee to try to persuade her not to cancel. Jen wrote in a text message that one employee is, quote, having another person reach out now and I'll keep you posted. Because by the way, in case you didn't guess this already, Stuart Smith wasn't just her assistant. According to the government, they were working together closely on a telemarketing fraud. And regarding another victim, the prosecution said they had a message from Jen saying, quote, do we need to refund this lady or is she done crying and ready to move forward? Jen's legal team has noted that when Jen, quote, began to work in telemarketing and for many years, she was engaged in a legitimate business and thought she was acting in a legal manner. They claim that, quote, there is no indication that she sought out being involved in a business that is rife with fraud. And there is no reason to believe she would have sought out illegal activity if it had not presented itself to her. In addition, Jen has said she never had any communication or, or contact with victims and that she didn't even know they existed until she saw the government's discovery in 2022. So by the time she was on the Real Housewives. Jen had already been involved with two coaching fulfillment companies, Thrive Learning and Guidance Interactive. And now she was on this show, getting a lot of attention. But yet how she made money seemed opaque. We can only assume the Real Housewives producers had no idea that anything was going on that wasn't on the up and up. But as season one aired, the truth seems to be that behind the scenes, Jen's business was under fire. So what I mean is, when Jen appeared at that party I mentioned earlier in the pink sequin mini dress and yelled about Mary Cosby, another cast member who said Jen smelled like hospital, this might also have been because things were actually pretty stressful in her business. Because in November 2019, right around when season one of Real Housewives of Salt Lake City started filming, several of the people Jen sold leads to were arrested. According to the government, throughout 2020, when Jen was yelling at Whitney wearing a Versace swimsuit in a hot tub, when she was shouting at Lisa about how Mary was married to her step grandfather, all that time, Jen was allegedly still selling leads to a man who was under indictment for for fraud and money laundering. Because while she was playing the role of Loudmouth, the antagonist quickest to anger and scream, she was also allegedly discussing with Stuart Smith how they needed to conceal their shady connection from law enforcement. She had allegedly already told Stuart to make sure people paid for leads in cash, asked others she worked with to communicate with her via telegram, on which she used the fake name Becky White. She'd apparently instructed Stuart to delete the sales scripts from Google Drive and eliminate any paper trail between her and some business elements that had already come under scrutiny from the federal government. But it wasn't enough. Jen was hiding in plain sight on a show watched by millions. And now federal agents were closing in, coming up on the rich Utah wives and their scams.

[Jen Shah]

I thought I was doing the right thing for, you know, the majority of the time, and also under the direction of other people that were running the companies.

[Narrator/Documentary Host]

We're here to arrest you. It was over $40,000 total that I lost.

[Jen Shah]

I literally was not the kingpin.

[Vanessa Grigoriadis]

Shaw says she made friends with another high profile inmate, Elizabeth Holmes.

[Jen Shah]

Lizzie and I are good friends.

[Advertisement Voice]

Ghislaine Maxwell, did you have any interactions with her?

[Unidentified Speaker (possibly Stuart Smith or another involved party)]

Um,

[Whitney Rose]

Mom, can you tell me a story?

[Advertisement Voice]

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[Whitney Rose]

Was she brave?

[Advertisement Voice]

She was tired mostly. But she went to Carvana.com and found a great car at a great price. No secret treasure map required.

[Whitney Rose]

Did she have to fight a dragon?

[Advertisement Voice]

Nope. She bought it 100% online from her bed, actually.

[Whitney Rose]

Was it scary?

[Advertisement Voice]

Honey, it was as unscary as car buying could be.

[Whitney Rose]

Did the car have a sunroof?

[Advertisement Voice]

It did, actually.

[Whitney Rose]

Okay, good story.

[Advertisement Voice]

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