Laura Owens, the daughter of longtime Bay Area radio host Ronn Owens, pleaded guilty to four felonies stemming from false pregnancy claims involving former "Bachelor" star Clayton Echard and another Arizona man.
Owens, 36, entered the pleas during a settlement conference in Maricopa County Superior Court in Phoenix on Friday, Aug. 28, resolving two criminal cases in which she had faced a total of 14 felony charges.
She pleaded guilty to two counts of fraudulent schemes and artifices, one count of perjury and one count of taking the identity of another, according to court records. Prosecutors agreed to dismiss the remaining 10 charges as part of the plea agreement.
Owens is scheduled to be sentenced Oct. 23.
One of the fraud counts carries no sentencing agreement, leaving the judge to decide whether Owens receives probation or prison time, according to the Arizona Republic. The other three counts call for probation.
The charges grew out of pregnancy claims Owens made against Echard in 2023 and against another Scottsdale man she briefly dated in 2021.
Owens filed a paternity case against Echard, who starred on Season 26 of ABC's "The Bachelor," claiming she was pregnant with his twins and seeking child support. Echard denied that the two had intercourse and maintained that he could not have fathered the children.
Owens later said she had suffered a miscarriage.
A Maricopa County Superior Court judge ruled in June 2024 that Owens had pursued the paternity case without good faith and cited "serial fabrications" in her testimony and court filings. The judge referred the matter to prosecutors for investigation.
The Maricopa County Attorney's Office said investigators determined that Owens altered an ultrasound image, fabricated a pregnancy video and repeatedly lied under oath between May 2023 and June 2024.
A grand jury indicted her on seven felony counts in May 2025, including fraud, forgery, perjury and tampering with physical evidence.
Six months later, prosecutors brought seven additional felony charges involving a second man Owens dated in Scottsdale in 2021.
Prosecutors said the man decided after their third date that he did not want to continue the relationship. Owens subsequently claimed she was pregnant by him, and investigators found evidence that she falsified documents to support the claim, according to the Maricopa County Attorney's Office.
The second indictment included allegations that Owens used an ultrasound image belonging to another woman as evidence of her purported pregnancy.
The guilty pleas mark a significant turn in a case that has generated widespread attention among fans of "The Bachelor" and spawned an online community that closely followed the court proceedings.
The allegations were also the subject of the 10-part iHeartPodcasts series "Love Trapped," released this year.
Owens is the daughter of Ronn Owens, who spent nearly five decades at San Francisco radio station KGO before retiring in 2021, and former KCBS reporter Jan Black, whose legal name is Elizabeth Naylor.
Her parents have recently faced separate financial scrutiny in federal bankruptcy court.
Earlier this month, a judge dismissed Ronn Owens and Naylor's Chapter 11 bankruptcy case after a U.S. Trustee investigation identified inconsistencies in their financial disclosures and examined how they spent more than $132,000 raised through a GoFundMe campaign centered on Ronn Owens' health and financial difficulties.
The bankruptcy proceeding is separate from their daughter's criminal cases.
Laura Owens previously pleaded not guilty to all 14 charges and publicly maintained that she became pregnant and later miscarried.
Her guilty pleas Friday avoid a trial that had been scheduled for later this year.
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This article originally published at Ronn Owens' daughter takes plea deal in 'Bachelor' pregnancy fraud case.