‘Unmanageable’ star marries inmate

He has now been sentenced to a different type of life imprisonment.

A Netflix star has redefined the word “shackles” after marrying a prisoner who proposed to her after just six weeks of dating her.

“I think he’s really emotionally intelligent,” Laura Gehrke, a 27-year-old real estate agent who considers her cellmate her soul mate, told the Kennedy News Service.

The new wife was referring to her husband Joshua Stewart, who is currently serving a prison sentence in Washington state, US, for murder and possession of a controlled substance.

Gehrke stars in the Netflix dating drama Too Hot Too Handle: Germany, which follows a group of determined singles who meet in paradise and must remain single for a chance to win $100,000.

While she may not have found a lover on the show, she did find love in an unlikely place — a correctional facility in Washington state.

The whirlwind romance began last Christmas when Gerke was stuck in Dubai and unable to return to Germany due to visa issues.

The lonely singleton came across a TikTok video about communicating with prisoners on social networking site writeaprisoner.com, which seems to have spawned many such lockdown love stories.

“I thought I could send one of them a message saying ‘Merry Christmas,’ ” recalled Gehrke, who said Stewart’s account was the second one she clicked on.

“I saw on his profile that he said he liked poetry, and I was intrigued,” the lovelorn girl recalled.

After messaging each other about poetry, the fledgling lovers began communicating via cellphone, often talking for up to 11 hours a day. She sometimes flew to Washington to meet with her imprisoned pen pals.

It wasn’t long before the inmate became her lover. “We really hit it off,” gushed a smitten Gehrke. “He was very open about everything from the beginning. He told me so many stories about his life.”

Although being in a relationship with a convicted murderer may seem unpleasant, the prison wife-to-be said his crimes have not changed her “opinion about him” because she knows the “backstory.”

“I didn’t ask him about his crimes right away because I didn’t want to draw conclusions about him based on that alone,” Gehrke said. “I heard a lot of stories about him growing up before I knew all the details of his incarceration. It put it all in a different perspective.”

In February, Stewart proposed to her over the phone – just six weeks after he first corresponded with his future wife.

Gehrke agreed and flew to Washington in June for a 90-minute prison ceremony.

“It was a prison wedding — another inmate was his best man,” she recalled. “We all wore white and had our own theme color. It was amazing.”

Although the couple was unable to consummate their marriage, they hope to receive approval for conjugal visits later this year.

Interestingly, Gehrke said their parents were supportive of their relationship, saying, “Obviously my mom had some questions, but she was very supportive.”

Online critics were not happy with the relationship, with many suggesting that Stewart was simply trying to “cheat” on his significant other.

“Bro just secured his financial future after retiring,” one hater said, while another added: “You definitely got all your priorities mixed up.”

A third wrote: “Once released he will disappear.”

However, Gehrke insists their relationship was not Bang-bam-Thank you ma’am.

“People just look at it with a bigoted mindset — they can’t believe we’re getting married for love,” she lamented. “They just think I’m using him, or he’s using me. They can’t believe it’s real love.”

She added: “We have a lot of supporters, but we also have a lot of haters.”

Gehrke hopes to live with her husband in the United States after he is released in December 2025.