Hidden True Crime - BEYOND THE VEIL: Dr Christine - Cult Expert - shares personal story of trafficking, survival and transformation

Episode Date: February 14, 2024

Dr Christine shares her courageous personal story of survival, trafficking and transformation. An interview with a cult expert who has her own harrowing story of being taken by a false prophet. She shares her personal and instructive story relevant to the Daybell case, and the FLDS members who once followed Warren Jeffs. Dr Christine is the founder of Voices for Dignity, a non-profit in Hildale, Utah that helps survivors of trafficking, coercive control and oppression. Dr Christine and Lauren explore some of the founding beliefs of Mormonism to provide a picture of how offshoot cults among believing members of the LDS church can transpire and evolve. For those new to this twisted case about doomsday beliefs leading to a murderous spree across states, and to better understand future episodes, we recommend our full Beyond the Veil season, but if you don't have that time, we have one episode summarizing everything you need to know: It’s our May 2nd, 2023 episode titled: "Beyond the Veil: The prequel -Chad daybell and Lori Vallow - the background story you’ve never heard." LAUREN MATTHIAS worked as an anchor and reporter for ABC, NBC, and FOX News in Boise, Idaho Salt Lake City, Utah. She spent a decade reporting on a diverse range of topics from high profile crimes and to Presidential visits. Most recently, she reported for Salt Lake City’s ABC affiliate News4Utah and in 2015 she received the Idaho State Broadcaster’s Association Best Reporter award and has been reporting with News Nation throughout the Lori Vallow trial. She is the producer and editor of the Hidden True Crime Podcast along with her husband Dr. John Matthias, a forensic psychologist. Contact them at [e-mail] WEBSITE: https://hiddentruecrime.com/ TO SUPPORT: https://www.patreon.com/hiddentruecrime https://paypal.me/hiddentruecrime https://cash.app/$hiddenTruecrime Our Sponsors:* Check out Acorns: https://acorns.com/HIDDENTRUECRIME* Check out Acorns: https://acorns.com/HIDDENTRUECRIME* Check out Armoire and use my code HIDDENTRUECRIME for a great deal: https://www.armoire.style* Check out Effecty and use my code HIDDENTRUECRIME for a great deal: https://www.effecty.com* Check out Happy Mammoth and use my code HIDDENTRUECRIME for a great deal: https://happymammoth.comSupport this podcast at — https://redcircle.com/hidden-a-true-crime-podcast1836/donationsAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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we revisit many interviews that have never been shared on our podcast until now. For many of our listeners, they understand the Lori Valo Chad Daybell case, but for those new to this twisted case about doomsday beliefs leading to a murderous spree across states, to better understand future episodes, I really recommend our entire, Beyond the Veil season. But hey, I also realize we don't all have time to listen to an entire season. So I took care of that for you, summarizing everything in a single episode. If there is one episode to listen to that will get you caught up on the Chad Daybell and Lori Vallow case, it is our May 2nd, 2023 podcast episode titled Beyond the Vale, the prequel, Chad Daibald and

Lori Vallow, the background story you've never heard. You can also find this on our YouTube channel if you want the visuals. I wrote and produced this episode for that very reason so everyone can have a solid grasp on this case in less than an hour. For any of your friends who need the basics so that they two can follow along into the next months and into Chad's trial, send them that May 2nd 2023 episode to get them started. This interview with Dr. Christine was recorded on May of 2021, one week before Chad and Lori were charged with first-degree murders of Tiley, JJ, and Tammy. So at the time of this interview, we were still awaiting charges to possibly come down. Keep that in mind as you listen to this story.

I am here with a very special guest tonight. It is not my husband, John. In fact, Dr. Christine, who is my guest today, knows that John is being. busy because he's watching our son so that we can record a very special podcast tonight. Dr. Christine is an expert on Colts and Colts Psychology. She has spent years helping people who have come out of cult situations and has appeared in the media a number of times sharing her expertise on Colts. And after sharing that, why don't you tell us, Christine, a little bit more about yourself?

I am married to a Turkish prince. I mean, that's my version. He is Turkish. We'll call him a prince. He's a music producer and digital genius in every way. I have four children. I live in Short Creek, where all the FLDS live, and I have a PhD in media psychology. And Dr. Christine, I'm sure that everyone's minds are spinning right now. You live in Short Creek. How the locals say it, Short Creek. That's right. Short Creek. It was Colorado City, Arizona, and Hilldale, Utah.

It's in southern Utah area on that border, those state borders. Now, this is where many of the FLDS members live. And by FLDS, we are referring to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, men and women who practice plural marriage. So, in other words, Dr. Christine, you live among those who are FLDS, in Short Creek. That's right. And she did move there with her Turkish prince, and that's actually how I know you.

It's true. In fact, our friendship starts. I was the ABC affiliate local reporter that reported in this area, and when I needed something, I would reach out to Christine, and she was so incredibly helpful. And we established such a great relationship and friendship. and she helped me to be able to tell these women's stories. And it was the women whose story I told. I'll never forget Esther and Norma.

You really helped me to be able to understand those who are FLDS. And so here today, we're at my house. Christine is here. One thing people's minds are probably spinning, you were never FLDS. I was not. you went to help them and to establish this nonprofit. You moved there. Where did you move from to come from Las Vegas?

From Las Vegas. So you and your husband, your Turkish prince, thought, hey, the FLDS families and people need our help? I mean, how did this begin? I felt pulled to the Short Creek area. And when there was a flood in 2015, a horrific flood that took the line. of, you know, two van loads of women and children. And I drove there with Gatorade and I went there to help with the recovery effort. And when I went there, I had everything in my mind that I'd seen

in the media. I thought that they would never speak to me. I thought this was a very dangerous, reclusive cult. I thought that there would be absolutely no happiness. And I, but I just, wanted to help. But when I went there, they were so warm and kind to me, and I started seeing things about them that broke the stereotype of what I had in my mind. I decided at that time I wanted to bring Christmas to the area. And so a couple months later, we put on this big first Christmas event for the people who had left the church. Even though when I was working to help with the recovery effort, I worked with the FLDS, I thought that if I move there and I help, I'll really only be able to help the XFLDS.

And because I have a personal story with fundamental Mormonism, it really gave me a drive. I spent years trying to figure out what happened to my brain and how to recover from it. and so I thought, you know, why don't I use my unique experience and my past pain and turn it into something positive? And so I went there to finish my dissertation and help these people. And little by little, I was doing more than helping people who had left the church. I gained the trust of people who were still in the church. And so my charity now is called Voices for Dignity.

and we primarily help people who are still FLDS because there are so many other charities that will help the people who've left, but it's a lot harder to get donations and to get volunteers to help this group of people because they have been so dehumanized. Thank you for sharing that. And that was one thing I actually remember

when you become a reporter in a new town, you're like a deer in headlights. It's your learning everyone's names and who's in charge of what. And I remember having all these contacts for people in Colorado City and in Hilldale. And it was a very important part of my job is covering that and making sure that I had relationships there. And that was the first thing that I remember about Christine is there were a lot of nonprofits. And I very quickly understood that there was one nonprofit that stood out that the FLDS families trusted and all of the nonprofits were doing incredible work there.

But I remember if I really needed to understand what was going on in the FLDS population, Christine was who would be able to tell me because you were friends with those people and close to them. Thank you. And what I remember about you is you had this good news aspect. Positive news. What did you call that? Positive news. Well, in broadcasting, actually, I would say,

that I really, really liked the B block stories. In other words, A block stories are the headlines, the stories that come before the first commercial break. Then you have the commercial break, and that's the B block. And those are usually more positive stories, not the headlines, not the crime. And there's a joke. When you're in broadcasting, you really want to be in the A block

because it means you're the headline. But I always liked the B blocks. I did not mind a good B-block story. So that's a way to explain it is I would say, I am not afraid to admit as a reporter, I love the B-block. I'm proud to be in the B-block. It means I have the good news.

Oh, you did. You reported on the FLDS in such a sensitive and humanizing way, and it was unusual because everybody wants to know how many wives you have, how many sister wives you have. They get very fixated on what's happening in the bedroom, and it's just inappropriate. These are human beings. These are mothers that love their children.

They're good fathers too. It's shocking to me how many good FLDS men I know. And there's never been a single article describing any one of them. That is interesting. That is true. You're right. We hear of abuse. We hear about Warren Jeff's who's in prison and we, you know, form our opinions on him and what this sect means.

In fact, really quickly, we have jumped ahead. Let's explain to our listeners what the FLDS are. And then I'll explain a little bit more about why this podcast is so important to the case of Lori and Chad Daybell. So the FLDS sect of Mormonism stands for the fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. And a lot of times I'll see questions like, oh, did Chad and Lori hang out with Warren Jeffs? Oh, did, you know, Anna LaBarrean, who I interviewed on YouTube, did she know Warren Jess and did she know Chad? And I explained it on a YouTube live that there are different offshoots of Mormonism.

And FLDS is one of them. So I'll let you explain what they believe. The FLDS consider the mainstream Mormon church to be the offshoot. Right, right, exactly. Because they stuck with the original principles as taught by Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism. And two really important principles are plural marriage and living the law of consecration, which is like communal living.

So they do those things. Polygamy. Yes. When you say plural marriage, polygamy. Right. Polygamy to them is sort of a distasteful word. They don't use it. They say plural marriage, but that's polygamy to us.

For those that are attempting to make sense of the different. offshoots. You know the FLDS population through the stereotypical prairie dresses and those hairstyles. So just to give people a visual, this is that offshoot that we're talking about. But I do like what Christine said. They consider the LDS church, the mainstream LDS church is the offshoot. Right. Because the mainstream church gave up polygamy to become a state, to become a state. And the FLDS say, they say, oh, so you can. change the doctrines of God just to become a state? I don't think that's how it works. So the FLDS are very, you know, they stick to the original teachings a lot more. So they live primarily in southern Utah.

In the 1920s and early 30s, they started moving to this area called Short Creek on the border of Utah and Arizona. And then they were raided multiple times. I think they were, It was a 1938 raid, a 1944 raid, a 1953 raid. In 1953, every adult involved in a plural marriage, man and woman, was arrested, and they bust the women and children to Phoenix, and the goal was to adopt out the children. and the press on this made the members of the public sympathetic towards the polygamists. Like, just let them live their own lives.

Why are you taking away their children? And after two years, the mothers were reunited with their children and with their families. And that was quite a monumental moment in history, not just for the FLDS, but even for the other, you know, groups, pilgrimist groups, they remember that because in Mormonism there's this persecution history. Very much so. Being driven out of Navu.

Governor Boggs, the Illinois governor, wanted Mormons out of his state. Joseph Smith was killed by a mob. There's a lot of early persecution. Governor Boggs, he issued the extermination order that Mormons could be killed on site and so on. when the Mormons were driven out of Navu, Illinois, and they were heading out to Utah.

Utah wasn't even a part of the United States. They thought they were leaving the United States where they could live polygamy and peace because that's what God wanted. But the tradition has continued that the people of God will be persecuted and the prophets will be falsely imprisoned and so on.

And I suspect that some of that is in the mind of Lori Vallow Daybell, do you think? Absolutely. Because he's following in the template of the leader and founder of the mainstream Mormon church, Joseph Smith. The main or largest body of Mormonism is called the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and that's what they want to be called. When I use the word Mormonism, I'm talking about the movement, which consists of FLDS,

which consists of Chad and Lori DeBow, which consists of. of the community of Christ, once the reorganized church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. So they all have a different name. So when I use Mormonism, please know I'm not trying to be derogatory. I do know the different names of the churches.

I'm talking about all of them as a movement. So Mormonism itself and the history of Mormonism started with Joseph Smith. Joseph Smith is sort of where Mormonism agrees, would you say? Right. Right. And there are so many offshoots. I mean, there's the AUB, the Apostolic United Brethren.

There's the TLC group. There's the, I mean. And they're all different. I just, I want everyone to know at home, too, listening to this. We have listeners from all over the world and they think,

oh, do you all intermingled together? They really don't. They don't go to church together. They often are not in the same communities. Correct. They often have a community where most of them are gathered. And those are in different places. and, you know, they have their different codes for living too.

Like, I was mainstream LDS. I converted when I was 18. And when I was mainstream Mormon, I wouldn't drink coffee. I wouldn't have caffeine. I would not buy anything on Sunday. I didn't want to work on Sunday. So I was shocked. I mean, I quit being mainstream LDS, you know, like 15 years ago or something.

When I immersed myself in this FLDS community, that they drink coffee, they drink wine. I mean, they, you know, alcohol is not a sin. So don't underestimate the prairie dresses. Oh, yeah. And they're, yeah, it was funny. I mean, but the rules are different. Yes, because Joseph Smith, the early Mormon pioneers were sent off with coffee in their

hand carts, you know. Really? I didn't even know that. Each family was given a certain, a lot of amount of coffee. So what you're saying is they're really sticking to this history that they know from Joseph Smith, which takes me back to one place where most Mormonism all agrees is Joseph Smith. And then what happened is Joseph Smith, along with his brother, Hiram Smith, were killed by a mob in Carthage jail. And they really didn't know who was supposed to lead

after that. And for the largest body of Mormonism, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, that person, the next prophet was Brigham Young. And Brigham Young led the saints and the Mormon pioneers to the Salt Lake Valley. So in Mormon history, after Joseph Smith is killed, there's this moment of confusion. Who is supposed to lead? And I think that's an important part of Mormonism, because if there's ever a question, for example, the LDS church saying, we're no longer going to practice polygamy, while those who are FLDS saying, well, we want to continue that, that's part of our history, that's an important belief, plural marriage. They can go back to this point in history of Mormonism where Joseph Smith was killed.

And there's a question as to who continued the truth. Would you agree with that? Absolutely. And I guess I want to ask you, Christine, it seems there are quite a few offshoots in Mormonism. More recent ones include Julie Rowe and Chad Dayball. I just find it really interesting. Why do you think this seems to happen over and over? Joseph Smith was considered the mouthpiece of God.

So he was a prophet. That means what he said goes. Who's going to argue with God? So if a prophet says it, it's like God saying it. So when Joseph Smith died, there was this vacuum. that vacuum was filled with Brigham Young in the mainstream church, but there were these other offshoot. I mean, there were the Strangites, and then there was the reorganized, which are now the Community of Christ. The Rigdonites. Yeah, the Rigdonites. They were, oh, it's fascinating

to read about all the different offshoots, even out in Pennsylvania and all kinds of things. But so if you're the prophet, you have, access to speak with Heavenly Father. Everybody believes this. Everybody listens. They come to you. They respect you. Women want to be your wife. And you have the keys, the authority to help people become sealed together or to do ordinances that will last be on the grave. So there's a lot of power in being a prophet. And I think that probably in most of the different groups. I imagine that the various leaders of the groups, even though they might be called prophets, I don't think that they're all evil by any means. I think that most of them probably

want to lead their group righteously and they don't go off the deep end. They're just following in their traditions. That's my opinion. But I think predators take advantage of this and say, well, I'm the new prophet. I joined the church when I was on the day of my 18th birthday. I wanted to join sooner. I was a teenager. I found the church. It provided meaning for me in a way that filled a need I had.

And so my parents were against it, but I ended up getting baptized on the very first day that I could. I met the missionaries at a lake on a freezing cold day in Michigan in April. and got baptized, and that was like the happiest day of my life up to that point. At any rate, one of the things that converted me was reading the Book of Mormon. Now, the Book of Mormon is a companion to the Bible. So the Bible was the history of the prophet in the old world, like around Jerusalem and so on, where the Book of Mormon was the history of the prophet and even a visit from Jesus Christ after his resurrection in the Americas.

Yes, it was 600 BC to 420 AD. When I read the book of Mormon, I came to believe it was true. And I went out of mission too. Did I tell you? Yes, you did tell me you served a mission. We're both returned missionaries here. That's like being a nun for a year and a half. There's a bond too.

They're like, oh, you served a mission too. Where did you go? Yeah, right, right. So, but I love the Book of Mormon. I read it 32 times. I studied every angle of it. I even wrote a book about it. It was for children, though.

It was called Turn Your Little Ones into Book of Mormon Whiskids. All of those mothers. Anyway, Joseph Smith found these metal plates that were inscriptions. Reformed Egyptian. So he found these golden plates. in Hill Camara, an angel Maroni led him to them. This is Mormonism's origin story that I'm sharing that Joseph Smith, after meeting God, the Father and Jesus Christ,

was led by the angel Maronai, an ancient prophet, who was now an angel to Hill Comorah in upstate New York, where the golden plates had been buried for thousands of years. So, since Joseph Smith was granted the power to translate these ancient scriptures by the gift and power of God, that made him the prophet. Okay. Now, supposedly, there were more plates

that were not allowed to be translated, and that was called the sealed portion of the Book of Mormon. The sealed portion of the Book of Mormon is LDS doctrine. It's well known, that there is a sealed portion that has yet to be translated. And so that's an important. important. Do you want to tell that now or do you want to wait with that? Put a pin in that. Yeah, put a pin in that. Put a pin in that. That still portion is important. We'll come back to that.

If you have somebody that says he's translating ancient scripture, then you think, oh, Joseph Smith, he's the new Joseph Smith. At least that's what happened to me. Yeah. Thank you for sharing that. It makes sense. And I want to add that Mormonism began with what is believed to be a restoration of the true gospel of Jesus Christ and God's official priested authority to act in God's name. So many churches, many Christian churches begin as a reformation. In other words, this church is really great, but we're going to reform it and make it this and maybe add a little bit of that. That would be reforming a church. But a restoration means that Mormons, again, I'm talking about all offshoots.

Mormons believe that Adam was a prophet, Moses was a prophet, and all of these well-known Bible figures and Book of Mormon figures were ancient prophets and that God would continually take his truth and authority from the earth due to wickedness, but that he would restore it again in the last days before the second coming of Christ. And so for Mormons, this is what God did. He restored his true church and God's official authority to the earth in these latter days. through the modern prophet Joseph Smith, who again is similar to or compared to Noah and Moses. And I'm sharing this bit of Mormonism 101 because I think that's an important point, restoration versus reformation.

God's truth was fully restored through the prophet Joseph Smith. It's a restoration. It's a complete truth from God, delivered to God's appointed prophet. And I think that's what puts Mormon offshoots maybe in a different category. category than other Christian offshoots that might just be merely reformations and varied adaptions. The restoration bit in Mormonism sort of plays into the modern day revelation and why Mormons believe prophets who are called of God.

Oh, that's a good point. And that's something that really appealed to me. I loved the fact that I was joining a church that was trying to be like the original church that Christ had when he was on the earth. I loved the principle that babies don't need to be baptized, they're pure, that you have to be a certain age and give consent to be baptized. I hated the thought of, you know, a little baby going to hell who couldn't even sin. And I also love the doctrine of the pre-existence that we lived before we came here in a spiritual form

and that, you know, there was this plan of salvation, you know, so this earth life was a test. And if you had enough faith and you pass the test, then you go to the highest kingdom and you get rewarded for what you did on this earth. So a lot of things about Mormonism really appealed to me as a teenager, not to mention the emphasis on family. And it was... Families can be together forever. Right. So that's the good stuff, you know. So I was willing to give up coffee and, you know, all that stuff to join the church.

And I wanted to be the very best Mormon I could be. I ended up going on a mission just like you and got married in the temple, which is the good Mormon way to get married. Yes, it is. You get sealed for time and all eternity in the temple, not death do you part. That's right. And I lived a very devout Mormon life. with my husband. I had four children. And then, let's just say things didn't work out with my first

husband. I got divorced. And I ended up, you know, a lot of the things happened. But to make a long story short, I ended up searching for my eternal husband. I was looking for my new eternal husband. You thought God had another plan for you. Right. And I prayed about who I should marry and I saw somebody in my dream. Okay. After your divorce. After my divorce, yes. So now I'm trying to find the real eternal maid of mine. So I end up going to, moving to Utah and I go to my very first LDS singles dance and lo and behold

there was the man that I thought I saw in my dream so I had this reaction like oh my goodness it's real it was like proof to me that God was really real

I mean I believed he was real I wouldn't have dedicated my life to it but it was something which I interpreted to be like empirical evidence. I dreamt about somebody and then there he was. So in my mind he came into my life for some divine

reason and that once you know it turned out to be a big bad conclusion. So I end up getting to know this man in the meantime I'm thinking

you know God really sent him to me for a reason. He wasn't the kind of guy I would have ever been attracted to. He didn't fit my prototype of, yeah, he wasn't my type at all. And I was dating some really wonderful men and they were handsome and funny and successful and, you know, very Mormon. And I didn't want to date this other man, but I felt like, well, God, you know, sent him to me. So he presented himself at first as an atheist. So I thought, aha, he said he was ex-Morman. So I thought, oh, my job is to reconvert him. So he was trying to pull me out of the church and make me into an atheist. And I was trying to convert him to come back to the church. Interesting. So we had this thing going on. And he could

not get me to break my faith. It didn't work. And I was dating other people. And he was, was pursuing me and lo and behold one day you know some things happened and one day he says so he told me this story about his past and he said that he had

written the sealed portion and he passed it off among one of these fundamental groups do you remember that the sealed portion that we asked you to put a pen in it this man is now telling you that he's translated or did he translate it he wrote it he said he wrote it and does he mean translate it or did he no no he told me that he forged it he wrote it oh he forged it you know he wrote it and that they believed it and this is one of the things he was using to try to

break my faith he was like they were so easy to deceive and if I could write this and they would believe that it was true, you know, then the Book of Mormon is a crock of shit. But that didn't have any impact on breaking my faith. And so at one point, he says, I have something to tell you. I lied when I said I wrote the sealed portion of the Book of Mormon. I actually translated it from the gold plates. Oh, wow. And he said, I had to tell you that because I was testing your faith. And you're the only woman that I've ever tried to pull out of the church where I didn't succeed. So you have passed the test.

And I was like, wow. Okay. Let me see it. Let me read it. So he sends me by email the first eight chapters of the first eight chapters of the the sealed portion of the Book of Mormon. And when I read it, it felt very much like the original book of Mormon. And the original Book of Mormon is something you have written a book about,

that you've read 32 times that you love. Right. And I joined the church believing the Book of Mormon was true. That was weird. It's weird. You believe that an angel came, gave these golden plates to this child, and then he translates ancient Egyptian and so on, reformed Egyptian by the gift and power of God, and now you have this Book of Mormon and the angel disappears, and you can't really prove that the angel came.

But you know, you have to take all these leaps of faith to believe in the Book of Mormon. And I did. And I love the Book of Mormon, and it brought me a lot of happiness. So now I meet this man who look like somebody in my dream and tells me he translated the sealed portion of the Book of Mormon. Same thing I read in some of the Chad Daybell stories. Yes. His seven missions, in Chad Daybell's seven missions, he mentions to Lori in an email that they will translate. ancient scripture which people have suspected including me to be the sealed portion of the book of

Mormon because in my case that made this man who I will call Adam that's not his real name but um so Adam then was the new Joseph Smith so I thought he was a prophet of God that he was the mouthpiece of God and whatever he said goes and what he wanted was for me to be his wife. And, you know, he's a prophet. He has the keys, the sealing power, and God wouldn't have sent me that dream for no reason. And so he takes me as his wife through his own little explanation.

You know, but before he did, I looked at him and said, promise me, you're not deceiving me just so you can sleep with me. Mom, can you tell me a story? Sure. Once upon a time, a mom needed a new car. Was she brave? She was tired, mostly. But she went to Carvana.com and found a great car at a great price. No secret treasure map required.

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Get started today. Wow, I'll never forget Melanie Gibbs saying in her interview with Nate Eaton that Lori said to her, well, if Chad's the devil, he sure is a good one. Like there was this moment of, to me, that tells me there was a moment of questioning, sort of like you wondering if he's deceiving you. But before we keep going, I've got to go back to the moment he said, I translated the sealed portion, you read it and you felt it was real. What were your feelings inside?

Thank you for asking me that. It was exciting. What he told me to do was read the sealed portion. Again, at that point it was only eight chapters. He has since completed it. and it's like a really long, but I only had the first eight chapters. So he told me to read the SILB portion and then read the first four Gospels in the New Testament, you know, Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, and then go back to

the Sill portion and go back to the New Testament, go back to the New, so I was intermingling all the good feelings that I had about the Bible and the New, you know, the New Testament and the words of Christ and mingling it right in with the, sealed portion and my brain merged the two and I thought about the joy that I had after I took the leap of faith and became mainstream LDS by believing in the Book of Mormon and I got my witness that it was that he had indeed translated the sealed portion of the book of Mormon. So in other words, your conversion to the mainstream LDS, Roman church allowed you to do the same thing here.

It allowed you to use the same faith and receive the same witness to believe that this man was also telling you the truth. Right. And he supplied evidence as well. He had other people who had testimonies of him. He had, he told me that the church actually was overseeing what he was doing. the fact that he provided these written documents was like proof as well. And then he, so he, oh, he also, he, he was always teaching about helping the poor and needy.

He was very Christ-like. He was a carpenter, just like Christ. He would go around in sandals and very humble and soft-spoken. soft-spoken, and he just seemed like such a Christ-like man. So I thought his demeanor combined with what I thought was my miraculous witness by that dream, combined with my belief in the Book of Mormon, and now here's the seal portion of the Book of Mormon, it just all came together. And little did I know that this man, this ex-Mormon, was,

an ex-mormon, anti-mormon, in my opinion, psychopath. Yeah. I've learned about him and, yeah, I think he's likely a psychopath. I mean, knowing what I know and reading the signs, it's just an opinion, but he had a life of deception in so many ways. And it's interesting because when I think about him and how he used my belief system, he knew I would obey the prophet. He knew that I would submit to the prophet. That's what you do.

I thought I was the wife of the prophet. I thought he would be the one on the other side of the veil, which is when you die, there's a veil, and then the husband comes through and takes your hand and takes you over. to the other side, you know, life after death. I thought he would be that person. This, this podcast season is titled Beyond the Vale. Oh, so they know what that is. No, no, I was going to tell you that. No, they might not.

So for those who don't understand what that means, this is in reference to what you just said, as well as Chad, Daybell, who believes he can see beyond the veil. So that's an important part of this. So he would take you beyond the veil. At this point, how are you feeling about the mainstream LDS Church's profit? Because there's always a prophet at the head. Did you feel that there were two prophets?

Or how did that work out in your brain? That's a great question. In LDS tradition, there's one prophet on the earth at a time. So there's only one mouthpiece for God. However, in the Book of Mormon, there's a story about Samuel the Lamanite. Okay. And there was a prophet in the Americas in, you know, when was it, 380 or whatever. And Samuel came from a different place from outside the mainstream church and preached to the mainstream church.

So my prophet, who I pseudonymed Adam, was like Samuel in the Book of Mormon. So he was from outside the mainstream church, and his job was to bring the mainstream church back into righteousness. So I still believed in the mainstream church, and I thought that what I was doing was for the mainstream church. And when I say what I was doing, by this point, my prophet was putting me through tests. He said that since I was the prophet's wife, I would need to be tested. And when he says you're the prophet's wife, did you two get legal? wet or what does he mean by he being the wife? No. He said that we were married in the way that Malachi married Anna, which was just,

in biblical terms, to know her, to know her was like to consummate. So in other words, because Melachi was a prophet, if he had sex with her, in other words, that made her his wife. So that was that's that was the extent of our ritual. Well, and to be very clear, you were a very righteous LDS woman who did not believe in sex before marriage. You were very strict with that. Absolutely. Absolutely. So it was scary for me. So now that I had been with him, I did not want to get excommunicated. I wanted him to be a prophet. I mean, if he wasn't a prophet, then I had just slept. with somebody I wasn't married to before.

And I had gone through the church disciplinary process before. It was agonizing and horrifying, and I never wanted to do that again. I wanted just to be a straight arrow, go to the temple, and just be a good LDS woman, and particularly a good mother. I had four children who were my absolute life, everything. They were everything to me. And they were not adults at this time. They were children.

No, they were little guys and one daughter. And I had this project, this media project where it was actually a TV show in development. And it was a parent-child show to promote positive parenting. And everything about me was about the mother-daughter or mother-son. You know, it was very mother-oriented. And he knew that was my first priority. Yeah, you were a elementary school teacher. Is that right?

I was a kindergarten teacher. Kindergarten teacher. And you were a ventriloquist. Yes. Yes. Uh-huh. And you were hoping to maybe even start a children's show on television. Yeah, that's right.

And I got funding for it. And guess what? The person who had signed to be my letter of intent to be my co-host was Mickey Rooney. I was succeeding. I was rocking. My manager was the same person who managed Andre Bechelli. So now I've got this pseudo marriage, and I'm thinking I'm going to be the one to help bring polygamy back into the world. I guess that was something that I heard would happen before the second coming.

I think it was very similar to Doomsday Prep because it was in preparation for the second coming. So I'm believing everything, and he's putting me through these tests. And the first test was that I had to sell everything extra. Then it was I had to get rid of my heirlooms. And then it was I had to give up the, I had a beautiful wedding dress that I had collected, dreaming about, you know, when I found my true Mr. Wright. And even though I was with him, I couldn't tell anybody.

It had to be top secret. I could not be known as his wife. So this was a secret relationship. and then he wanted, he told me that I would be helping him translate the civil portion, and in the same way that Joseph Smith got murdered, because he translated the Book of Mormon, I would be at risk. So I needed to make sure my children were safe and they couldn't be with me.

That was his original rationale. Let me just clarify what I'm hearing. My mind is, wow, he's asking you to give up your airlines, everything essentially that matters to you. your heirlooms, your wedding dress, all these things that really mean something to you. And then he's saying, I want your children to be safe so they can't be with you. That's how it started. And then so my two boys went to stay with their father, my two oldest boys, and then I had the younger ones.

And then he said that I needed to, he asked me one day, do you, how much do you love the Lord? And I said, with all my heart, he said, would you die for the Lord? And I said, I would. He said, would you make the sacrifice of Abraham? He asked this. Yes. Oh. And I said, what does that mean?

and he said, you need to give your children up for adoption. What was going through your mind at this moment? Panic. Terror. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. And when he left, I remember walking through the valley, screaming and wailing. Just wailing and wailing. And I thought, what does he mean?

Why would the Lord want this of me? But my brain had turned off its critical thinking because I had slept with him. And I didn't want to lose my soul to hell. And he was the prophet, the mouthpiece of God, saying that if I wanted to be with my children in eternity, I needed to be willing to give them up in mortality. So for two weeks, I was in agony. Absolute agony, not knowing what to do. And then my brain thought of a solution.

I thought, I mean, I was stuck between a rock and a hard place. If he's really a prophet, he's a mouthpiece of God. He can determine whether I'm going to be with, my children in eternity or not. If he's not a prophet, then I'm going to hell because I had slept with him. Oh, wow. So this was a lose-lose for you. There was no good place for you to be.

No. And so then my brain found a solution, and that was that I would test him back. and that if he was really a prophet, he would know that I did not obey that. I changed the custody schedule. So there was doubt in your mind. There was definitely doubt that he might not be a prophet still. Yeah, you know there was. I mean, just one percent, but these were my children.

It's not something I could go through with. Yeah. Well, I was stuck. I really, you know, like I said, my critical thinking had turned off. I'd made all these sacrifices. And, and, and, but this was too much. This was too much. So I said,

I will relay to him that I have done it. And, but there's no fucking way I'm going to do that. But they weren't staying with me. I was then told to move to downtown Salt Lake among the poor needy. So I ended up in this resident hotel, which he approved of,

and he said that's exactly where you need to be and in this hotel it was where people who just got out of prison would stay so i was in this place with 80 it held up to 80 men it was men and then there was me he he approved this place and at this point he thinks just to clarify he thinks your children have been put up for adoption are they with their dad is that what's yeah with their dad and and and my daughter was with friends near me. But I didn't know what the future held. I didn't know if he was really a profit. I didn't know if he would figure it out.

I didn't know if I had, if I disobeyed, you know, what my parameters were, you know, if I would lose them forever, I didn't know. But what happened next was an absolute nightmare. and so I'm crying out I started I started to be harmed in this location can I ask more when you say starting to be harmed yeah I well when it was over I qualified for services as a survivor of sex trafficking okay all right and he knew all this he was behind all this and I'm crying out. I'm suicidal. I've been beaten. I've been...

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The Mickey Rooney Project? Yes, because I was in a state. of absolute severe trauma. I didn't know who I was. I didn't understand what was happening. And he was still sending revelations. By this time he's in jail. And I thought he was falsely in prison

just the way Joseph Smith was. And he was, you know, sending men from his cell that got out before him over to exploit me. Whoa, wait, so what was he in prison for exactly? Violating a protective order against an ex-Polygamous wife. So he's still getting revelations in jail and he... It almost ups his prophet status. This is just like Joseph Smith.

Oh, absolutely. And it's probably why Chad being in prison isn't a problem for Lori, nor even her being in prison. It actually gives you street cred, so to speak. This is the way it goes. It strengthens their testimony that they must be prophet and prophetess if they're being persecuted.

The righteous must suffer. That's what my prophet was telling me. The righteous must suffer and that me as his wife, I had to suffer in such an intense way that it would be like descending below all things. You know, like, and so I felt I was being psychologically tortured and physically harmed.

So he was sending his cellmates or people that got out of prison to come to you and exploit you. Right. That happened. And then I was crying out. He had a revelation that he was to be married legally now, but it was to a different woman. It was to a woman who was over the funds.

You know, there were, there were, the money from me went to. He took your money, all of your money. Yeah, yeah. So the money from me went to this supposed fund to help the poor and needy. You know, and I put in money that I had. I sold things, you know, all that kind of thing. And so this woman was handling these funds to help the poor needy. And I was now poor and needy.

You know, I was destitute and desperate and, you know, in need of therapy, in need of, you know, probably hospitalization. I was definitely in need of rescuing. So I cry out to this woman and say, this just doesn't make sense. If I feel like you are deceiving me because this isn't how God works, he told me that I was being surveilled like there were three men watching me at all times. Does anyone else find themselves saying, I feel way older than I actually am, or I feel way younger. Did you know there might be some truth behind that feeling? That's where true diagnostic comes in. With their true age test, you can discover your true biological age, plus get insights into health risks for heart disease or Alzheimer's, even your mortality. I just

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because the prophet communed with God and I did believe he was the prophet. He was using that power over me to abuse everything in my life, everything that a woman holds near and dear to her heart was stripped from me from my dreams. He tried to take my children to everything, you know my dignity my heirlooms everything and then so this woman in his revelations he says he's going to be

marrying this woman and that i needed to continue obeying him and supporting him and this woman all the days of my mortal probation which means all the days of my life so i was to be a slave all the days of my life for them or I would not be with my children in heaven. Which is all you want. Again, that's Mormonism, to be able to be with our families forever. That's right. To love them forever. So I start reaching out to other people that I thought were believers as well.

You know, there were supposedly some people in, you know, South America. there were emails of other believers that I had sent things to. There was a believer that showed up to the hotel with something, you know, a communication from the prophet. Then there was this woman. And then there were cellmates that were believers, became believers. And when this one cellmate got out of prison jail and came to me, I was a mess.

You know, I mean, I had been suicidal. Were you suicidal at this point? At this point, I was very touch and go. I mean, it was hourly. Yeah. And I remember walking through the bad part of Salt Lake City, just wishing somebody would murder me because I didn't want to commit suicide

because I thought that was against God and I thought, somebody just take me, somebody just kill me but I did do a couple of attempts towards suicide like waiting on the edge of the curb while trucks are going by trying to decide which one to jump in front of because in that in that last revelation that he sent he said that um I mean he made it clear I was nothing you know I was nothing but a slave and in other things he sent that all my sacrifices were in vain because I was not happy. Whoa. So because you weren't happy,

so you were supposed to be being abused and psychologically tortured with a smile on your face. That's right. That's right. So it was as cruel as you could be, as cruel as you could be. So I reach out to this woman. I tell her my life is hanging by a thread. Please let me know if you're deceiving me. And she writes me back and says, neither Adam nor I would ever deceive you not for money not for entertainment

or not for any other reason I'm so humbled that I have been called to be his wife I don't know how I can even do this I just hope that I can't okay so here I am on the edge of life and I'm crying to another woman thinking she will step in right and that she'll say no don't worry you're okay You don't have to listen to him. Right.

She doesn't say, no, he's, he's, she says, no, he would, we would never deceive you. But when this man, this cellmate gets out of jail comes to me, he starts crying. He starts crying. And he, um, his name was Jeff. I'll say his name because he was a hero. His name was Jeff Richens. And he went and got that woman. It brought her back to see what.

had become of my life. And they came clean. And they said, he's a fraud. Hmm. You know? And this was his cellmate in prison. Who posed as a believer. This is his fiancee who posed as a believer.

Here, I thought I was his wife. And, but the whole time he had an actual fiancé. Which was this woman. Which, and together, they kind of, I think, brought out the worst in each other. and I was just a human experiment. And what they told me is that they were all atheists. None of them were believers. That the prophet said I needed it.

I needed this experience to teach me a lesson because I would not break my faith. He could not break my faith. So I needed it. And he told them that if they told me, that I would die. So when I learned this, I remember being on my knees,

falling to my knees and like rocking back and forth, just rocking and crying and wailing. Were they there at this point? Yeah, yeah. Yeah, and I remember just wailing because, you know, they believed I had given my children up for adoption. She believed it, and she didn't even step in.

Wow. And so I just had a breakdown then, you know, that she knew that whole time. But she thought you'd given them up. Right. And yet wouldn't tell you the truth. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

She was willing to let you lose your children to play her little game. And she knew I was being, I sent, you know, an email I'm being, I've been raped and beaten and robbed. And if this is not true, please, I'm suicidal. Please tell me. And nothing. Oh, no. It's all true. you know and but with Jeff Richens she came and told you the truth finally he made her he took

it took hours to drag her there and he and he they came clean they said none of the people were who they said they were so I my entire world is crashing down like buildings coming down from this guy like I did not know how the world worked I didn't know if prayer was real. I didn't know if there was a God. I didn't know if the utility man was really the utility man. I didn't trust anybody. I didn't trust anything. All I knew is that I was in trauma. I needed help. I had nothing left. I had been a successful person on the verge of really making a difference in the world for children. And it was gone.

And I didn't, I was homeless. And I wanted to just go back and have a nice life with my children again. And all of my dreams, everything was gone. I had physical trauma. I couldn't get a therapist because in Utah, they decided, I did go to the police. But in Utah, they decided that I was a victim of fraud and that victims of fraud don't get victims advocates.

Oh, wow. Okay, so hold on. Whoa. So you go to police, you shared with him how he lied and how he, did you talk about the rape and the sexual abuse? Not at first. You know, I'd come out of purity calls. with Mormonism.

And so, but I did say, and there's more that happened that was worse. And I just expected them to pry about that, but they didn't. I mean, the fraud alone should allow you to get a victim's advocate. When I didn't get a victim's advocate, then I said, okay, I was also sexually assaulted repeatedly. So, you know, and I had the evidence. Yes.

You know, I had my medical records. I had witnesses. I want everyone to know too, although we're not using his name, and for many reasons. I know who this is, and I've seen the evidence. And this story is real. This is a very real story. I just want everyone to know that, and the evidence is real. And I was told that the law enforcement doesn't want to get involved in things that involve

fringe religion. Victim blaming. Yeah, total victim blaming. I should have known. and I should have not, and they said, how could you believe that somebody translated the sole portion of the Book of Mormon? So here we are in Utah where everybody believes that the sealed portion of the Book of Mormon will come out. But I should have known that that wasn't true.

But, you know, I was a convert in the first place. It just felt the same. And, you know, because of those coincidences like that dream, which, by the way, later I learned that this man had gone to the same educational, program that I had gone to during the exact same months. And so he was there. It was the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California, in the Russian program. I was in that.

And he was too, at the same time. So my brain just picked his face. Wouldn't you know it? I would have the perfect storm coincidence that my dream would pick the face of the man this ex-mormon anti-mormon psychopath kind of guy. And I would think, there he is. The man that God wants for me. Someone who wanted to use you as a human experiment.

Yeah. Which is what he did. Yeah. To feel powerful. I'm sure he had a motive. I'm sure power was one of them. I think that's one reason we're choosing not to use his name. He's still alive.

And he might want. you know, people to know he did this. Yes, I think he's proud of it. I think he's proud of it. My life took a turn that I never expected, and healing was brutal. It was brutal. Letting go of the self-blame was impossible,

especially when, you know, everywhere I turned people were like, well, you made your own bed, you sleep in it. That's incredible. So this victim blaming was so intense, everywhere you went, you're a fringe, you know, religious group. He wasn't punished for doing this to you. There was no justice.

No justice. At all. He wasn't even interviewed. He even threatened me. Okay, so a judge told him, no contact with your victims. And he was in jail still. And he called a newspaper reporter who recorded the phone call. And he said, you tell Christa.

If she doesn't drop charges, I will destroy her. So I call the, you know, detective and say he's threatened me. And I got a case number for witness tampering and retaliation. And they don't even go and pick up the audio tape. Wow. So it's been hard that, you know, some things in life, you just don't get justice for. It's very devaluing to a woman

to have that happen and no one care. The treatment you have received, it's incredible to me. I know. I tried for, it took moving to California and having several PTSD relapses before I was identified as a survivor of trafficking in that situation. And then I,

I got the proper therapy that I needed, and then I understood, and then I could finally let go of the self-blame, because in my situation, there was force, fraud, and coercion. That is not consent. I did not do it to myself. It took years for me to really get that through my head. And so I gather my family back together. It was hard to find the little bits of money and become stable again. and I moved to California and I met my futurehood. Most people don't realize how much their personal information is being bought and sold every day. Data brokers are making billions, pulling details about you from public records and the Internet, and then packaging and selling it, usually without your consent.

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about your story and this man who did this to you. And in the article, it was by a male journalist. They victim shamed you intensely. They said, they started the article off by saying, well, she's learned her lesson. Right. So what you are saying is not an exaggeration. I just want everyone to know. I was shocking to read some of the articles at the time. Thank you.

So my husband and I, we started a technology company and we were succeeding. We moved to Las Vegas. And I thought, I started helping people who came out of polygamous situations because I had thought that that fiancee of his was my sister wife. I mean, even though I got demoted from first wife to slave wife, I still thought she was to be my sister wife. So I thought I was in this polygamous situation. Or, you know, I mean, as soon as he got out of prison, I thought we would all be like this family thing. So I'm, so I became very anti-pilogamy because I saw the coercion and how how people can use their power, their religious power over you.

And you're really a goner if you believe in the wrong person and you believe in that person fervently. And I actually feel sorry for the woman that he did marry, which was his fiancé. He stayed married to her just until the statute of limitations expired. You know, she moved on. I'm pretty sure she was a victim of his too in her own way and you know I don't want to shame her for the pressure that she was under but she some of the emails that were abusive to me

came from her email yes and I've read some of those and so I got over it you know it took me a while but I got over it and then I thought you know I can use it took me like a decade to study how the brain worked. I wanted to know, how could this possibly happen to me? I thought I was, you know, I never thought I was Einstein or anything, but I thought I was a smart woman. I remember you're telling me this. You went and wanted to know if you had autism or, you know, or if something, there was something hidden about you that you didn't know. Yeah, I thought this would never happen to anybody else. It would only happen to me because there was something wrong with my brain. And as I learned about cult mind control and that it's happened to hundreds of thousands,

if not millions of people, it was such a relief to me. Because what my brain did, take note of this, this is really important, but what my brain did in that situation is what it needed to do to survive. Because if I would not have found a way to keep holding on in that impossible situation, I would have killed myself. But I hung on. And when I first got rescued, my cause was to get involved in suicide prevention because I was, that was what I thought would be something good that came out of this.

But I later turned my attention into being an anti-polygamy activist and was on a couple of, you know, docu-series helping people get out of, young people get out of, of polygamous situations. Well, then I decided to move to Short Creek thinking, I have this knowledge now. I understand psychology. I understand cult psychology. You're going to go help all these women that are polygamous. You're going to just get them all out of there. Yeah.

Because they're all being abused clearly. Yes. It's like, you know, and so. Idealistic Christine on a mission. Right. So I moved to Colorado to Short Creek area, which is Hildo, Utah, and Colorado City, Arizona. I start helping people that were. were out of the church.

I never imagined that I would gain the trust of the people that are still FLDS, especially since I was a high-profile anti-pilogamy activist. But I did, and that's a story in and of itself. Here's the moral of that story. You can't help somebody if they think you're trying to attack them and kill them and destroy them. And I could not be an anti-polygamy activist and make any difference in the lives of the people there if they were living in a plural marriage situation. Even the people who leave the FLDS, they stay in their polygamous relationships. You can leave a religion. You don't really

leave a family. That's a whole other thing. Right. And there are many, many, many plural relationships in that community that don't want out of those relationships. They're not FLDS anymore, but they want to keep that family intact. Hildale, Utah just elected their first female mayor. I reported on that when I was there, and she is ex-FLDS. And she was a polygamist when she became mayor, someone that she raised a family with. Right. Right. And now I have a charity called Voices for Dignity. What I've learned is that no matter what people believe, they still deserve help, just like I did. I had people that wouldn't help me when I needed a hand from anybody. I needed understanding I needed therapy. I needed anything. I needed a piece of bread. And for people to withhold that, even the mainstream LDIA's church, I went.

to them because I thought that they had been overseeing this and just didn't know how bad it got. I thought I took one for the team, you know? And the church wasn't there for me. They said that they were not allowed to help someone like me. In what sense? What's the word that they used in the Temple Recommend interviews? I had affiliated with French religious. Wait, what was that?

You had affiliated with people against the church or... Right. that you were following someone besides the prophet. Right. So I had, that was considered, that made me an apostate. So they're only seeing this too. Sort of like, we can't help you because you're doing this and this is your fault. You shouldn't have known.

You shouldn't have affiliated with this man. He has a polygamous history. And so I walked over to the LDS church headquarters and said, I need to warn you about somebody who goes to LDS dances and searching for women. He's a predator. Yeah. And the church security, man that I spoke to, said, oh yeah, we know him. We have a file two feet high on this guy.

And I thought, why did you let him in the dance? Really. And I told him what happened. I was crying. I was always crying. and I told him I need help. And he said, go talk to your bishop. I think you need to clear up, you know, your sins with the bishop.

He wanted me to go confess what I had done. When, you know, my big sin that I had done was that I had flawed thinking. I had flawed thinking, that's for sure. And I take responsibility for my flawed thinking. thinking by learning how to think critically, by no longer relying on magical thinking or feelings or coincidences, you know, by studying and by, I went, you know, I went back to school. I have a PhD now. I'm Dr. Christine now. And so I've taken responsibility for my role in what happened to me. But I don't need to confess what I did wrong, which

is an issue that I have with Utah. You know, what would make me really happy is to one day have the chance to speak before the lawmakers and say, you know, you have to stop failing your women. This is what happened to me. There was no opportunity

for me to have justice of any kind, not one dollar back, not one audience with a lawmaker, nothing, you know, and let alone all the many, many, many crimes that he has committed since me that would not have happened. And again, that is my opinion, that he hasn't been convicted of any crimes, but he has certainly been reported time and time and time again,

and he just slips through the cracks every time. So when the Lori Vallow and Chad Daybell story came out, people contacted me. because when they saw Chad, they thought of my prophet. Adam. Yeah. We would call him. Right. Adam.

And they thought, you know what? They did the same thing that I did, which was make the assumption that Adam is the ring later and that he's manipulating her. Because that's what happened to me. Yeah. But I don't know. I do see a lot of similarities. You know, there's the sealed portion or the translating ancient scriptures

making yourself into a prophet. There's the gathering. That's what I was supposed to be helping with as well. There's having a publishing company and publishing a large amount of books because a real publisher won't take your books. So you need that ego stroke of having your own publishing company.

Yeah. Sounds familiar. And I want to say for people to understand, too, that there were the seven missions, again, that Chad wrote to Lori in an email, and many of those missions are also what we're talking about, the translating of the scriptures. And then this Reddit email that we have brought up before, this infamous Reddit email that was written by someone, you know, it was either Melanie Gibb or law enforcement, take your pick in my opinion. but it said that Chad and Lori got sealed in the temple or a pretend sealing while their spouses were still alive.

And as Anna Labaran pointed out on our live interview on YouTube and your friends with Anna, you know Anna. I love Anna. Yeah, you love Anna. She quickly said, there's polygamy involved here too. That's polygamy. That's what you were going through. So what I went through was pseudo polygamy because I believed it was, you know, or in

that template, but it turned out everything I believed was false. But I will say that he did not accomplish his goal of annihilating my belief in a higher power. It failed. Beautiful. Yeah. He failed. And now, but I want to say something, I went through a lot of trauma. And there's something called post-traumatic stress disorder, which of course I had.

but there's also something called post-traumatic growth. And that is when you become stronger and better than you would have if that wouldn't have happened to you. It's not just learning from it. It's where you actually, you go through the refiner's fire and you find a whole new purpose. And that has been my joy. Now I look back on it all and I'm happy for every part of it. I mean, I wish it wouldn't have happened because I was on a really great path, but I'm on a different path because now I can relate.

I am in a position where I'm an intermediary for the FLDS and different parts of the outside world. And that's a first. I'm able to get therapy services into these women, which never happened before. And not if they leave the church now. That's right. And I learned that it doesn't matter if somebody believes differently from you

or if you don't like what they believe, they still deserve to have civil rights. They still deserve humanitarian support. And we should not use a person's religion as a filter to determine whether or not we should be kind to them. I believe that if we can be kind to people who are different from us, we can change the world. That's probably the biggest lesson that I learned. Instead of blaming everybody for the harm that came to them or for the terrible things that you think they believe,

you know, why not reach out with unconditional love and see if you can make a difference? You're not going to change anybody's mind by attacking them. You don't change minds through attacks and through facts. You change minds through caring and emotion and helping people learn to think for themselves. Another way to say that is you thought you were going to Short Creek to hold up giant science all these women and say, look, look, you're being deceived. Come with me. Come with me. Come with me. Let's go. And when you got there, you realized that's an attack to that. That's an attack. Exactly. That's an attack. I'm never going to be able to help these wonderful women and these wonderful families, these wonderful children, if I'm trying to take them away from something that they love dear. That's right. And you can't force people to change their beliefs anyway. And I want to tell you I do love these people. They're nothing like they're portrayed in the media. I'm not sanitizing the fact that there has been abuse. Of course.

This is, and I'll say it, this is Warren Jeff's community. Warren Jeff's. in prison for sexually abusing children. And he's been in prison since 2006. Now, keep in mind, Warren Jeff's has been in prison since 2006. I want you to know that that's when George Bush was president. Saddam Hussein was still alive. Okay, that's how long he's been in prison. He's not running the town from prison.

You know, you keep seeing media pieces that like to portuguese. betray him that way. Because he's such a good bad guy. He can't fight back. You can't defend yourself from those kinds of convictions. And so. And that is the face we see with this community today. That's right, which makes it very difficult for me when I need to get school desks for the children or things to help the mothers. People will say, why should I donate to? people who believe in him. You know? And instead, you know, the donations go to the charities that help the people who've left.

But I also help people who have left. And we also help people if they choose to leave. You help humans. Right. It's not an if. There's no if with what you do. Right. Right.

I just figure we all need to stop judging and start helping. And how can somebody gain trust in the outside world if every message that they get is, that you're despised in the outside world. Their children deserve as much help as the rest of the children in the world. They've been through a lot, and guess what? I get to accomplish my mission of trying to help children. You were a victim who never got justice because you were part of a fringe religious group,

and so I see you now heading to go live in a place many people would not have chosen to go live to be that victim's advocate to people in a fringe religious group. The victim's advocate you never got. Oh, thank you. Thank you. In fact, when we met, I think it was over the story.

We had four FLDS women get certified as sexual assault victims advocates. That was a story. So they can help when one of their own has, you know, has an issue. Yeah, and they are FLDS, not X, FLDS women who are victims advocates. And just so you don't worry about me, because I told a pretty intense story, I am very, very happy. We have a little petting farm.

My animals are like emotional. support animals. I live in the most beautiful place on earth. I'm married to it. Zion is in the background of this beautiful place on earth. That's true. And I'm married to a Turkish prince who loves me. And I have amazing children. And I'm continuing to do research in my area, which is, you know, the trauma of media misrepresentation and dehumanization and victim shaming. Wouldn't you know it? And so life is beautiful for me. And I just want to make life beautiful for as many people as I can. Thank you. I have to ask, we told your story, what helped create you, you know, the growth, the post-traumatic growth, but also the comparisons

to, as you pointed out, to this tragedy, Chad and Lori Dayball that we've been covering. I've asked everyone I've interviewed this. And I want to ask you, but I want to ask you a couple more questions too because you know none of us know that charges haven't come down yet i mean maybe they will have come down by the time this is published because i think something's happening but you have a bias and you know that but do you feel like your profit the man who manipulated you who was a complete fraud do you feel like chat is a complete fraud as he does this do you think he doesn't believe. I wonder about that. You know, my instinct is to compare him to my prophet who was, you know, just a master deceiver just year after year after year after year, a new deception

then the next and then the next. He didn't believe any of it. So through that filter, I wonder, but I haven't studied Chad enough to know, but I don't think that they're the same in that regard. I'm thinking that Chad is pulling rank using his using this religious story to get ranked to have won her over because I mean how perfect. He is the mouthpiece of God. So anything that she wants. It's cozy season and nothing compares to wrapping yourself in a Minky Couture BlanketkaTor Blanket. Luxuriously soft, perfectly warm, thoughtfully made. From movie nights to chilly mornings, Minky Couture turns everyday moments into pure comfort. Once you feel it, you'll understand why it's called the original best blanket ever.

Visit minky couture.com or a store near you and make this cozy season your softest one yet. wants to do, she can, you know, get a true reading whether it's good or not. And I do think that Chad knows he's lying. I do think that he is a deceiver. And I also have room for believing that he might believe some of it. Okay. But I know I am pretty confident. he's not having conversations with God the father.

I can, yeah, I'm pretty confident. Yeah, and I think he knows that too. Okay. You know? Yeah. Lori, I don't want to comment on too much. Does she really believe it? Do you think she really believes it?

I do think she believes it. Okay. I do. I think she was hyper-religious and, you know, had coincidences probably like I had, that she uses those coincidences or maybe they were faked miracles that, you know, Chad arranged or something, I believe she has some sort of evidence in her mind that makes it all true. She said in a call with Melanie Gibb that was recorded, I know this is true and she said these words, I cannot deny it. That's what my prophet said to. My false prophet, he said,

he made up this story about how he was similar to Joseph Smith and he had this first vision and he said I know this is true and I cannot deny it and I think that's a cop out you know Lori might believe it but I still think she's probably questioning okay her mental state is in big question right now I think we're going to know more soon her mental state should be in question because in people who have hyper-religiosity, I know that there is often damaged to the prefrontal cortex, and I wonder, you know, if that has happened to her, it's hard for me to relate,

considering the outcome of the children. Right. Your two choices were very different. Your prophet said, get rid of your kids through adoption, and you couldn't do it. Chad likely asked Lori of this and she did it. And it was worse than adoption. So do I think Chad believes what he's saying?

It's really hard for me to believe that he actually believes all the things that he's saying. I think he's on an ego trip and that he has picked up ideas from different people. you know, I imagine that he thinks maybe he is godlike. And so if it comes from him, you know, it should be followed. But as far as she goes, I think she's got to have, there's something, I think there's a big piece of the puzzle that we're missing. Maybe it'll come out in charges. Maybe she's got, you know, brain damage.

maybe, you know, people have epileptic seizures that can be experienced as awe and as, you know, divine experiences. I don't know, but she's definitely not using her critical thinking. And she's definitely a believer in your opinion, definitely believing all of this. I do believe she believes it. I speculate that she probably believes her children are in heaven and that whatever happened to them was a good thing. And I just can't imagine her world when she becomes aware that all of this was a hoax.

He knows he's not speaking to God and he's not a prophet. He knows he's not speaking to God. You know, I don't know if he believes any of it. I mean, I have to compare him to, my con man sociopath, psychopath person, I mean, it just seems to me like he was riffing and making things up as he went along and got attention for it and expanded on it, wrote fiction about it, turned, you know, changed the story, said it's real and it just sounds so much like, you know, Adam. You know, one minute he's saying he wrote the sealed portion

himself the next minute he translated it by the gift and power of God just like Joseph Smith the next minute he says oh he lied about that he really did write it and the next minute he says there is no premortal life or there's no reincarnation and then you know five years later he's teaching reincarnation and he's just a shapeshifter and he would learn and read other people's works and kind of amalgamate them and bring out a new iteration of it all and I suspect that Chad probably has done something similar. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

As he? Some of his concepts seems like he's pulled from this person or that person. Everywhere. Everywhere from offshoot Mormon obscure groups, you know, Julie Rowe to Twilight to Star-Tor. Trek to Hollywood films. I mean, I mean, there's to Joseph Smith to the Book of Mormon. One thing I feel pretty confident about is that he has no original ideas that I've seen.

Right. Right. So I wonder if this is all just a big Dungeons and Dragons game to him. You know, just living out of fiction like he writes in these last. touch with reality. In my doctoral program, one of the things that I learned about is priming in the brain and how when you prime the brain, the brain is more likely to see something that isn't there or see something in a certain way. For example, there was a study done where people had to put money in a box. It was called the honesty box at work for a carton of milk.

And one week, there would be a calendar by the box that had flowers. The next week, it would have eyes. And on the weeks when it had eyes, people were more honest. And yet at the end of the study, they hadn't even consciously made the awareness that there were eyes or that the calendar was changing, and yet somehow feeling like they were being watched, made them more honest. In my case, I had a picture on my wall of Maroni, the angel Maronai, kneeling down with the gold plates. So it was more real to me.

In Mormonism, you have all these stories of prophets and supernatural people, people that live forever. There are books about it, and it's very real in your world. So the world that Lori and Chad are coming out of is like a fertile garden for Chad to experiment with some of his fictional things and making them seem real. Priming is so interesting. We think we're in charge of all of our thoughts. But there's a mentalist named Derek Brown. He did a study or an experiment with two marketers and his goal was to prime them from the time they got off the train to the time they got to the office to prime them with messages they were not consciously aware of so that when they came into his office and he asked them can you make up a slogan for my

taxidermy business that they would make up a slogan similar to what he had intentionally primed them with. And the results were stunning. And you can see this on YouTube. And it was something like all good dogs go to heaven or something like that. He had written the slogan and the picture that he wanted in advance and placed it on the table under something. And so when they came up with theirs, it was so similar to the one that was already on their table. And they were like, how did this happen? And that's an example of priming because our brain will not even realize that we're grabbing onto things. And they're influencing our decisions. And that's what happened to me too.

Going to church every Sunday and believing in Joseph Smith and singing, we thank the O God for a prophet and studying everything I could about the Book of Mormon and things that are not logical became realistic to me when they were illogical. And I don't know how much of that contributed to the thought process or the irrationality of what happened and the tragedy in Lori's life. But I just think that in order to understand her, we have to understand that our our brain's plate tricks on us. And nobody is immune.

Yeah, nobody. No one. And thank you for sharing that important lesson, that no one is immune. Tell us a little bit about Voices for Dignity. Thank you. Voices for Dignity is a 501C3 based in Utah. And we help people who have been dehumanized or misrepresented in the media or exploited, oppressed, that kind of thing.

We do a lot right now to help empower FLDS women and children, assist with housing stability and food stability, education, and different fun activities and so on therapy. But we also help people who have been misrepresented and exploited and dehumanized in the media that are not related to the FLDS. So it's another cause. And right now with some,

much cyber mobbing and online rage and media exploitation. I do a lot of individual fielding of phone calls and people who are really suffering because of that. The media misrepresentation has really harmed an entire community in Short Creek. But on an individual basis, it's like everybody is at risk right now of doing something wrong and then having their entire life devastated because of a mistake. Yes, I feel that. Right. The thing is, it's public shaming and public humiliation. People are getting involved in doing this to others. And, you know, the reason they do it is because maybe they're projecting their own rage. I mean, their own harm, maybe they're attributing, finding somebody to get even with because they didn't get justice or maybe there's something called third party punishment, which happens in every culture, where, even if you don't know somebody, you want to get involved in punishing them because it tells the world that you're one of the good ones. So we do this to people and we publicly humiliate

and shame them. It happened to me, you know, in the various media pieces, except for you. Thank you. You were so kind and sensitive and it was, you're really special and ethical and how you do your media. I was really honored when you did let me and allow me to interview incredible women that were FLDS. So thank you. They are. They are wonderful. And one of the many morals of the story here, I developed a tender heart for people who've been just publicly shamed for, you know, for obvious reasons. And I just hope that, you know, we can all work together to be more sensitive and stop hating people that are different. Just, just see people for the human beings they are because we're all flawed. I think another point.

to make too is this tragedy with Lori and Chad DeBal really is in essence a story and a tragedy of dehumanization. John and I have talked a lot about that in past episodes and we plan to bring it up soon again in our next episodes that what Chad did and what Lori did was dehumanized people We called them zombies. They put them in a place where they didn't matter as much as the other people. There were the gatherers and there was dark and there was light. Chad's entire system is one of dehumanizing. And I think that in our own lives and what you've learned through your studies

and through being Dr. Christine in your life experiences is that we can all dehumanize if we're not careful. We can all say, oh, that FLDS group that's led by Warren Jeff's in prison or, oh, those prairie dresses, or, oh, they don't deserve my money, or any other group that we might marginalize without even realizing it, maybe the political party that we don't agree with, and those politicians in that party, maybe someone whose views we dislike so. much we dehumanize that person that those views are coming from. And I think that that's what you and I have talked about a lot, Christine, is how we're all capable of dehumanizing. Even me in this

case, I have been so snarky sometimes on social media because this case, this tragedy makes me so angry. I won't deny that. That being snarky and mocking some people involved makes me feel good for the moment, you know. And so I'm here to say I have not been perfect in this situation. And I think the lesson that I keep coming back to is Chad and Lori dehumanized. And that's why this tragedy happened. And so to not be like them, we need to all check our biases and acknowledge that we are dehumanizing even when we don't realize it. Absolutely. We can't hurt people that we see as warm and wonderful human beings. I mean, dehumanization was the beginning of the Holocaust.

It's how, you know, it's how wars are started, how humiliation happens. And humiliation is called a nuclear bomb of emotions. It's the most intense human emotion. When you feel dehumanized, you are humiliated. That could result in many tragic outcomes. And so I love your summary here that we all, need to be more humanizing and stop stereotyping and labeling and deciding that we're better than

some other group because that's what started that whole tragedy. Right. And it could be while Chad and Lori dehumanized others to the point of death and murder and destruction, I think the point of mine and Jod's podcast is that they were both likely dehumanized at some point in their life too. And really that is the cycle. And so we have to all take apart in trying to stop that cycle. So thank you, Christine, for being here.

A surprise guest that nobody even was planning on. Thank you for having me here. Thank you for doing this podcast. Yes, and thank you for all that you've taught us. Until next time. And next time, everyone, I'll be planning on going to Short Creek myself. And take a video camera with us then. and we'll do some wonderful things for YouTube

to introduce you to this wonderful community so you can see the wonderful humans that live here and the work that Dr. Christine does. So thank you so much. You can find and follow Dr. Christine, her work and bits of her life in Short Creek on Instagram at Dr. Christine Marie. That's dr.christine Marie.

Her website, you can check that out, is victim blaming.com. As far as Hidden a True Crime podcast goes, you can learn more about us on our Facebook page, facebook.com slash hidden true crime, and again on our YouTube channel, Hidden True Crime. Now, something I want to bring up, in response to Sean Little Bear's interview last week on our YouTube channel, Julie Rowe, a prominent member of the preparing community, posted a response on her YouTube channel, mentioning me, our podcast, and calling out Sean Little Bear. Julie was angry and her video has now been viewed thousands of times.

Many have asked Dr. John's thoughts on Julie's response and her video. Dr. John did decide to share some initial thoughts on our Patreon account, patreon.com slash hidden true crime. Also, as a side note, Julie Rose says in that video of hers that we've never asked her for an interview and we absolutely have reached out as early as October of last year. still like to talk to Julie Rowe and are willing to listen. Hidden is willing to listen to you to our listeners. If you have something to say or to inform us about the workings of the Lori and Chad Daybell case or anything related to the case, please email us at hidden truecrime at

gmail.com. Thank you for spending dinner with us. And as always, please let your friends know we have a seat for them too. Hello, Hidden Gems. It's Lauren with Hidden a True crime podcast for exclusive content, things Dr. John and I only dare say behind a paywall, become a Patreon member at patreon.com slash hidden true crime. You'll find bonus episodes, early releases, and insider info. Thank you for your endless support. Most people don't realize how much their personal information is being bought and sold every day. Data brokers are making billions, pulling details about you from public records and the internet, and then packaging and selling it, usually without your consent.

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