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There aren't many social media stars who have been convicted of second-degree murder, but Gypsy Rose Blanchard has amassed millions of followers seemingly overnight since she was released from a decade-long prison sentence last week.
Blanchard, 32, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in 2016, when she was 24, for her role in conspiring to kill her abusive mother Claudine “Dee Dee” Blanchard at her Missouri home in 2015 with the help of her former boyfriend had been involved at the time.
“Hello everyone, this is Gypsy. I'm finally free!” Blanchard said this in a video posted after her release on her Instagram page, which now has 6.1 million followers. “I just want to send a quick video to thank everyone for the tremendous support I have received on social media. Everyone was really, really nice and supportive. I really appreciate that.”
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Blanchard has also been promoting her upcoming book with co-authors Melissa Moore and Michele Matrisciani, titled “Released: Conversations on the Eve of Freedom,” scheduled for release Jan. 9, as well as her three-night Lifetime special “The Prison “. “Confessions of Gypsy Rose Blanchard” premieres between Friday and Sunday.
GYPSY ROSE BLANCHARD GOES ON SOCIAL MEDIA AFTER RELEASE FROM PRISON: 'FINALLY FREE'
Gypsy Rose Blanchard, 32, pleaded guilty to second-degree murder in 2016, when she was 24, for her role in conspiring to kill her abusive mother Claudine “Dee Dee” Blanchard at her Missouri home in 2015 her ex-boyfriend had been involved at the time. (Lifetime/A&E)
“After a life of silence, I can finally use my voice to tell my story and speak my truth,” Blanchard said in a statement in October announcing the show. “As a survivor of relentless child abuse, this documentary chronicles my quest for liberation and journey through self-discovery. I make no apologies and am not afraid to reveal the hidden parts of my life that have never been revealed before.”
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The 32-year-old has posted photos of herself with her new husband Ryan Anderson, whom she married in prison, and even defended him from online haters.
GYPSY ROSE BLANCHARD, WHO PLANTED THE MURDER OF HER abusive mother, is released from prison
Gypsy Rose Blanchard has millions of followers on Instagram and TikTok. (Lifetime/A&E)
“Ryan, don’t listen to the haters. I love you and you love me. We don't owe anyone anything. Our family matters. If you get likes and good comments, great, if you get hate then whatever, because YOU.” “Whatever. I love you,” she wrote in a comment on her husband’s Instagram page.
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Experts believe that Dee Dee Blanchard suffered from Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a mental illness in which Dee Dee projected false illnesses onto her daughter in order to gain attention or material items out of compassion for the victim.
Dee Dee convinced Gypsy that she was suffering from a variety of illnesses, including leukemia, and that she was years younger than her actual age.
Experts believe that Dee Dee Blanchard suffered from Munchausen syndrome by proxy, a mental illness in which Dee Dee projected false illnesses onto her daughter in order to gain attention or material items out of compassion for the victim. (Lifetime/A&E)
She also forced her daughter to sit in a wheelchair, forced her to take medication she didn't need, shaved her hair, removed her teeth and fed her through a tube in her stomach.
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The current social media star has also received tens of thousands of comments on his social media praising him for his courage and quick return to his new life.
Dee Dee convinced Gypsy that she was suffering from a variety of illnesses, including leukemia, and that she was years younger than her actual age. (Lifetime/A&E)
“She may be out of prison, but she's still in jail 24/7,” read an Instagram comment on a selfie Blanchard posted Tuesday.
Others have taken to defending Blanchard from those who call her a “murderer.”
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GYPSY ROSE BLANCHARD TELLS DR. PHIL ABOUT THE GRIM MOMENT HER MOTHER WAS MURDERED: “EVERYTHING GOT CALM”
Dee Dee forced her daughter to sit in a wheelchair, forced her to take medication she didn't need, shaved her hair, removed her teeth and fed her through a tube in her stomach. (investigative discovery)
“I'm really sick of everyone calling her a murderer when she wasn't even the one who actually killed her mother and it was just self defense,” one Instagram user wrote. “She felt like there was nothing else she could do. Her mother literally abused her, beat her and tied her to the bed just because she wanted to live a normal life as a teenager.”
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Blanchard and her ex-boyfriend Nicholas Paul Godejohn were arrested in connection with Dee Dee's fatal stabbing in 2015. The next year, Blanchard was sentenced to a decade in prison and Godejohn to life in prison.
Blanchard's case has been the subject of several documentaries and feature films. (investigative discovery)
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Greene County Prosecutor Dan Patterson said at the time: “While the evidence in this case clearly establishes that Gypsy Blanchard was guilty of murder and that the murder was neither justified nor excusable, the amended indictment and 10-year sentence keep Gypsy fair and “Blanchard was held accountable to the law, taking into account the extremely extenuating circumstances of her mother's nearly two decades of systematic and deliberate abuse of the gypsy Blanchard in order to facilitate her mother's fraudulent activities.”
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Blanchard's case has been the subject of several documentaries and feature films, including HBO's “Mommy Dead and Dearest,” Investigation Discovery's “Gypsy's Revenge,” Hulu's “The Act,” and most recently, Lifetime's “The Prison Confessions of Gypsy Rose Blanchard.”