BOISE, Idaho– Chad Daybell, a self-published doomsday fiction author, is on trial in Idaho for the deaths of his wife and his new girlfriend’s two children. It’s a complex triple murder trial that investigators say involves unusual claims that the victims were possessed by evil spirits — and more typical claims involving life insurance and Social Security benefits.
The children’s mother, Lori Vallow Daybell, has already been sentenced to life in prison. But Chad Daybell has pleaded not guilty to murder, conspiracy and insurance fraud in the deaths of his late wife, Tammy Daybell, as well as children, Joshua “JJ” Vallow and Tylee Ryan. The process is expected to take more than two months.
Here are some of the people involved in the case.
Chad Daybell, 55, was a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and self-published fiction loosely based on its teachings. He married Tammy Daybell in 1990. They had five children and a house in rural southeastern Idaho.
Prosecutors say he met Vallow Daybell at a conference in Utah in 2018. They became a couple and insisted they were married in a past life, police said. They led a group of friends in their efforts to exorcise evil spirits by praying and doing what they called “energy work,” prosecutors said.
In some cases, they claimed, a person could become a “zombie,” and the only way to banish a zombie was to kill the person, friends said. A friend told police she heard Vallow Daybell calling the children zombies before they disappeared.
In October 2019, Daybell reportedly told authorities that his wife was battling a respiratory infection and died in her sleep. The death was initially attributed to natural causes, but authorities became suspicious when Chad Daybell married Lori Vallow Daybell just two weeks later.
Tammy Daybell’s body was exhumed and an autopsy revealed that she died of asphyxiation.
Lori Vallow Daybell, 50, is a beautician by profession, mother of three and married five times. She was convicted last year of murder, conspiracy and grand theft and has been sentenced to life in prison without parole. She also faces charges in Arizona in connection with the 2019 death of her fourth husband.
Vallow Daybell’s first marriage, to a high school sweetheart when she was 19, ended quickly. She married again in her early twenties and had a son. In 2001, Vallow Daybell married again, this time to a man named Joseph Ryan. The couple had a daughter named Tylee in 2002, but divorced a few years later. Ryan later died at his home of a suspected heart attack.
After her father’s death, Tylee received a survivor benefit, which Vallow Daybell collected herself after Tylee disappeared in 2019.
During her sentencing, Vallow Daybell made a lengthy statement saying that “accidental deaths happen.” She claimed that the spirits of the three victims visited her regularly and were all happy in the ‘spirit world’.
In the summer of 2019, after her fourth husband was shot and killed by her brother, Vallow Daybell moved with her two youngest children to southeastern Idaho where she could be closer to Chad Daybell. In September, the children disappeared and Chad and Tammy Daybell filed to increase Tammy Daybell’s life insurance benefits, prosecutors said.
Tammy Daybell died the following month.
The children’s bodies were found the following year, buried in Chad Daybell’s yard.
Charles Vallow, a member of the LDS Church, entered the picture several months after Vallow Daybell and Joseph Ryan divorced. Vallow Daybell joined the LDS Church and the two married in 2006. They later adopted Joshua Jaxon “JJ” Vallow.
By 2019, the marriage had soured. Charles Vallow filed for divorce, claiming in court documents that Vallow Daybell believed she was a deity tasked with helping to usher in the Biblical apocalypse.
The two were estranged but still married when Vallow Daybell’s brother, Alex Cox, shot and killed Charles Vallow outside his home in suburban Phoenix.
Cox told police the shooting was in self-defense and that no charges were ever filed in the case. Shortly after Charles’ death, Vallow Daybell moved to eastern Idaho with her brother and two children.
Both Chad Daybell and Lori Vallow Daybell are accused of conspiring with Vallow Daybell’s brother, Alex Cox, in the death. But Cox was never charged; he died suddenly in December 2019.
Autopsy and toxicology reports showed Cox died of a pulmonary blood clot, and law enforcement officials have said Cox’s death was due to natural causes.
During Vallow Daybell’s trial, prosecutors presented several witnesses and pieces of evidence that appeared to link Cox to the deaths, including GPS data on Cox’s phone that could be traced to the places where the children’s bodies were found.
Prosecutors say Cox also tried to shoot Tammy Daybell in October 2019.
Friends of Cox and Vallow Daybell testified last year that the siblings were very close, and that Cox believed he was put on Earth to serve as Vallow Daybell’s “protector.”
Cox also believed that people could be possessed and turn into zombies, his wife, Zulema Pastenes, testified. When Cox heard Tammy Daybell’s body was being exhumed, he said he was the “trap man” but would not elaborate, Pastenes said. He died the next day.