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cover of episode 5 - Gone

5 - Gone

2021/3/2
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Mommy Doomsday

AI Deep Dive AI Chapters Transcript
People
K
Kay
无足够信息创建详细个人简介。
L
Lori
M
Melanie Boudreau
M
Melanie Gibb
N
Narrator
一位专注于电动车和能源领域的播客主持人和内容创作者。
Topics
Kay: Kay 和 Larry 在 2019 年经历了糟糕的一年,Kay 的兄弟 Charles 被杀,之后他们联系不上孙子 JJ 和 Lori,最终通过 Charles 的 Gmail 账户发现了 Lori 的地址并报警,启动了跨州调查。他们非常担心失踪的孙子和女儿。 Lori: Lori 向警方解释称 JJ 因为学校问题被送往亚利桑那州,并声称 Kay 和 Larry 想要争夺 JJ 的抚养权,坚称自己是受害者,并声称自己一直尽力照顾孩子,否认与 Chad 的关系,并对 Chad 的身份含糊其辞。她要求 Melanie 对警方撒谎,并坚称自己没有做错任何事,认为自己受到了撒旦的欺骗。 Melanie Gibb: Melanie Gibb 开始配合警方调查,并向警方坦白了 Lori 的谎言,她与 Lori 的谈话被录音,她开始怀疑 Lori 的说法,并最终相信 Lori 参与了不法行为。 Narrator: 讲述了案件的来龙去脉,包括 Charles 和 Tammy 的死亡,Lori 和 Chad 的结婚,以及警方对失踪儿童的调查。警方对 Lori 和 Chad 的行为感到困惑,认为孩子们处于危险之中,并呼吁公众提供线索。Alex Cox 的死亡给调查带来了新的挑战。 Melanie Boudreau: Melanie Boudreau 和她的丈夫 Ian 参与了案件的调查,Ian 同意佩戴窃听器秘密录音与 Melanie 的谈话,但后来告诉了 Melanie,Melanie 仍然相信 Lori 没有伤害孩子,并认为对失踪儿童的担忧被夸大了。 Kay: Kay 和 Larry 在 2019 年经历了糟糕的一年,Kay 的兄弟 Charles 被杀,之后他们联系不上孙子 JJ 和 Lori,最终通过 Charles 的 Gmail 账户发现了 Lori 的地址并报警,启动了跨州调查。他们非常担心失踪的孙子和女儿。 Lori: Lori 向警方解释称 JJ 因为学校问题被送往亚利桑那州,并声称 Kay 和 Larry 想要争夺 JJ 的抚养权,坚称自己是受害者,并声称自己一直尽力照顾孩子,否认与 Chad 的关系,并对 Chad 的身份含糊其辞。她要求 Melanie 对警方撒谎,并坚称自己没有做错任何事,认为自己受到了撒旦的欺骗。 Melanie Gibb: Melanie Gibb 开始配合警方调查,并向警方坦白了 Lori 的谎言,她与 Lori 的谈话被录音,她开始怀疑 Lori 的说法,并最终相信 Lori 参与了不法行为。 Narrator: 讲述了案件的来龙去脉,包括 Charles 和 Tammy 的死亡,Lori 和 Chad 的结婚,以及警方对失踪儿童的调查。警方对 Lori 和 Chad 的行为感到困惑,认为孩子们处于危险之中,并呼吁公众提供线索。Alex Cox 的死亡给调查带来了新的挑战。 Melanie Boudreau: Melanie Boudreau 和她的丈夫 Ian 参与了案件的调查,Ian 同意佩戴窃听器秘密录音与 Melanie 的谈话,但后来告诉了 Melanie,Melanie 仍然相信 Lori 没有伤害孩子,并认为对失踪儿童的担忧被夸大了。

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Chapters
Kay and Larry struggle to contact Lori and her children, who have mysteriously disappeared. Kay discovers Lori's new address in Charles's email, leading to a multi-state investigation.

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A project with so much potential, a unified and successful team, but then chaos, missed deadlines, no communication, and a trail of digital tumbleweeds. This wasn't just any project failure, folks. This was the case of the collapsed collaboration. But there's a way to rewrite this story. Monday.com can illuminate any project, assign tasks, track progress, and share files and updates all in one place with no mysteries. Tap the banner to go to Monday.com.

A few days before Thanksgiving 2019, we're nearing the end. And yet we're back at the beginning. It had been a hard year for Kay and Larry. No, hard doesn't even begin to cover it. It had been an awful year, a nightmare. In July, Kay's brother Charles was killed by his brother-in-law, Alex.

And then Kay and Larry started having a hard time getting a hold of their grandson, JJ, and his mother, Lori. You know, we called Lori so many times. I emailed her, texted her, left voicemails. Please, let us... Please, whatever, we want to see JJ. And it wasn't just that they weren't picking up the phone. No, worse than that. Lori and the kids had disappeared.

They'd quite obviously left Arizona, but where had they gone? No idea. Kay and Larry couldn't even jump on a plane and demand answers. Where would they start looking? Hawaii? Texas? Kay and Larry were desperate. And that's when Kay noticed something on her computer.

I didn't notice it at first, but a couple minutes, I saw the, when you have Gmail, there's a circle in the top right corner of your computer screen that shows, it showed C. And, well, I'm Kay, so I'm like, I hovered over it, and it was charles.valo.gmail.com. And I thought, oh my God. Somehow, Kay found herself on the login screen to Charles' email and

Well, what would you do? And so I clicked on it, and I was in his Gmail account. I don't know. Honestly, that's divine intervention. I truly believe that that compulsion was truly Charles speaking beyond the grave. Well, not the grave. He got cremated. But anyway. Well, it was certainly some kind of guidance, because there in her deceased brother's inbox were notes

Revelations? And I see emails from Amazon. So I clicked on one and it was an order being delivered to Rexburg, Idaho. I said, well, damn, this is their address. This is where they are. There it was. In the Gmail account of a dead man. The answer Kay had been so desperate to find. Where had Lori gone when she flew the coop in Arizona?

to a townhouse complex up in Rexburg, Idaho. And it wasn't just her address that Gmail account coughed up. The Amazon emails made it pretty obvious someone had been using Charles' account to do a little shopping. But the dead don't know can't hurt them, right? But now that Kay had what she thought must be Lori's address, she went straight to the police. Y'all go put eyes on JJ. Y'all better do it. Y'all got to do it.

And that's how Kay and Larry jump-started a multi-state investigation. What police did you call to ask to get this welfare check done? Actually, we called the state of Arizona. We called the state of Idaho. You called everybody. Yeah. You called everybody. Because what was in that Amazon package was every bit as interesting as the address it was delivered to. That order was for rings.

Simple ones, tasteful. Sterling silver with a malachite inlay. Appeared to be the very ones Laurie and Chad later wore in their wedding photos. So what was the big deal about that? After all, they were in love and Laurie was an eligible widow. Well, here was the big deal. Those rings were purchased 17 days before Chad's wife Tammy died. In her sleep.

They clearly were planning on life without Tammy. Clearly. With what I saw. No doubt. That's rather chilling. Lori was yet again a newlywed. Her husband, Chad Daybell, led the path to wedded bliss crossed through the valley of death. First Lori's husband, Charles, and then Chad's wife, Tammy,

There's so many loose ends. Lori's life, whether she knew it or not, was starting to unravel. And police were headed to her doorstep to ask, where are the kids? The long search for two missing children will lead us to a double wedding in Las Vegas, a cross-country investigation, and a newlywed wearing a wire. This story is about Lori Vallow, her missing kids,

and her great attempt at escape. You're listening to Dateline NBC's newest podcast, Mommy Doomsday. After Kay made all those calls, the cops showed up at Lori's townhome for a welfare check on her son, J.J. And who did they see? But Lori's new husband, Chad Daybell, and Lori's brother, Alex Cox. Alex told the police that Lori was out. And J.J.?

Alex said JJ was safe and sound down in Louisiana with his grandmother, Kay Woodcock. Oops. The cops said, no, that's the lady who called us up wanting to know where her grandson was. We don't know what Chad and Alex said to each other after the police left, but we do know what Chad did. He called up their pal Melanie Gibb in Arizona.

It was two days before Thanksgiving. I get this phone call out of the blue. You remember Melanie Gibb, the friend who went to a religious conference with Laurie? She was there when Laurie and Chad first met, and she had seen their spiritual evolution, had been part of it. She was one of their 144,000. Well, now Chad and Laurie were calling in a favor.

And Chad said, hey, Melanie, I just want to let you know that the Rexburg police are going to call. Don't pick up. How did he seem? Calm? No, no, nervous. And because he was nervous, that sure made me feel uncomfortable. And he said, and Lori's going to tell them that JJ's with you. And I went, JJ's not with Kay? No. And she's going to be calling you. Back in Rexburg, police returned to Lori's townhome.

At this time, they found Lori. Lori, I'm Lieutenant Bob from the police department. How are you? You got him in? Lori seemed pretty calm, all things considered. So, we're here. This is a big mess. I just talked to the guy on the phone. And what did he ask you? He was just saying that he wanted to do a wheelchair on JJ. Okay.

She said it had been a horrible year for their family. She'd had to move around a lot. Said JJ was having a hard time in school in Rexburg.

So even though they'd only been there for a couple of months, she was already planning on moving back down to Arizona. I'm going to go back to Arizona so I can put him back in the special needs school. He couldn't do the school here. It was too hard for him. He would scream and cry, take him to school. The principal would have to come out, try to drag him out of the car. Like, this is too hard. Lori said she had sent JJ down there early to stay with her pal, Melanie Gibb. Lori claimed that was why JJ wasn't in the house.

And on top of it all, since her husband Charles had passed away, his family had been horrible to her. The people who called the police, Kay and Larry, JJ's grandparents, Lori said Kay had grabbed her husband's life insurance money and now wanted her son too. This whole welfare check, it was just a play for custody, she said. But you have legal custody. He's

son i adopted him two years we had him from the time he was eight months old so two years old so she does nothing that wants to cause me trouble so i don't tell people the truth about where we are what we're doing because of those reasons so i look like a suspect but i am not a good person raised all of my kids i've done everything that i'm supposed to do in life but it's causing me trouble right now

Lori was the real victim here. What a story. See, and we hadn't heard any of that as far as... I'm just saying she's doing this as part of that. That's my understanding. And our only concern in this whole thing is the child. I got it. And so that's where we're at. And then we were just a little weirded out when, you know, and I understand now that we've heard your side of the story.

The detectives sounded like they were getting ready to leave when one of them asked about the two men police had encountered that first time they dropped by. It's awful. I feel like I'm being tracked all the time. I'm like, why are police coming to my door? They said they were out visiting with two guys.

And I assume one's your brother? Yeah. Who was the other one? The other guy they were visiting with. Who were they visiting? Well, we had two detectives over here trying to... Looking for you a little while ago. Oh, because I was at the store. And they ran into probably one of your brothers. My brother and his friend, probably. Who's that? Chad. Chad from Rounder? Chad Daybell. Alex's friend?

At that point, Lori and Chad had been married for three weeks, although you wouldn't know it from the way Lori spoke to police. It's just a mess that is constantly causing me trouble. Chad DeBelle? D-A-Y-B-E-L-L? He's an author. Doesn't he live like out in the... He's not the Chad DeBelle that... He has a wife passed away recently. Oh, my God.

Is that him? I don't know. But it is. But it sounds familiar as an author. Anyway, the detectives left and police made a phone call to Lori's friend, Melanie Gibb. They just wanted to ask her how JJ was doing in Arizona. But Melanie didn't pick up. Surprise, surprise.

That's exactly what Chad had told Melanie to do, not pick up. So the detectives turned around and knocked on Lori's door again. Told her they were having a hard time getting hold of her friend Melanie. There was an obvious reason for that, said Lori. They must be at the movies. One thing JJ really wanted to do.

Well, they were going to Frozen 2 today, so they may be at the movies. Could you get a hold of her at some point and say, can you please call back the officer that's been trying to call you? Sure. Yeah, because I think they are at the movies right now.

At the movies in Arizona with Melanie Gibb watching Frozen 2. Lori painted a pretty picture.

Then said goodbye to the cops and closed the door and called Melanie. And I asked her to lie. Lori calls shortly after and says, hey, everything's fine. They're gone. I told them, oh, I told them that JJ was with you. You guys were at Frozen. We were in a movie theater watching Frozen. Go ahead and just get your camera out and take a picture of a whole bunch of kids. I'm like, that's not going to happen. In my mind, I didn't say that loud because I was just shocked.

It's like a bomb drops on you. What do you do? You just are in shock a little bit. And there it was, the moment a great crack appeared in her high-water dam of belief. The shock, the sudden uncertainty, the great rushing flood of clarity. But not all in an instant. It was going to be painful first. It left such a bad feeling in my stomach.

And my mind was trying to process it all. And my world is just flipped upside down. I have now got to process everything about them. You know, everything, all their belief structures, everything. I start to get a feeling inside. So I'm in the middle of this tug of war. Who do I believe? What do I feel? Do I go against what's going on inside? Do I believe them? It was, I can't even begin to tell you how horrible that moment was for me. It was, no words can describe it.

And that was the beginning? Oh, yeah. The beginning of a whole different paradigm. But it changed my life forever. A whole different paradigm. And so when Melanie spoke with police, she didn't tell them they'd been at Frozen 2, didn't show any photos of a random group of kids. No. She told them that JJ was not with her. She hadn't seen him since all the way back in September. The next step was standard procedure.

The cops returned to Lori's Rexburg townhome with a search warrant. But Lori was gone. All of her personal items are gone. You know, if she was coming back, she'd have left, you know. They're one day gone the next day. It was around that time the FBI got involved. Started working with local law enforcement from Rexburg, Idaho to Gilbert, Arizona. With investigations into Charles and Tammy's deaths,

It didn't look promising for those two kids. The pressure was on to find them wherever they were. Chad and Lori's friend, Melanie Gibb, flipped. She started cooperating with the investigation. That's when you started working with the police, that period of time? I started within a short period of time. I was saying within a week after that experience. Once I knew, Keith, that...

The path that I was on was not a good one. Once I knew that for sure, I completely turned immediately. You don't walk with Satan once you know that they have been or you've been part of friends that have been. You turn. But if you believed all that time that it was the reverse of Satan, that these people were agents of light. That's the great deception now. It's a little hard to make it flip, isn't it?

Once you realize you're on the wrong team, then you flip quickly because that's one of Satan's most major tactics he'd use on humans to think that you're actually following God. That is one. I mean, look at all the wars that have gone on in the name of God. Melanie called Lori to confront her, and Melanie recorded their conversation. Lori seemed taken aback.

You're being controversial to me or if you're recording this conversation for the police or whatever intention is on this phone call. I love you with all my heart. I appreciate those words, but if you really loved me, you wouldn't have told the police that I had JJ with me. That's not what a friend does. I mean, that just makes me look weird and it's not safe for me. That doesn't look good. I mean, you had to think of my welfare if you love me.

I do, and I did exactly what I felt the Lord was instructing me to do. I appreciate you, and I will never do anything to harm you. And you can have all of this confirmed to you by the Lord. And my conscious is clear. I feel very understanding what's really going on, Lori. And I believe that you have been very deceived by Satan. I believe that he has tricked you. And I just, I don't believe what you're doing is correct. I just don't. I mean, Tammy dies.

And then your husband died. And then he's missing. It just doesn't sound like God's plan to me. It gives me a gut feeling. Like in my gut, it feels weird. It doesn't feel right. I don't have peace about it. I never have felt 100% peace about it. I always felt like a little weird in my stomach about all these things. You know me, Mel. You know me. This does not sound like you. Like you've been influenced by somebody dark who wants you to...

Believe dark things and have fear. Have fear of the celestial world. I don't have fear. You obviously do. No, I have a peace of conscience and I can see clearly. And what she could see, said Melanie, was evil. She invoked a name from the Book of Mormon, Korahor, an antichrist. I was reading the story of Korahor and it is so very similar to this, you just can't see it. But he did it because he was trying to reclaim a people.

thought at the very end because of his carnal and natural desires that's what influenced him he was very very well honey you got a lot of natural desires we all know that but you think it's me i think both of you have similarities it's in the scriptures it's in the scriptures and the scriptures are very powerful

Yes, they are. I live by the scriptures, as you know. I know, but we can rest the scriptures for our own vain glory. Do I rest the scriptures? We can. We can do that. And I feel that you have. I do not. Our belief systems. Do I rest the scriptures? Is that what you're accusing me of at this point? I feel that you have. Well, I'm sorry that you feel that way. I love you so much. I know you do.

A few weeks later, Rexburg PD put out two press releases. Said they were investigating the possible connection between Tammy Daybell's death and the two missing children. They said that Lori Vallow had completely refused to assist the investigation. Quote...

It is astonishing that rather than work with law enforcement to help us locate her own children, Lori Vallow has chosen instead to leave the state with her new husband. We publicly call on Lori Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell to do the right thing and come forward with the information they have about the location and welfare of Joshua and Tylee.

This entire investigation could have been avoided if Laurie and Chad had simply been honest with law enforcement. It was quite possibly the weirdest police statement we'd ever seen. We here at Dateline started our investigation, looking for answers to questions the whole world seemed to be asking. We drove past Charles and Laurie's old house, didn't see anything unusual. And then we drove past a cluster of townhouses where a tipster said they might be living.

Investigators tonight say these siblings, 7-year-old Joshua Vallow and 17-year-old Tylee Ryan, are in danger. Investigators are calling out the children's own mother and her new husband for refusing to cooperate with authorities. Family are worried Vallow is part of a doomsday religious group. Her husband, Daybell, has published several books on events leading up to the apocalypse.

Well, this morning, there's still no sign on the children, but the FBI is going back several months to a family trip which could hold more answers. With the search intensifying for the siblings, the FBI is asking for the public's help, requesting photos or videos of them from Yellowstone National Park dated September 8th, 2019.

Part of today's news conference was the Woodcocks wanted to announce that now there's a $20,000 reward for information leading directly to the recovery of Joshua and Tylee. Despite still not knowing where JJ or Tylee is, they still have hope and faith that the two children are still alive. As we peel back the layers of Lori and Chad's doings, we learn there was quite a tale behind those Rexburg PD press releases. Details we'd only find out about months later.

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A project with so much potential, a unified and successful team, but then chaos, missed deadlines, no communication, and a trail of digital tumbleweeds. This wasn't just any project failure, folks. This was the case of the collapsed collaboration. But there's a way to rewrite this story. Monday.com can illuminate any project, assign tasks, track progress, and share files and updates, all in one place, with no mysteries. Tap the banner to go to Monday.com.

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Two days after police went back to Lori's house in Idaho and found that Lori and Chad were missing along with Lori's kids, something rather unusual happened in Las Vegas. Weren't expecting to go there next, were you? But Las Vegas is the location of the next scene in this strange saga because that's where two couples part of Lori and Chad's in-group were getting married.

Lori's brother, Alex, was marrying another believer, a woman named Zulema. And the next day, Lori's niece, Melanie Boudreau, the other Melanie, the one whose husband had recently been shot at, was getting married to a man she met on a Mormon dating app two weeks earlier. His name, Ian Palowski.

The weddings took place at a 24-hour spot a couple of blocks from the Strip called a Chapel of Love, advertised on Google as affordable Las Vegas weddings. But that's all we have. The rest, the end of days romantic comedy of it all. You'll just have to imagine. Anyway, what was the big rush? Well, we got niece Melanie and her new husband Ian to sit down for an interview.

The story from the outside is this. Suddenly, Laurie's husband is dead. He's been either killed in a self-defense incident or murdered, one or the other. And then a little while later, Chad's wife dies very mysteriously. They're still trying to figure out why or what happened.

And two weeks later, they get married. And then Alex gets married to Zulema and you guys get married. And all at the same time, all very sudden. So what's the deal?

I think. I mean, it's just coincidence? A lot of it is. Strangely, like, Alex and Zulema dated a long time. I think almost a year. And just kind of took things slow. And, you know, Ian and I, we took things faster than any...

Any normal couple would. And, you know, Chad and Lori also, but we're all kind of doing our own thing. There's no cult. There's no planned marriages and all this that we've been accused of. We're just kind of going about our own things. And, you know, Lori is a family member to me. So, yeah, I love her and try to spend time with her, but I'm not a member of any cult. And she's not either as far as I know.

Melanie was certainly a true believer, very close to her favorite aunt, Lori, and very close to her uncle Alex, too. You'll remember that Melanie's ex-husband, Brandon, alleged that Uncle Alex had tried to kill him. There are more things involved here, too. There are allegations that it was Alex who took a shot at Brandon. Do you know that to be true?

I don't. There was a time where I was confused and feared if that did happen because Brandon was so sure with the details. It's been upsetting because he told a lot of people I had hired my uncle as a hitman. Well, part of it. That was what was put out there. Yeah, that's been one of the claims. There was a time I didn't know if he could have done that, but...

There's just, it doesn't add up to me. Well, you're involved in a very nasty divorce with Brandon. Yes, but I would never want something to happen to him. He's always going to be the father of my kids. So absolutely, it's upsetting when people are claiming that you've hired somebody to do this. Well, speaking of upsetting, out of almost anyone, it seemed likely that Melanie would have noticed that JJ and Tylee were missing.

After all of the time of the welfare check, pre-marriage to Ian, Melanie lived in Laurie's townhouse complex, lived right next door. So, of course, I asked. Did you ever see Tylee and JJ? When I moved up there, I did not see them. No, they were gone. She had their stuff there in the home, and they were never up there as far as I know.

From November, from when I first got up there, I didn't see them. Did you ask? Where are they? Yeah, I had asked Lori. You know, I wasn't close with Tylee during her teenage years. She was very independent. She graduated early from high school with her GED and was out with friends a lot. Very social and friendly.

just could hold her own. And JJ, she had hired a nanny, I believe, for a while. And I know he had to be in special school sometimes for his needs. And so if I didn't see him around and I trusted her that, you know, she's always done everything she can to protect the kids. And I wasn't at her apartment every single day. I was moving in, getting everything ready for my kiddos and, you know, dating. You had to wonder. Yeah.

I just have a lot of trust for Lori. She's always done everything to protect her kids. And if she says they're with somebody, then I just would, I just believe her. She's never, she's never lied to me before. Never lied. Ever. Completely trustworthy. Right.

The police have been very interested in the two of you. I know. The police and the FBI. Have you worked with them? We kind of got left behind. Chad and Lori kind of just took off and, "Okay, we don't know where the kids are." They came in, took my stuff, and I just cooperated the whole time. I've gone in there, nothing to hide. Hey, here's the last time I saw the kids. The cops were searching for JJ and Tylee, and Chad and Lori had fled the state.

Meanwhile, the exes had been talking. Ian's ex, Natalie. Melanie's ex, Brandon. Brandon told Natalie the whole story, the strange beliefs, the attempt on his life. Ian's ex was terrified. She called Ian, worried about putting their kids into such a strange situation. And that's how it came about.

Just a week after he slipped a wedding ring onto Melanie's finger, Ian and his ex-wife Natalie had a little conversation with Rexford PD and the FBI. And that's when the FBI made a remarkable request. They asked Ian to wear a wire to covertly record his conversations with his new wife. Even more remarkable, Ian agreed.

You made some recordings? I did. Yeah. What did they want you to record? They just, they wanted to wear abouts of Tylee and JJ, if there was anything I could get on that. And, you know, I did my best for a little bit. And, you know, there was nothing there. It wasn't being discussed. What an odd sensation it was. I in my chair, the newlyweds a few feet across from me holding hands, discussing the sanctity of marriage, among other more obvious issues.

Like Ian recording for police the secret words of the woman to whom he had pledged his life. But, he said, after just two weeks, before he got anything that would help find the kids, he flipped again and told Melanie what he'd been up to. That had to become...

You know, every marriage has its issues. That must have been one early on. Yeah, that was really hard. But I had to look at the intent behind that. How did you find out? He told me. And, you know, you're shocked. Like, why didn't you come to me? You know, I want to help. The whole point was not to come to you. Sure, sure. They wanted to know your unguarded thoughts. Yeah.

It sounded like something out of a TV show and not a very realistic one. But here they were talking about it like last night's supper, like Ian had burned the Thanksgiving turkey or something. Ian said that after he understood Melanie's side of the story, he thought the uproar over the missing kids was all just hype, fear. You know, but what I've seen, you know, in the past, you know, three and a half, four months, what I've witnessed from Melanie, from her family, is

I've got no reason to believe any of that fear or believe that there's anything that's been done to harm the kids.

I believe Chad and Lori have a reason for everything that they're doing. Are you sure this isn't magical thinking? That you just really want this to be the case? Therefore, you're going to think it is? No, I believe she's doing everything she can to protect them. I'd love to know where they're at so I could... Well, you know, the authorities, most of them think that probably they're buried in a field somewhere. You know, that she is somewhere in Yellowstone under a rock somewhere.

And the JJ is God knows where, maybe out in Idaho somewhere. I mean, this is pretty serious stuff. And they, you know, that's why they're so diligent about trying to figure it out. Yeah. And that's why I've really tried to give the authorities all the pieces that I have so they can figure out, you know, why are Chad and Lori, you know, doing what they're doing? That's right. She'd given them everything she had. She said, nothing to see here.

And she still believed in Lori. I have to wonder if she has a reason she doesn't trust authorities or the court system. The court system's kind of failed her in the past. And, you know, I... Do you realize how astonishing this sounds? I know, but... I mean, really astonishing. Sure, I understand that. But the bottom line is I don't know what I don't know. And all I do know is she's done everything to protect her kids always.

Will we see JJ and Tylee again? I absolutely believe so. I hope so. After a couple of weeks, Ian stopped making recordings for the FBI. But that didn't mean the investigation was over. In fact, law enforcement was still looking intently at Alex's involvement in Charles's death. And then... There are some football feelings you can only get with BetMGM Sportsbook. That's right. Not just the highs. The ohs.

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A project with so much potential, a unified and successful team, but then chaos, missed deadlines, no communication, and a trail of digital tumbleweeds. This wasn't just any project failure, folks. This was the case of the collapsed collaboration. But there's a way to rewrite this story. Monday.com can illuminate any project, assign tasks, track progress, and share files and updates all in one place with no mysteries. Tap the banner to go to Monday.com.

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It was the lead that went cold, stone cold. Another 911 call, but this time it was for someone in Laurie's inner circle. - I have a older male here named Alex. He just passed out here on my bathroom. - It was Zulema's son on the line. He found Alex passed out in the bathroom, dead, less than a month after his wedding day.

Remember those Chandler, Arizona detectives, Moffat and Inclon? The detectives who'd been investigating Alex for killing Charles? They were sitting in the Phoenix FBI office on a conference call with Gilbert and Rexburg police. And as they were talking... We found out through one of the Gilbert commanders that they were responding to Alex's house for basically a man down or a medical emergency.

This is a guy you'd probably wanted to talk to again, I'm assuming. We did. In fact, he just got back into town like the day or two prior, and we were definitely, one of the things that we wanted to do was follow up and contact or ask some further questions of him. What did they find out when they got to his place? They found him in, you know, a state of medical distress. I don't know the specifics. I know that he was, you know, down. He was transported from the scene and later pronounced deceased.

So where does your investigation stand? I mean, what do you do with this? Well, you know, there's a lot of moving pieces. We are still examining data. You know, we have, I can't tell you how many search warrants we've written for, you know, all sorts of different accounts and devices and that type of stuff. So we are still combing through data. What was a cop to think?

First, Alex kills Charles. Then Alex is in Rexburg when the kids disappear. And now he was dead. Yeah. I don't know why Alex died. I'm very interested to see what the toxicology reports. But you definitely go, oh, man, is there more or is there criminal wrongdoing in this also? Now the answers seem more elusive than ever.

The loyal brother who knew what happened to Charles, who must have known about the near shootings of Chad's wife and Melanie's husband, who must also have known where the kids were, was dead. And with him, a little flicker of hope died for grandparents Kay and Larry. My first thought personally was, I'm really disappointed because...

I felt like, and Kay and I talked about this, I said, we just lost probably the most important part of this story. Because he knows where what happened. He knows where all the bodies are. He knows where the bodies are. Sometimes that's a metaphor, but maybe not in this case.

Lori's friend, Melanie, told us how within a week after she realized JJ and Tylee were missing, she confronted Alex. I asked him questions that were hard. What did he say? And I said to him, do I want to know what happened to JJ? Because that little feeling inside was going, there's something kind of weird going on. He goes, you don't want to know. And I thought, whoa. And then he said, they won't be able to be found. In the final episode of Mommy Doomsday...

Chad and Lori's escape? Well, maybe not so much. Hey, Chad and Lori's Dateline. How are you? We're just wondering where you guys are headed to. You guys headed back to Idaho? You guys heading out today? No, no comment. Chad and Lori's hideout in paradise. Next time on Mommy Doomsday. There are some football feelings you can only get with BetMGM Sportsbook. That's right. Not just the highs. Woo! The ohs. Ah!

Or the no, no, no's. No! It's the feeling that comes with being taken care of every down of the football season. The feeling that comes with getting MGM rewards benefits or earning bonus bets. So, whether you're drawing up a same-game parlay in your playbook or betting the over on your favorite team...

The BetMGM app is the best place to bet on football. You only get that feeling at BetMGM, the sportsbook born in Vegas, now live across the DMV. BetMGM and GameSense remind you to play responsibly. See BetMGM.com for terms. 21 plus only, DC only, subject to eligibility requirements. Gambling problem? Call 1-800-GAMBLER.