Sherri Shepherd is thankful she went to prison.
The talk show host recently opened up about her eight-day stint in jail during the early ’90s — a sentence she received for not paying $10,000 in moving violations — revealing the experience was one of the most pivotal of her life.
“Yeah, I went to jail for not paying my tickets," Shepherd dished in an interview. "At the time I did not think being in jail was a good moment, but looking back I learned to pay all my bills."
"Jail, that was a classroom… it was a life lesson, and now I pay my bills on time," she noted of being behind bars before her career took off.
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The people Shepherd encountered in the facility were not only fellow inmates, but became motivators who gave her the strength to move past the dark moment. “One of the girls in jail said, ‘Leave Sherri alone because she’s gonna be somebody and we are going to be here for the rest of our lives.’ Literally that’s what she used to say," The View alum recalled.
“Her name was Shelby and she came to both my weddings when I got out. But sometimes people see things in you that you don’t see yourself, and when she said those words, ‘Sherri is gonna be somebody,’ I never thought that for myself. So I just knew that something was going to happen," she explained.
And that she did! After being a popular co-host of one of the most successful morning shows of all time and having an illustrious acting career, Shepherd took the reins from Wendy Williams and secured her own talk show, Sherri, which currently airs in the former daytime diva's slot.
Despite Williams not being very supportive of her new series, the 55-year-old still gave the former disc jockey all of the credit she deserves. “Wendy is the queen… There’s something for everybody," Shepherd made clear, ensuring there are no hard feelings on her end.
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Page Sixconducted the interview with Shepherd.
