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cover of episode The Rise and Fall of Ruby Franke | August 30, 2023 | 6

The Rise and Fall of Ruby Franke | August 30, 2023 | 6

2024/6/10
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The Rise and Fall of Ruby Franke

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#politics and government#law enforcement and public safety#social issues#parenting practices and challenges People
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Paula Barros
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@Paula Barros 介绍了Ruby Franke虐童案的始末,以及案件中涉及的儿童虐待和创伤主题。她详细描述了案发经过,包括受伤男孩报警、警方调查、其他孩子被发现以及Ruby Franke和Jodi Hildebrandt被捕等关键事件。她还探讨了案件中涉及的法律程序和社会影响。 @Brian Schnee 提供了关于案发当天警方搜寻失踪儿童的详细报道,包括多个执法部门的合作以及搜寻过程中遇到的挑战。他强调了事件的复杂性和紧急性,以及警方在有限信息下进行调查的困难。 @Alice Dawes 描述了Ruby Franke最小的儿子Russell逃脱虐待的经过,以及他穿越沙漠寻求帮助的艰辛过程。她还谈到了另一个孩子Eve在接受帮助时的犹豫和恐惧,以及这反映出的虐待的严重性和对孩子心理的影响。 @Randy Kester 讲述了Kevin Franke在事件发生时对孩子们下落一无所知的情况,以及他被Ruby隐瞒真相的经历。他描述了Kevin在得知事件后所做的努力,以及他试图寻找并保护孩子们的过程。 @Jeremy Diaz 分析了检察官在处理Ruby Franke和Jodi Hildebrandt案件时所面临的挑战,以及他们如何试图确定谁更应承担责任。他解释了检察官与Ruby达成认罪协议的过程,以及这其中涉及的策略和考量。

Deep Dive

八个乘客的陨落:Ruby Franke虐童案全纪实

我,Paula Barros,将带你深入了解震惊全美的Ruby Franke虐童案。这起案件涉及儿童虐待和严重创伤,其细节令人不寒而栗。

故事始于犹他州伊文斯镇一个炎热的夏日清晨。一个911调度员接到一个令人震惊的电话:一个赤脚、受伤的男孩出现在邻居家门口,恳求帮助。他的脚踝被胶带缠绕,身上有伤口,严重营养不良。这个男孩,是Ruby Franke最小的儿子Russell。

他的逃脱,是一场惊险的逃亡。 Alice Dawes描述了Russell穿越炎热干燥的沙漠,跋涉至少半英里,最终寻求帮助的场景。这对于一个12岁的孩子来说,需要巨大的勇气。

与此同时,警方和医护人员迅速赶到现场。他们发现Russell的情况正如报警者所描述的那样糟糕。不仅如此,在屋内,他们还发现了Russell的10岁姐姐Eve。Eve也遭受了类似的虐待,但她却极度抗拒接受帮助。Alice指出,Eve的抗拒源于她母亲Ruby的洗脑,让她相信自己应该承受这些痛苦。

这起案件迅速引发了全州范围的搜捕行动。 Brian Schnee详细描述了当天警方的行动。从伊文斯镇到250英里外的Ruby家,再到American Fork一个朋友Pam Botcher家,多个执法部门通力合作,展开大规模搜捕。搜捕过程充满挑战,因为警方掌握的信息有限,需要在短时间内找到分散在全州的六个孩子。

在Ruby家中,警方扑了个空。最终,他们找到了另外两个孩子,他们正躲藏在Pam Botcher家中。Pam Botcher是Ruby和Jodi Hildebrandt共同的朋友,她对整个事件的发生也感到非常困惑。警方在现场的执法记录仪画面记录下了Pam及其丈夫Roy的震惊和不解。

Jodi Hildebrandt,Ruby的同谋,拥有一个看似坚不可摧的豪宅。 警方获得了搜查令,并在Jodi的豪宅中发现了一个被描述为“安全屋”的房间。这引发了人们的猜测:孩子们是否被囚禁在这个房间里?

8月30日,Ruby Franke和Jodi Hildebrandt被捕,并被指控犯有六项加重儿童虐待罪。 他们的逮捕并没有立即引起广泛关注,直到第二天,信息才逐渐被公开。

Ruby Franke的认罪,揭开了更多令人震惊的细节。 Jeremy Diaz分析了检察官的策略。他们与Ruby达成认罪协议,让她以换取对Jodi Hildebrandt的证词。Ruby承认自己参与了对Russell和Eve的虐待,包括踢打、溺水、捆绑以及长期剥夺食物和水。

Ruby的认罪协议中详细描述了Russell和Eve遭受的虐待:长时间被迫进行繁重的体力劳动,在酷暑下暴晒,导致严重的身体和精神创伤。

Jodi Hildebrandt则拒不认罪,她的行为更加令人费解。 她的态度激怒了很多人,也让案件的走向更加扑朔迷离。

Kevin Franke,Ruby的丈夫,在事件发生时对孩子们的下落一无所知。 Randy Kester讲述了Kevin被Ruby隐瞒真相,以及他在得知真相后所做的努力。他试图寻找并保护孩子们,但却为时已晚。

这起案件不仅揭露了令人发指的虐待行为,也引发了人们对家庭暴力、儿童保护以及社会责任的深刻反思。 案件的后续发展,以及Jodi Hildebrandt的审判,仍将持续牵动着人们的心。 这起案件的复杂性,以及其中涉及的多个家庭和个人,都使得真相的还原变得异常艰难。但无论如何,这起案件都为我们敲响了警钟,提醒我们关注儿童的福祉,并积极预防和打击儿童虐待。

Key Insights

Why did Russell Franke seek help from a neighbor on August 30, 2023?

Russell Franke, severely malnourished and bound with duct tape, escaped from his abusive home in Ivins, Utah, and sought help from a neighbor. He had trekked over hot red sand and made his way to the neighbor's house, where he rang the doorbell and asked the neighbor to call the police.

Why did the 911 dispatcher send police and paramedics to the neighbor's house?

The 911 dispatcher sent police and paramedics to the neighbor's house after receiving a call from a man who found a barefoot and injured young boy, Russell Franke, at his door. The boy had duct tape around his ankles and wrists and was severely malnourished, indicating severe abuse.

Why was Eve, Russell's sister, hesitant to go to the hospital?

Eve, Russell's 10-year-old sister, was hesitant to go to the hospital because she had been brainwashed by her mother, Ruby Franke, and Jodi Hildebrandt to believe that she deserved the abuse and that seeking help from strangers would lead to further punishment. This made her extremely scared and resistant to medical help.

Why did law enforcement need a warrant to search Jodi Hildebrandt's home?

Law enforcement needed a warrant to search Jodi Hildebrandt's home because it was a large, palatial property that resembled an impenetrable fortress. The high stakes and urgency of the situation led a judge to approve the warrant in under five minutes, allowing officers to begin their search for evidence of child abuse.

Why were the remaining children found in American Fork?

The remaining children were found in American Fork because Ruby Franke had called her friend, Pam Botcher, and asked her to take care of the children while she dealt with a family emergency. Pam, who was confused and unaware of the severity of the situation, agreed and took the children to her home.

Why did Kevin Franke drive 250 miles to southern Utah?

Kevin Franke, the children's father, drove 250 miles to southern Utah after receiving an urgent message from Ruby Franke about a family emergency. He was in a state of panic and wanted to find and take his children to safety, but upon arrival, he was prevented from doing so as the situation had become an active investigation.

Why did Ruby Franke plead guilty to four counts of aggravated child abuse?

Ruby Franke pleaded guilty to four counts of aggravated child abuse as part of a plea deal. She agreed to testify against Jodi Hildebrandt in exchange for the state dismissing two other counts of child abuse and the prosecutor's office remaining neutral regarding future hearings before the Utah Board of Pardons.

Why did Jodi Hildebrandt's behavior in court raise questions?

Jodi Hildebrandt's behavior in court raised questions because she appeared stoic and almost lost, possibly not fully understanding the gravity of her actions. Her lack of remorse and her continued resistance to admitting fault suggested that she was trying to mitigate her punishment, which puzzled many observers.

Shownotes Transcript

Translations:
中文

This is a Law and Crime Network presentation. This podcast explores themes of child abuse and trauma. Please listen with care. He's got wounds. He's got duct tape on his ankles. It doesn't say his weight, but we know that he is severely malnourished.

So really, this is an army of law enforcement this day trying to figure out not only what happened to these children and Ivins, but are the two other children in northern Utah safe? Police department! Is there a reason you're so scared right now? It's us? Okay. My intention is not to scare you. Are you okay? Or is there something that I can do to make you not feel as scared right now? Or would you rather not talk?

And from that point on, everything just spiraled into a very, very deeply rooted situation that really involves a number of court cases all in one surrounding the entire eight passenger saga. I'm Paula Barros, and this is the rise and fall of Ruby Frankie, presented by Law & Crime. It's a hot late summer morning in Ivins, Utah, when a Washington County 911 dispatcher receives an alarming call.

A man in the quiet community of Kayenta has just answered a knock on his door to find a barefoot and injured young boy begging for help. His ankles are taped up, and he won't tell us why. He has duct tape around each ankle. Yeah, there's sores around them. And he has them around his wrists as well. Okay, this boy has been... This kid has obviously been...

The dispatcher immediately sends for police and paramedics to respond to the scene.

She keeps the man on the line, gathering more information over the course of the 10-minute call. He said he just left through the porch at the neighbor's house. Her name is Jody Hildebrand, and she lives two doors up the street. So he walked just under the block to get to our house. He rang my doorbell and asked me to call the police. Ruby Frankie is his mom's name.

KUTV's Brian Schnee recalls the details of the call vividly. Initially, the neighbor asks the child, where did you come from and how did you get out of the house? And he tells the dispatcher he left through the porch. So he goes to a home that is a stone's throw away from Jodi Hildebrand's house and calls for help. And what happened from there is this neighbor, who has not wanted to talk about this since to anybody,

Has this boy who comes up to their front door. He notices this boy is emaciated, clearly has wrists that were bound, as he described, and ankles that were bound. There were wounds there. The neighbor starts to get really emotional at points during this conversation he's having with the boy and also the 911 dispatcher as she asks him questions.

So she is asking him questions. He relays the question to the child that comes to his door. And it's kind of like he's the relay, almost the lifeline in this instance for what this little boy has gone through. And you can feel and hear the pain and agony in describing to the dispatcher what this little boy looks like. And it doesn't sound good. It sounds like something out of a horror movie, right? Right.

Russell Franke, Ruby's youngest son, had finally broken free. It was a tremendous act of courage for anyone, but especially for a child.

Eight Passengers follower Alice Dawes paints a picture of his escape route. He had trekked over hot red sand that there are tumbleweeds. We're talking we're in the desert of southern Utah here. So it's hot. It's very, very dry. There's no tree cover. We're talking scrubby plants that he had made the track. It's at least half a mile. I'm not sure if that's correct, but let's surmise that it's a long way for a 12-year-old boy.

Once Russell's cry for help was heard, unbeknownst to him, Jody Hildebrandt and his mother Ruby were now under their biggest spotlight yet. So the 911 call was pretty damning right away. That was something that people that listened to it, I think, immediately felt for this little boy and what was going on. And at that point, we didn't really know a whole lot, right? Like, this is the initial stages of how the Ruby Frankie Jody Hildebrandt child abuse case really got unfolding.

The Santa Clara Ivins police were en route to the neighbor's house to respond to Russell's plea for help.

And they arrived to find him exactly as described by the man who called it in. He's got wounds. He's got duct tape on his ankles. We find out from the welfare report later that cayenne pepper and honey had been used to dress wounds and then duct tape put over those wounds. It doesn't say his weight, but we know that he is severely malnourished.

Inside the house, officers found 10-year-old Eve. She showed signs of similar torture and abuse, but unlike Russell, was hesitant to cooperate. We find out later that his sister, who turns 10 the next day, fought for four hours with paramedics and welfare staff before she would consent to going to the hospital.

Alice believes Eve's apprehension was further confirmation that she was being severely abused. She was a bit of a spitfire. She didn't always toe the party line. And so to see this child who had that, you know, that streak in her, see that streak still kind of alive and well, but fighting the people that wanted to help her was heartbreaking.

It appeared that Eve had been made to believe by her own mother that she had done something to deserve this heinous treatment.

She literally and figuratively had beaten her down, but also I think brainwashed her so much to believe that she was responsible for her own injuries and it was her fault that these things were happening to her, which happens in the case of abuse. We know that particularly when it's children who are being abused in whatever kind of capacity, they will internalise those things and believe, well, if this is happening to me, then it must be my fault.

But the fact that she was so against any medical help or intervention shows just how scared she was of Ruby, how scared she was of Jodie coming back to find that, you know, she had spoken to anyone outside of the house, that she had accepted help from strangers. Eve finally agreed to join her brother and the two were taken to the hospital for medical treatment.

Thank you.

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Go to audible.com slash imagine and discover all the year's best waiting for you. Meanwhile, the police still needed to search the rest of Jodi's palatial 10,000 square foot home. Calling it a home almost feels like an understatement. At first glance, it resembles an impenetrable fortress. There's nothing cozy about this place.

If you're familiar with this story, you may remember there's something unmistakably stark about the property. Dr. Kirk Honda, host of the Psychology in Seattle YouTube channel, describes how he interpreted the place when he first saw it. It just looks like some kind of evil villain compound. If you were to make a movie, a fictional depiction of a Marvel villain that was like anti-children,

If the Santa Clara Ivins police wanted to look further, they needed a warrant. And due to the high stakes nature of the situation, a judge approved the warrant in under five minutes. The officers immediately began to poke around. So they're combing that home. They located a room that they described as a safe room. Keep in mind, a lot of large homes are

these days do have a safe room for the whatever or the inevitable, right? So was that the room these children were held in? That is what we were led to believe initially. But you can also argue that that is where somebody goes if somebody enters their home or they need to be safe for a moment's notice. A lot of these large-scale, almost mansion-style homes have those. But they describe what it was like kind of walking through that home. They found the safe room, and that immediately to people went, oh, my goodness,

Were these children held in the safe room? Recovering Ruby's youngest children and searching for clues in Jodi's house was just the tip of the iceberg on August 30th, 2023. What happened in Ivan's set off a frenzy, really statewide, to figure out where are the other children?

So the law enforcement in St. George wanted to find out where the remaining children were, at least the two others of the six passengers, right? So we had two passengers using the lingo that were in Jody Hildebrand's home, two who are adults and then two outstanding. So where are the two other minor children or at least under the age of 18? So in this moment, on this day, on August 30th, the law enforcement that were handling the initial stages of this investigation wanted to find out where are those two other children.

Their next stop is Ruby's house, 250 miles away. Officers from a number of agencies in Utah County, Springville Police, Utah County Major Crimes Task Force. So when officers get to the house, they try to obviously knock on the door, and then they kick the door down. They basically blow right through the door and they clear the house. Police Department!

Not only did they not get an answer on the door, they look through the home, they clear the home, nobody's there. So then they're looking to find out where are those two other children. Turns out they were in American Fork at a common friend's home of both Ruby Frankie and Jodi Hildebrandt. Around noon or so, we start to hear that Ruby Frankie called her friend, who is Jodi's longtime friend, Pam Botcher. Pam Botcher is the third member of Connections Classroom.

There's one other sibling that we're still looking for, considered still as dangerous, and DCFS has a warrant to take them both into custody. Seen picking up on the Springville Rec Center around 1:15 today, and that's how we kind of figured that out and had you guys go out there.

With this new information, Springville police quickly pivot to Pam's house in American Fork, about 20 minutes north. I'm Officer Hawkins, sir. I'm looking for Pam. Body cam footage shows a man in a white shirt and red shorts at the front door. It's Pam's husband, Roy. Is Pam in today? Yeah, that's my wife. Is your wife, she's here? Hello, Pam, how are you doing? Hey.

Pam then appears on the body cam footage too, approaching the officer in a yellow and white tie-dye t-shirt, her hair in a ponytail, with her phone tightly gripped in her hand. You have a warrant? Yeah, we do. Will you just tell them you're alright? Roy turns his head, addressing someone out of frame. Well, we have to physically see her s***.

So when they reach the front door and they ask to speak with Pam Botcher, both her and her husband are stumped. They don't understand what is going on. I'll go ahead and get the copy of the warrant for you, okay? They have a warrant for my house? Specifically for you. Yeah, for you and the child. Yeah.

A young girl approaches the doorway between Pam and Roy. Presumably, she's one of Ruby's outstanding daughters. They ask Pam to come with them. They do place her into custody in a detainment form by actually putting cuffs on her and putting her in one of the patrol cars. They talk to Pam about what she knows about Ruby, what the two girls were doing there, how she had the two girls initially.

Pam is filmed from the backseat of a police car. She's strapped in and handcuffed, responding to questioning. It's important to note here just how bewildered Pam looks in these moments.

Is Ruby Frankie's daughter. She's a friend of ours. She comes over and helps me every once in a while to do cleaning and stuff. I didn't make her scrub the floor and they vacuumed and stuff because I have company coming tonight out of Costa Rica. But she did it of her own free will. We had lunch. Pam says about five to 10 to 20 times in this conversation of the body camera, they were just doing some cleaning for me. We ate some ice cream. That's all it is. But the officers need more clarity.

At this point, Pam is out of handcuffs, leaning against the police car door. The officer questioning her is taking down notes on a clipboard. So just to make sure I'm understanding all this quickly, Ruby contacted you around noon? She said she had a family emergency. She said, would you mind watching the girls while I'm gone? Because she was leaving. I said, yeah, I could do that because I need some help cleaning. I just went to the pool and said, hey, they have a family emergency. Can I pick up ***?

I said, sure. Your mom said you could come help me clean today. She said, okay. Okay. And what else? Ruby just told me she'd be out there.

Brian Schnee confirmed this is when the details start to get a little murky for everyone. She instructed Pam to go find them and pick them up and take them to her home without much detail. At least that's outlined by Pam from that body camera interaction with American Fork Police, who are also very confused about this situation. Keep in mind, they're getting like second or third hand instructions.

Go find these children. And they were having the hardest time putting all this together. And I can't blame them for that because there's like three different families we're talking about. The whole scene appears undeniably confusing and bizarre for all parties involved. Brian shares his insights from reporting that day.

So in Pam's defense, she was extremely confused because I don't think the officer had all the facts because they were getting this from another agency. And then finally things started coming together. As we sit here and talk today, Pam has not been charged with anything. Though Pam has not been charged in connection with the events of August 30th, 2023, she was certainly a central figure in both connections and the recovery of Ruby's other children, who like their sister Eve, were also

were also very suspicious of the authorities. When officers are finally able to approach one of the girls, Assistant Attorney Jeremy Diaz remembers Pam's husband Roy stepped into protection mode.

When police do end up finding the children at Pam's house and they sit down and they talk to Pam, it's not just a conversation that they have with Pam in the police car. They talk to Pam's husband, who is very standoffish and really quite obstinate in a way. Roy's arms are crossed against his chest. Ruby's daughter, whose face is still blurred out, is cowering behind him.

She can stay right here on the porch so you can see her. So I can see her? Uh-huh, absolutely. What are you afraid of, sir? I'm, I'm, I don't know what's going on. So that's where I'm going to break you on. I'm telling you, I'm answering your question. Okay.

Number one, I don't know what's going on. Number two, I don't want Springville to drive up and you guys whisk her away. Number three, her mom isn't here right now. And I feel like I'm kind of trying to protect her from getting into a bad situation.

When officers finally get to speak with the teenager seated at a rocking chair on Pam and Roy's front porch, she's timid and seems scared. Do you need medical attention at all? She doesn't respond. The officer continues to make an effort to get through to her. Is there a reason you're so scared right now? It's us. Okay. My intention is not to scare you. Are you okay? Or is there something that I can do to make you not feel as scared right now?

Or would you rather not talk? The children don't really want to engage with police. They're standoffish. But eventually, the girls complied.

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If you're having trouble putting the pieces together from this whirlwind day, you're not alone. Law enforcement were working off of limited and evolving details too, searching for six kids spread across an entire state. It was a lot of ground to cover with very little to go off of.

To bring you up to speed at this point in the story, Brian, who reported on the search in Utah that day, breaks down the order of events from Ivan's to American Fork. But ultimately, the two children found in Ivan's and Jody Hildebrandt's home were first. Then two other children that were Ruby Frankie's other two children were found in American Fork that day. And then Chad and Sherry on their own as adults later.

It's a village. So you have Santa Clara Ivins. You likely have a Washington County task force. I'm sure that comes in that features people from all over the county. Then they call up to Utah County, which is not close. The state of Utah is massive. And this spans two very far points from each other. So they call up north, if we were to use that as just a geographical reference, to not only Springville police, but then American Fork police. And then the Utah County Major Crimes Task Force gets involved.

They were on a time-sensitive and a potentially life-saving mission. So really, this is an army of law enforcement this day trying to figure out not only what happened to these children and Ivins, but are the two other children in northern Utah safe?

Well, they were taken away out of the, I guess, fluidity of the situation, right? What do you know about what's been going on? I'm sure they were asked questions and they wanted to make sure they were in good care. Wouldn't you, right? After you found that your two siblings were found four hours south of you, roughly, and are in rough shape.

And these two didn't appear to be in any sort of harm's way in that moment or maybe even showed physical signs of anything in terms of not eating or wounds that you could see. They seemed to be just fine going about their daily life. One of them was at work. The other one was elsewhere. So they were not in captivity like these two other children appeared to be in that moment. The four minors were finally taken into state custody by day's end, only to face another uphill battle.

Where would the Department of Child and Family Services place the four of them? From this situation forward, it just got really messy, right? There's a child welfare portion of this case in terms of who lives with who and where is this going in terms of the well-being and the future of not only these children, but two other children that are under the age of 18. And where was their dad, Kevin, in all of this? And I know throughout the course of this, a lot of people have asked, well, what about Kevin? What about Kevin?

Kevin's attorney, Randy Kester, says at this point, Kevin wasn't aware of the whereabouts of his children at all. As we reported in previous episodes, Ruby had kept those details from him in their separation. He was shocked, devastated, hurt, felt deceived, didn't know any of that was going on. He hadn't seen his kids for 12 months or more.

and didn't know that they were even in Ivins in southern Utah. He didn't even know that they'd been taken down there. Or he probably would have objected strongly, but she didn't tell him. And apparently took the kids down there even as early as June, and he knew nothing about it. Then, like Pam, Kevin was contacted by Ruby on that fateful August day.

I think it was a text, may have been a phone call, and he responded and said, "I'm at work. I need to get back to you." And she essentially said, "This is an emergency. I need you to come get the kids."

So he, of course, tore down there, not knowing any of the details of all this that was going on until he got there. In a state of panic about his children, Kevin traversed the state of Utah looking for them. He actually went there to get his kids when he found out about this. He drove all the way to southern Utah, which is 250 miles, and met with law enforcement and gave statements and evidence.

made an effort to try to get his kids out of that mess. But Kevin was too late. It wouldn't be as simple as just picking up the kids and taking them home. This was now an active investigation. Two of the children, as everyone knows, had already been taken to the hospital. So yeah, he was prevented from taking his kids home.

With so many questions left unanswered by law enforcement at the time, it's possible that Kevin could have been considered a person of interest. I don't think at that point anyone knew that Kevin wasn't involved in the physical abuse of these kids. And so just out of an abundance of caution, it's my impression that while they did their investigation, they weren't letting anyone have contact with the kids.

Kevin had made contact with the police, but I bet you're wondering, where are Jodi and Ruby in all of this? Given the sensationalism of the search for the children, you'd think their arrest would have garnered similar fanfare. But the exact details are limited. And the story began to come out bit by bit about what had actually happened.

Substantial information didn't begin to trickle out to the public until the following morning. August 31st, 2023 is when I first heard about Ruby Franke. That is when the Santa Clara Ivins Police Department or Public Safety Department there, two small towns come together. A lot of people got the dates wrong because they waited till the following day to put out the information. Where we learned August 30th is when Jodi Hildebrandt and Ruby Franke were taken into custody.

At 9.33 p.m. on the 30th, Ruby and Jodi were arrested, taken into custody, and charged with six counts of aggravated child abuse. They were ordered to be held without bail in the Washington County Jail. Kevin Franke has not been charged in connection with this case. ♪

And from that point on, everything just spiraled into a very, very deeply rooted situation that really involves a number of court cases all in one surrounding the entire eight passenger saga. When the news broke, Ruby's eldest daughter, Sherry, took to Instagram, posting a photograph of police outside the family home. The caption read, Finally. And this was just the beginning of a social media firestorm.

and really gained the interest from people around the world about how this could take place and how these two lives between Ruby Franke and Jodi Hildebrandt came together and just how messy it gets. And I think the rest of the world couldn't believe it either because this is something that happens in a movie, right? This is something that is the worst of the worst.

Whether people were clued into Ruby Frankie and Jodi Hildebrandt's operation prior to their arrest or not, they certainly were now. Armchair detectives began scouring the internet to compile evidence of past transgressions and signs of suspicious behavior. In a twisted turn of events, the two women were more popular than they'd ever been.

Internet chatter on YouTube and Reddit continued. But after the arrest of Ruby and Jodi, mainstream media attention on the case slowed down.

That is, until December 2023. I got a note from Ruby's attorney about a week or so before the waiver hearing that is waiving the right to a preliminary hearing. In many cases, it means no trial, you can enter your plea agreement. Ruby Franke's statement from her attorneys on that Friday before the hearing said, "Initially, Ms. Franke believed that Jodi Hildebrand had the insight to offer a path to continual improvement.

Ms. Hildebrand took advantage of this quest and twisted it into something heinous. Ms. Hildebrand systematically isolated Ms. Frankie from her extended family, older children, her husband Kevin Frankie. They also took the liberty to use most of that statement by pointing the finger at Jodi Hildebrand.

Assistant Attorney Jeremy Diaz says in his experience, this approach from both the prosecutors and Ruby's legal team isn't uncommon. So as a general matter, when you're talking about people with their co-defendants, in this case, you have two co-defendants. The prosecutors are oftentimes going to look at the evidence and they're going to try to see if they can zero in on somebody who they think is more culpable than the other.

In this case, I think with what they had, it's pretty clear that the therapist here, the one who's providing the counsel, again, kind of the puppet master, if you will, is more culpable. And the prosecutor's office, I think, zeroed in on that pretty quickly. And so with that, they approach Ruby and her attorney and say, hey, this is what we're thinking by way of an offer. In order to get this offer, you've got to come in and you've got to tell us everything that you know about Jodi.

and how Jody impacted you. Generally speaking, there's going to be some sort of debrief agreement where they're offered what is oftentimes, at least in Utah, called a clean for the day agreement. It's this basically a contract where you can sit down and you can talk to a detective, an investigator, and you can feel free to just kind of spill the beans, if you will, without any sort of

recourse of it being used against you at trial. I mean, there are some exceptions related to that. I imagine that that sort of a debrief agreement was very much a part of this because before a prosecutor will generally make an offer where you agree to testify, they want to have an idea of what you have to say. What kind of evidence would you provide at trial in order to get the offer extended?

Ruby entered a plea deal, agreeing to testify against Jody. Taking the deal meant the case would not go to trial. Ms. Frankie, how do you plead to count one aggravated child abuse, a second degree felony? Guilty. To count three aggravated child abuse, a second degree felony? Guilty. To count five aggravated child abuse, a second degree felony? Guilty. And to count six aggravated child abuse, a second degree felony?

with my deepest regret and sorrow for my family and my children. Guilty. Standing up in the courtroom in a gray and white prisoner's uniform and her hands in cuffs, Ruby pleads guilty. This morning, Ruby Franklin pleaded guilty to four counts of aggravated child abuse. The state agreed to dismiss the two other counts of child abuse. And she agrees to testify truthfully against Jodi Hildebrandt and in return, the Washington County Attorney's Office agrees to remain neutral regarding future hearings before the Utah Board of Pardons.

Ruby's plea agreement opened up yet another can of worms. The plea details the abuse Russell and Eve endured in Jodi's home.

When you go through and you look at the injuries associated with Russell, Ruby had boots on and was involved in kicking him while he was on the ground. She admits to holding his head underwater. Obviously, incredibly, incredibly concerning situation.

the tying up and the malnourishment. They talk about how the two children were forced to do physical tasks for hours, even days at a time, like carrying boxes of full books up and down stairs, working outside in the desert climate. They were denied water. They were doing so without shoes.

And in the summer heat, they were out in the direct sunlight for several days. They were blistering. But there was also part of the abuse about the isolation from other people. They were basically shunned, therefore leading to both of them having severe emotional harm. While Ruby may have spared herself and her family embarrassment from a public trial, outrage was growing online as more information emerged about the treatment of her youngest children. Questions still lingered.

What will Jody do? And would either woman serve any time? I don't understand why Jody's fighting back the way that she is. I don't understand why she doesn't just say, God, you know what? I played a part in this and I'm so sorry. I was wrong. Jody Hildebrandt comes into the courtroom. A very stoic Jody, almost looked kind of lost, not really understanding what was really going

in that moment in terms of what have I done, but maybe I have done nothing wrong almost by the look of her face. I think that that's when she realized that there was no way that she would get out of this without an extremely long jail sentence. What's happened now is she's pushed into a corner. She's going to say and do whatever she can to try to make it better for her. That's all coming up on The Rise and Fall of Ruby Franke.

This has been a Law & Crime production. I'm your host, Paula Barrows. Our executive producer is Jessica Lowther. Our producer and writer is Cooper Maul. Our editor is Brad Mabee. Our bookers are Alyssa Fisher and Diane Kay. And special thanks to Sean Panzera for designing our key art.

We're sunsetting PodQuest on 2025-07-28. Thank you for your support!

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