Ruby & Jodi: A Cult of Sin and Influence (2025) s01e02 Episode Script

Our office got a call
as this case was, was breaking.
We were hearing that this was
a really bad instance of child abuse.
And it involved
Ruby Franke's children.
You're not in trouble with me.
We're just trying to figure out
what's going on.
Our main focus right now is you.
He had duct tape and clear plastic
underneath the sleeves on both
wrists.
You could smell it.
The flesh.
The police weren't sure how many
Franke siblings were in the house,
and the boy hadn't seen them for some
time because they were isolated.
The police officers are looking
at him in the state that he's in
and they're terrified
they're going to go find a body.
I'm going to cry.
We need to identify that house.
If there's two other kids there,
we need to go do a security sweep
of that house.
But it was a very large house with
a large concrete bunker basement.
Jodi?
-I need you to step out.
-I have my attorney.
-That's great. Step out of the house.
-No.
-Step out of the house.
-Step out of the house.
-They're going to go into my house.
-Police Department.
And they searched the house
with guns out looking for children.
Control, can you hold the air?
We are searching the house.
And they find a little girl.
You- come on out buddy.
I'm a police officer.
She's sitting in a closet,
I can't even imagine how terrified
she must have been.
Hey, are you okay?
She was so afraid that she
wouldn't come out of the closet.
Are you scared?
Just nervous.
She wanted to make sure that Jodi
was giving her permission to do that.
Over the hours,
the first responders sat with her
and tried to help her
get comfortable there.
She's starving,
she ate a whole pizza.
This little nine-year-old girl.
After she had a full stomach,
they were able to get her
to voluntarily come out
and go to the hospital so that she
could be examined for her injuries.
There aren't words
to describe how I-
you can't even
put yourself in the place
of who would ever do that to a child?
-There's no other kids besides her?
-No.
While this is happening,
the police get a search warrant
and they detain Ruby and Jodi.
Place your arms
around your back for me.
And do a comprehensive
search of the house
looking for evidence
of the child abuse.
They're seeing like, a bathroom
garbage can full of Saran Wrap,
and they found this mixture
of honey and cayenne pepper.
The boy had injuries
from the handcuffs
that were wrapped in this Saran Wrap
and then duct tape.
We later found out that that's how
they were treating his wounds,
is rather than putting
an antibiotic on,
they were putting honey and
cayenne pepper in the open wounds.
And then the officers find
what looks like a built-in safe
and when they open it,
it's a panic room.
In this panic room,
they find the handcuffs and the rope
that the boy had left in a bedroom
earlier that day when he escaped
and so, it's clear
that after he'd run away,
Jodi had gone back into the house
and tried to hide
evidence of the abuse.
Shelby Lofton joins us live
from Utah County.
I'll talk to you a bit
about this story, they-
I work for KSL5 News
which is in the local news TV market
in Salt Lake City.
Right before our morning
editorial meeting,
I learned that something
had gone down with Ruby Franke.
I share with my newsroom
that I used to watch Ruby's family
vlogging channel
and I think we should look into it.
And my manager said,
we need to get down there now.
We took chopper five,
that long flightdown the stretch of
Utah for Ivans
and we're reaching out to the police
and we're trying to get
any confirmable information we can.
We learn about
the two young Franke children
that have been taken from this home
to the hospital
and that Ruby and Jodi Hildebrandt,
because police suspect them
of very serious child abuse.
How did it get this bad?
So then I'm thinking
Ruby has six children,
Shari and Chad,
they're out of the house,
they're adults at this point
but where are these
other two minor children?
And so I ask the police
and they say it's a part
of their ongoing investigation.
There's two siblings
that we're still looking for,
are considered still endangered.
Alright, let's go!
-Go long.
-I got long!
Police Department!
Hello, come out!
Look anywhere a
a little emaciated kid can fit.
Containers.
It's good.
Okay, grab it down!
Suspects are the parents.
And we're still looking for
the other kid's siblings.
DCFS has a warrant to take
them both into custody.
-Hello Pam. How are you doing?
-Good.
I'm Officer Hawkins
American Fork Police Department
Eventually, we learn
that the two middle daughters,
who are now teenagers,
were found at Pam Bodtcher's house.
We learned she was a close associate
to Ruby and Jodi.
How did you
start to know the family?
How'd you guys meet?
-The Franke family?
-Yeah.
Through a program
called Connexions.
And these two children
are unharmed physically
but still that complicates
the picture more.
Are these two middle children truly
okay and why were they separated?
Both Ruby and Jodi,
the officers bring them in separately
to interview them
and ask what's been going on.
Help us understand what's happening.
I'm not trying to hide anything.
I'm not trying to be difficult.
This is really
like if you knew all the pieces,
I think you'd have a lot of empathy.
Jodi acted like she was in the right,
and others were in the wrong.
I'm a psychologist, I have watched
people flip things all the time.
So I get it.
I sit on your side. I get it.
I wish people didn't do that,
but they do.
We're just here to talk to you about
a few things involving your kids.
Do you live around here or?
I can wait all day so
It's up to you, if you want
to talk to us about what's going on.
Ruby, as soon as it becomes
clear to her that she is a suspect,
she just kind of shuts it down.
I'll wait until I have a lawyer.
When you have a mom that's involved,
your first question
you ask is where's dad.
-And how many kids do you have Kevin?
-I have six kids.
-Are they all living with you, or?
-No.
-I haven't seen them for over a year.
-Any of them?
No. None of them.
-For a year?
-Over a year.
We received a phone call from 911.
A twelve to thirteen-year-old boy
was knocking on doors
in the neighborhood
asking for food and water.
You can see that Kevin was shocked
to hear what the children looked like
and what was going on.
He was severely emaciated.
-That he had-
-What does emaciated mean?
Skinny, scrawny, malnutritioned.
Not enough food,
not enough water to sustain life.
-So he had-
-I'm sorry, what?
It became pretty clear to us
that we didn't have evidence
of Kevin being aware
of the child abuse
or being involved in the child abuse.
And as far as we're concerned,
that's as far as we go.
Hop on in.
You're under arrest.
It's gonna be two counts,
second degree felony
and child abuse and neglect.
There are a lot
of layers to this story.
There were a lot of questions,
and it took us some time
to kind of process that.
No one in our office
had heard of either Ruby or Jodi,
we didn't have it on our radar that
it'd be a high media interest case.
Tonight, shocking allegations
as Utah mommy blogger with millions
of followers is arrested.
Ruby Franke from the family channel
8 Passengers
Behind bars along with her
business partner, Jodi Hildebrandt.
Jordan just like, jumps up
off the couch.
Jodi and Ruby were just arrested.
I started getting all of these texts,
one after another
saying Ruby Franke
I was like, here we go.
I keep saying disturbing
but that's the only way
I can think to describe this.
When I saw on TV
the cause of the arrest,
I was just completely horrified.
Ruby's children were found bound
and injured.
Emaciated with wounds
all over their bodies.
This is one of the worst
child abuses cases
he and his entire office
has ever seen.
As a journalist, I certainly have
alarm bells going off.
As a former viewer,
I'm thinking, whoa.
Because where I left the Franke
family, that marriage was intact
and I never could have
imagined Kevin,
he hasn't seen
his own children in a year?
How did we get here?
Close it.
I don't know if Kevin
was a good dad or not,
but I do know
that Jodi's venom is real
and that Kevin
has all the signs of it.
To more effectively control
and inflict the organizations
teachings on children,
you need the man out.
That was the main reason Hildebrandt
did that with Kevin Franke.
Take one, mark.
Nobody's really tapped
into who the evil one actually was.
This is a wolf in sheep's clothing
that saw an opportunity.
You guys have no idea
who this woman is.
You have no idea.
The path of a lot of folks
we've interviewed
seems to be like,
you grow up in the church.
And then the next step is to go
to BYU. And then marriage.
It seems like
a very fluid trajectory.
Yeah, that was my experience
as well.
I went to BYU,
I met my wife that first semester.
We were living
at the same apartment complex
so one day, going to class,
I was at the back of the bus
and she turned around
and introduced herself.
Quickly, we got to know each other
pretty well through that semester
and we were married
shortly after that.
I did go to BYU,
and then after that got married
and then had a couple daughters.
You know, in the LDS culture,
family is everything.
Very quickly, you meet someone,
get married, have a child,
you're tied to each other
and that's another
cultural thing that almost like,
the first person
that asks you to marry him,
sometimes you'll just get married
because somebody asked
and it was the first one.
So many relationships that I saw
would push personal happiness aside
for you gotta make it work
because you're married now
and in the next life.
There's a lot of expectations
that are placed on young people
in the Mormon Church.
Thinking about the pressure and
all the rules and the expectations,
there's lots of shame that comes
from not abiding by those things
and it's enough that it keeps you
in line especially as a youth.
My earliest memories
are mixed with the church.
We were always being taught
these stories of obedience
and how God would bless you.
To me,
it was everything to be obedient.
I believed everything
that they taught me there.
While I was studying at BYU,
I met the daughter
of a prestigious Mormon family.
We spent like, three weeks together
every single day
and then she told me
that she got an answer from God
that I was supposed to be
her husband.
I was honest with her. I told her
all about my personal life,
my insecurities and traumas
and challenges.
Because when you're the victim
of sexual abuse
you feel like
you're not innocent anymore.
This happened when I was
in the Boy Scouts of America.
He was twenty-five, I was fourteen
and I just couldn't even process
what was happening to me.
I broke down and told the church
about the sexual abuse
that was going on.
The top church leader emphasized
on the phone how important it was
that we didn't let other people know
about what happened.
Once you become aware of child abuse,
you may need assistance
determining whether the information
is privileged to remain confidential
or whether the law requires it
to be reported to civil authorities.
He even made me promise on the phone
that I wouldn't tell my parents.
Then I just said to him no,
that doesn't work for me.
There are some people
in a conservative culture
who believe that exposing the truth
isn't important
if it damages an institution.
That it's supposed to be so sacred
as the church or scouting.
I was really lucky my dad dedicated
tens of thousands of hours
in trying to help fix the damages
that these people prolifically done.
And so, with all the help
from my parents,
I eventually filed a lawsuit
against the Boy Scouts of America.
We fought for years.
And only for it to become
this incredible nightmare.
Two years later,
I ended up taking a settlement,
but I had no idea my story
would cause a chain reaction for me.
Having all your personal life
just exposed everywhere.
I can't explain
how traumatizing it was.
And that caused so many problems
in my relationship with my wife,
coming from a family that was really
high up in the church,
se had some issues,
some control issues and stuff.
And so, when she came to me
and said we should take therapy,
I was thinking, that's a great idea,
we'll do this together
and things could get like, better.
The repair of damage
inflicted by abuse
should be done privately,
confidentially
with a trusted priesthood leader.
And where needed the qualified
professional he recommends.
Within the Mormon church it's not
uncommon.
if you're struggling with any issue
that you're going to go
to your bishop about it.
What he's going to do
is either give you advice
or he's going to say,
no, I think this is over my head
and I'm going to
refer you out to therapy.
We went to the bishop,
and the bishop was like,
you need to go to Jodi Hildebrandt.
And so, we did.
And that's when Jodi Hildebrandt
destroyed my life.
You can change.
You can change. You don't have to
live with this the rest of your life.
The first time we met Jodi
it was in a group of couples.
She rolls in, she's charismatic,
like a talk show host.
Everyone turns to her
to say the final word on everything.
You're all children of God.
I'm a child of God and
you are divinity. That's who you are.
Jodi would just start talking
about top people in the church,
famous people that she had helped.
They relied on her for- for truth.
Like she starts telling
these funny stores
that relate to all the intimate areas
that are harmless,
and it really relaxes people
and they start talking.
Then she starts to show
public examples
in your little
private group of people
who are in denial
and then laugh with you
and everybody's oh, I guess
I was in denial, and
One thing Jodi started teaching
all the time
is that the relationship has to end
before it can be reborn.
And that's very symbolic
of like, Christianity
that something has to die
before it can be resurrected.
Stories about how eventually
we go through this moment
where we go a certain amount of time
without sex and everything
and that then
it will be like reborn
and it just slowly brining us
there but with fun and charisma.
She just started teaching
all the success
that people have by following us
and I started to see that something
was changing with my wife.
I started to feel like hey,
this is really good thing.
This could really improve
our relationship.
I had been asked did I go to Jodi
Hildebrandt for marriage counseling.
The answer is no. I actually went
there on- on my own accord.
Kind of work on- on myself.
I've had my bumps and bruises
in my childhood and young adult life
and so I've always been interested
in therapy.
I like to do film stuff
and music here and there
and I was actually doing a show
and it went incredibly well.
But there's ego involved
in you know, getting attention
and I remember when the show was done
and I'm taking pictures,
I just felt kind of off.
I felt like I want
to get ahead of this feeling
before it gets out of hand.
I happened to be talking
with a friend of mine
and he brought up Jodi Hildenbrandt.
And so, I watched some videos of her
and as a father of three daughters,
I think the thing
that was compelling to me,
I loved that you know,
she was a strong woman.
She had a great delivery.
She had a great presentation
and I did want to learn more
at- at that time.
Spend a moment to look at yourself.
Look at the way humility
shows up in you.
See if that's something
that you resist.
First thing that you do
is the one-on-one therapy
and my first meeting with Jodi,
I really enjoyed it.
She took a liking to me and so there
was this comfort with her.
At the beginning she is so good
at helping you feel safe
and developing this trust by asking
about what you struggle with most.
I guess she starts to understand
where the chinks in the armor are.
And then she starts asking
about some intimate things.
Masturbation or pornography
or any sexual relations.
And then she starts to push on that.
In sexual transgression,
the soul is at stake.
What your average person
considers normal behavior,
is often called a sin
within the church.
It just creates a lot of sexual shame
for having normal sexual feelings
or experiences.
The Mormon church for decades
and decades taught that masturbation
is next to murder.
The stakes are incredibly high;
your eternal life
and your eternal family are at stake.
Certainly, Jodi Hildebrandt's going
to use this pattern to her advantage.
The first thing that the adversary
does is to disconnect us.
What do you think shame does?
Shame is the master emotion.
I'm a member of The Church
of Jesus Christ Latter-day Saints,
I love so much about it.
And Jodi was brought up
in the LDS church as well.
And so, everything Jodi was saying
it made sense to me at the beginning.
This is the invitation
for not just this weekend,
but for the rest of your life
to make your soul stronger
than you flesh.
The people that Jodi worked with
probably didn't know her history.
She had a messy divorce,
she was estranged from her kids
and there's patterns of not being
able to maintain basic relationships
and then here she is
giving advice on those things.
I've had a lot of hard in my life.
I wouldn't have learned this stuff
if I hadn't been driven to my knees
hard.
And so, I get it and I'm inviting you
to stay in this experience
and not call it bad.
Three months after the first session,
everything changed real subtly.
My wife was being instructed by Jodi
to start to limit the communication
that we had as a couple.
The damage and the disconnect
that happens because of lust
affects your spiritual,
emotional system.
I was aware of Jodi Hildebrandt
way before she became national news.
Many of her previous clients
have ended up eventually in my office
trying to undo the damage that
was done in her treatments styles.
After a while,
Adam started calling and saying
this therapy's really, it's weird.
Adam had no idea
what he was getting into.
Eventually, Jodi was trying
to convince my wife
that we needed to start going
to her like, every single day.
We had a lot of money
from the settlement
and we were paying thousands
of dollars to Jodi regularly.
Jodi's a money-maker.
She figured out early on
that you can have therapy with
one person for so much an hour.
Or you could earn ten times
that with just a group.
Thank you for coming.
I appreciate you spending time
with me this evening.
I've personally spoken with literally
dozens and dozens of victims
of this pattern that Jodi Hildebrandt
would inflict upon these families.
She'll quickly
get the husband to confess
to masturbation and pornography,
which I'm almost certain that she did
with Kevin Franke.
I was working through
and seeking help with pornography.
I've made some wonderful progress.
You came to the realization
that you needed help?
And weren't doing things right?
Or was that something that
Jodi helped you guys recognize?
Jodi saw the need for me
to get help.
Jodi Hildebrandt was one
of the Mormon Churches go-to experts
on treating pornography
and masturbation addiction.
You really can't understand
Jodi Hildebrandt Connexions
or Ruby and Kevin Franke and what
she did with so many other victims
without understanding
the Mormon churches' approach
to sexual transgression
and to pornography masturbation.
Human sexuality has been around
since the very beginning.
You can find it in our poetry, in our
music, in our myths, in our stories.
When you have the capacity
to now put sex on video format,
this created a porn panic.
Especially in religious communities,
this is seen as the ends of times.
We had an outbreak of pornography
and masturbation concerns
within Mormonism,
that began in the nineties
and really started surging hard
in the two thousands
and two thousands and tens.
The church started to have anti-porn
talks at general conference,
it will destroy or ruin
your marriage, everything.
Just droves of people talking
to the bishops about this secret sin.
In Mormon church, you don't have a
sexual outlet unless you're married.
And they had redefined in church
that pornography was anything
that turned you on,
so imagine no sexual outlet,
anything turns you on,
I also confessed that I looked at
Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition.
Just glancing at it,
that was a confession.
The value of a counselor went
through- through the roof.
The power to break the pull
of this addiction is found in God.
He can help you change.
So the Mormon church
has this weird dilemma
where they don't want us
talking about sex,
they don't really offer a lot
of great information about sex
other than it's sacred and
it's special and at the right time,
and the right place,
with the right person.
While on the other hand, they're
talking about sex all the time,
especially with the Mormon men.
I want to assure you, young men,
that your leaders
know of the challenges
you face in today's society.
Live for the blessings
that are promised
to those who remain morally clean.
It's a lot to ask
for a twelve-year-old boy
to look up the ladder,
you have to prove to your bishop
through your worthiness interviews
that you are worthy to receive
this next office in the priesthood.
It's exploring,
like probably all kids do,
and I discovered masturbation
and I remember thinking,
holy cow, this feels good.
I was like,
I'm gonna tell all of my friends.
And I'm so glad I didn't tell anybody
'cause like, within a day or two,
those thoughts have cumulated
and I realized that I was committing
the sin next to murder.
The Church of Jesus Christ
Latter-day Saint
developed their own twelve-step
program for addictive behavior.
They basically adopted
the Alcoholics Anonymous model
to try and start capitalizing
on this masturbation and pornography
addiction idea.
And it doesn't matter if you're
looking at pornography too much
or if you masturbated once in the
last month,
you're sent to this program.
Jodi worked within the system
of the LDS church.
She learned how to work the system,
how to get the referrals,
how to earn trust.
I tried to be perfect my whole life,
but I struggled on and off
with pornography
and I knew that
the Mormon church taught
that pornography and masturbation
was committing the sin next to murder
but during this time,
I hadn't looked at pornography
or masturbated like for months
and months and months.
But still, Jodi was trying
to demand that I get a sponsor
and that I start getting into
like this sexual addicts group.
I don't want you to think
that as long as I stop the behavior,
then I've changed.
Because that is not legitimate
change, that's only sober.
With these families,
the husband had to enroll
in Connexions
super expensive individual therapy
for the sin of pornography
and masturbation.
And then these addiction recovery
support groups both online
and in person some
were also run by graduates
of Jodi's therapy program,
many of which were not
in any way credentialed
or trained
as mental health professionals.
You need professional help
and you need your twelve-step groups
and sponsorship
because those are the people
who actually understand
how to help you
through this process accurately.
Till this day I don't know
how my wife found Jodi Hildebrandt,
you know, who referred her,
what happened,
but she started seeing Jodi
for personal reasons.
A floodgate opened in May 2016,
that's when it was just a full,
sudden change in my wife.
At that time, she took my laptop
and had it scanned for pornography.
She didn't find anything,
I don't use pornography
but then she said even though
you're not addicted to porn,
you must be addicted
to something else.
I could become addicted to ice cream,
I could become addicted to anger,
quite literally I can become addicted
to anything
that I choose to become addicted to.
She like, got everyone chasing
this unicorn, abstract idea
that she could cure you.
She knew how to work with your brain
that would make it happen.
What I saw in this group setting,
you got men
that are in their fifties,
some in their seventies and then
a 15 year old comes in.
Then somebody that's done
some heinous crime in my eyes,
they're put in this group.
Everybody is categorized
in the same sphere, I guess.
I'm a pretty tough guy
but it got to me.
Now you're thinking
you're this monster
because you masturbated
or you looked at Instagram
or a woman who was in a bikini.
So, you keep on going back,
you keep on writing checks,
and the nervous system
gets just destroyed with shame.
One guy had incest problems,
one starts talking about he's
an exhibitionist, he's got victims.
The next one said he was a voyeurist
and he's got victims, too.
But Jodi taught that
it was an issue in your head,
that context didn't matter.
She's treating us like we're all the
same and we have the same problem.
If you are conscious
and you are lusting,
the consequences are going to be
significant for you.
She even said that
I was the worst addict of them all
and that's when I lost it.
I couldn't function.
I couldn't think.
It triggered the trauma I had
as a victim of sexual abuse
and I just said to my wife,
I don't want to be here anymore.
That's when our problems
started to get just crazy.
When I was in Connexions,
Jodi taught sexuality
as the bane of all existence.
Men are the problem
because they're lustful.
The wife was instructed to withhold
any sexual intimacy,
even emotional intimacy
from the husband.
Jodi would say that women control sex
and we need to use that
to make sure that truth
is being lived in our relationships.
Truth is about boundaries.
A boundary has to do
with what you're going to do,
not what somebody else
is going to do.
How are you going to stop?
You- you walk away.
Jodi had my ex send a contract
that I needed to sign
for us to stay together.
It said stuff like,
I can still live in the house,
but you can't sleep with me,
I don't have to do anything with you
for like three years.
If you want our marriage to stay
together, you gotta sign here.
It was a divorce receipt.
My wife fully implemented
Jodi's principles.
She was using separation
to cooers me
to essentially become
a Hildebrandt follower as well.
She sent a list of demands
that I needed to adhere
to avoid permanent separation,
or to avoid divorce.
The demands was to attend
Jodi's Connexions class.
I had to attend a twelve step
program, I had to find a sponsor.
Jodi had this incredible distain
towards the idea of males.
What I saw is constant separation.
All she wanted to do
was separate men and women.
I would give anything to live
in the same room with my husband
and you're telling this woman
to kick her husband out?
Separation is a principal of truth
and separation is a necessary thing
in order to become people
who live in truth.
Eventually I refused to go to Jodi,
but my wife continued to go back.
My wife, eventually, she says
if you don't accept these teachings,
I'm going to find a new dad
for our daughter.
You're replaceable, I need someone
who is also a Jodi disciple.
When you're in truth,
things are clear to you.
You accept pain and you let go.
This was a very effective move
on Jodi's part
of creating separation and isolation.
Everybody's starting to go crazy
and they start to crumble.
You didn't even know what Jodi
you were going to get.
Sometimes you'd get this
loving person.
And then other times you
just feel this darkness within her.
You need to understand honey,
that I will commit to you.
If something comes up that I deem
is more important,
then I'm going to do that.
I don't know how long
you're going to stay married,
but that's what you need
to say to them.
When all the kids left,
Ruby took all of them?
Yeah, she stayed in the house
and I moved out.
OK. And did you ever try
to reach out to the kids?
Drive by the home or
No. I honored the separation
and boundary that we agreed to.
-So, what was your separation
-There was no contact after-
Did you have
a no contact order in place?
Order no, this was between
my wife and me.
Did she ask you to
not contact the kids?
Ruby invited me
to leave the home.
In the days following the arrest,
I'm hearing these different accounts
from people coming forward
saying they're victims
of Jodi Hildebrandt's,
it starts to make the Kevin Franke
piece of this become clearer.
But I still am operating
with a lot of skepticism,
it's still really hard for me
to believe that this family man
has been away
during the abuse of his children.
And so, I decided to door knock
the Springville neighborhood
where the Franke family lives.
And it's actually the neighbors
who tell me,
well, you know Jodi Hildebrandt
moved in there, right?
And I said, what?
She lives in Ivans.
And they said, no, Jodi moved in
a few months ago maybe a year ago,
it's all fuzzy.
But she moved in, she lived in that
house with them in Springville.
She is right there with Ruby
and Kevin is gone,
never comes, he never comes
to check on the kids, nope.
No one knows where Kevin is.
March of 2021
when after a Connexions conference
down in St. George,
all of the inner circle
All the people who were being trained
as mental fitness coaches and stuff,
so that was Ruby, a bunch of
other people, and their spouses,
we went out to
like a dinner afterwards.
And that's where Jodi really
opened up to the women
in a private conversation that
she believed she was being
tormented and haunted
by shadow figures every night.
Ruby was convinced that
we could intervene and help Jodi.
It was at that point that Ruby said
we could take her up to our house.
The moment she showed up
at my house,
just the weirdest crap
started happening.
Lights turning on and off.
Sounds of people walking on walls
and across the ceiling.
Stuff floating around
and it was just
It was weird.
I've got to say, I'm a smart guy.
I'm an engineer.
I've been a college professor.
I can't explain some of the stuff
that happened.
She would talk in
like different voices.
It was really creepy.
But the voices would say
"She's ours. We're not letting go."
"She's mine.
I'm going to marry her."
She believed that Satan
wanted her as her bride.
Jodi had so much power
over Kevin and Ruby
that they bought into
what Jodi was saying,
that she was being tormented
by demons or devils.
And their belief in Jodi made it so
they were seeing those things, too.
Kevin even says at one point,
I'm an engineer,
I'm a very logical person,
in other words is what he's saying.
And yeah, I can't yet I can't explain
the things that I'm seeing.
He may be an engineer,
but his belief system is still geared
towards seeing the improbable
or the fantastic
because he sees Jodi as an authority
of this, a moral authority,
whose visions are real.
And I think they believed
she was going to help heal the world
and fight evil through her teachings.
Whenever she started to go
into a trance and go into possession,
Ruby would go up and check on her.
And then at some point Ruby said,
"You know what, I'm just going
to start sleeping in there."
That's kind of weird, but okay.
And that was that. They started
sleeping in the same bed.
Inexplicably, after entering into
this super unethical relationship
with all the Franke family,
Jodi moves into the Franke household.
And then she convinces Ruby
that she and Ruby need to sleep
together in the same bed
and if this weren't unethical
and horrific enough,
for any licensed
mental health professional,
Kevin ends up being kicked out
of his own home.
July twentieth, 2022,
Ruby went on a trip
with Jodi and Pam down to Arizona.
When she came back from that trip,
before she even brought
the bags into the house,
She pulled me and said,
"I want to talk with you."
And that's when she
asked me to leave.
The neighbors tell me
that they were noticing
Ruby was gone for days on end,
but they would see children's faces
in the windows.
And so they knew kids were home alone
and that's when
they really were frightened
and concerned for the wellbeing
of these children.
Simultaneously, we're learning that
Shari Franke, Ruby's eldest daughter,
has called ECFS
and asked them
to please check on her siblings.
Hi, my name is Shari Franke.
My four younger siblings
are living in Springville.
My neighbors have been telling me
that they have been left home alone
for about four or five days.
So, I'm taking in these details,
Kevin's attorney says no,
he got his own apartment,
and he was told by Jodi
that he had to be isolated
to reflect on his own behaviors
and work on himself.
And basically, it was Ruby's call
whether and when
he could come back.
And I just keep asking,
how could a man do that?
How could a man walk away
simply at this request,
don't you want to fight
for your family?
When we're doing an investigation
and we're trying to figure out
what in the world is going on,
information of prior bad acts,
is really helpful to us.
We had these pieces of evidence
and then Jessi came in and helped us
put that together
into a picture for us.
Mark it.
We reached out to the ex-wives
of our participants.
All declined to comment on the record
or participate in the documentary.
This documentary series explores
the complex dynamics
of families affected
by Jodi Hildebrandt's actions.
While it highlights her patterns
of manipulation and harm,
it's important to recognize
that these stories
involve multiple perspectives.
The Church says ended its association
with Hildebrandt in 2012
after her license was suspended.
However, some bishops continued
referring people to her after that.