Hidden True Crime - "I Mourn With You Too" | Psychologist Reacts to Lori Vallow Daybell's Final Sentencing

Episode Date: July 27, 2025

**This episode was recorded live** The victims spoke. Lori did too. And the judge didn’t hold back. Dr. John Matthias analyzes the psychology behind it all—what Lori said, what she didn’t, and what it means. About Hidden True Crime: What started as a simple conversation at their dinner table became a captivating podcast. Join the dynamic duo of Dr. John Matthias, a criminal psychologist, and Lauren Matthias, an investigative journalist, as they delve into the psychological facets of unthinkable crimes every week. Their unique perspectives and in-depth analysis offer a fresh take on true crime storytelling. Thank you for your support through sponsorships, subscribing, listening, and becoming a Patreon member at Patreon.com/HiddenTrueCrime Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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provided through our affiliated medical group, Weight Watchers Clinic. Medications require eligibility and prescription. Individual results may vary. See site for more details. Hello, hidden true crime. Hello, hidden gems. We or I am live from Phoenix, Arizona, where I just attended the sentencing of Lori Balladeva, the second sentencing that I have attended for her, this time for the murder of her, then-husband Charles Vallow, and the attempted murder of Brandon Boudreau. This is Hidden True Crime. I am with my co-host and my husband also. I never know what to introduce you as.

Dr. John Matthias, he is a clinical and forensic psychologist, and he has assessed criminals for decades. And this is a case that we have covered from the very beginning. In fact, as we watched the victim impact statements, John from our home and me inside the courtroom, we were watching many of our friends. We were watching their pain and their sorrow of people that we have gotten to know and care about as they shared their grief. And it was really heart-wrenching. And this was just hours ago and I'm actually still recovering a little bit. So people actually, admittedly, I'll just say this, complain that I've gotten too attached to this case emotionally. Yeah, I have.

I have. And I felt that in the courtroom today. And so, yeah. And John, I would love to hear your take. You watched it from home from the court TV. But having said that, I'm going to defend you on that because I don't think it's detracted from your ability to be objective and present the facts of the case. Thank you. Yeah, that's fair. I am emotionally connected, but I remain objective and

remain as someone who reports the facts. Thank you. I guess what I'm trying to say is, yes, I am emotionally invested in this case as a journalist, but yes, I remain a journalist. And thank you. Thank you for this. And I feel emotionally attached to the case as well. You and I have been covering this case for five years, and I've been pretty vocal about the fact that one of the reasons that I found this case so compelling is that JJ reminded me a great deal of our son. And every time I think about the Dave L case, I think about our son and JJ and what it would be like to experience that loss. And so I feel some emotional attachment to this case as well. And I've gotten to know people on the case as well. In addition to you, I've

developed relationships with the Woodcock and some other people on the case. and so I feel some emotional connection to the case. But again, I think I'll never let those emotional connections detract from my assessment of a case or whatever insights I'm developing, you know, I'll always try, you know, no matter what, I'll try to tell the truth and be as honest and accurate as possible, even if there are emotional attachments. I also want to say that we heard for the first time ever from JJ's biological father, Todd. It was an incredible opportunity for him for us to witness his victim impact statement.

And like you, yeah, I connect to many people. And I shared as much with John DeLinn in the Mormon stories interview. I recently did, a long-form interview, that I connect. a lot with Tammy Daybell. I thought a lot about her. My story, she has touched me. Tammy Daybell, getting married so young. And I do believe she was emotionally abused and to Tiley being deemed difficult because she spoke her mind, being deemed dark in the end. Yeah, so many, connections to so many of these victims. And right. But John, I'm going to turn the time over to you. It sounds like we're in a classroom. I'm going to turn the time. I'm going to turn

the time over to you, Dr. Matthias. Am I giving a presentation? Is that my assignment? I'm going to go to the Blackboard. No, we're going to continue our conversation, but I'm going to let you talk more than me now, and I'm going to mute myself. That's what I'm going to do.

So, you know, I feel like talking about some of our emotional connections to this case is a good intro because I'll start with Judge Breske. One of the things Judge Breske began with was this, He started by saying that in today's world, that there seems to be this assault or this attack on truth. And then he reminded us that in the courtroom, no matter what he thinks or feels about the case, the jurors are the ones who are responsible for determining the truth. And so the judge directs the process. The judge is the conductor.

The judge obviously has to know the law to allow certain evidence in or out based upon facts. right, but the judge is still guided by facts and evidence. It's the jurors that determine the outcome of the trial, and it's the jurors who are responsible for determining what's true and what's not. So my quotes here are from my notes. I haven't had time to go back and get the full quotes. So these are going to be a little bit inaccurate. They're going to be kind of paraphrasing. So keep that in mind if people say, That's not exactly what he said. Okay, yes, I know it isn't.

It's my notes. Judge Breske said, towards the end of his final statement, he said that Lori Daybell, Lori prayed on the vulnerabilities of others. She used the tools of control and harm. Some people lost their sense of self and their ability to distinguish truth from falsehood. And I think that's important

because this idea of, I think when we look back on Daybell at some point, I don't know, maybe a decade down the road, maybe less, I'm not sure, but I can argue that some of this is a sign of the times. Some of this has to do with the attack on truth in our society, in our world. And Lori Daybell is an expression of that. She's symbolic of that. She's an extreme example, but she's someone who has so clearly lost her capacity to interpret reality, whatever that is, or to interpret the world, evidence, facts, that she lives in this delusional world. She lives in this fantasy world. And not only does she live in that world, but she got to the point where that world was so compelling for her that she believed she had to act. out that fantasy. It's one thing for somebody to live in a fantasy world. It's another for someone to

act out that fantasy. In fact, acted out to such an extreme degree that you commit murders. And that's what happened here. So not only is this an attack on the truth, it's an immersion in this fantasy world that divorces us, detaches us from reality from the truth. Right. And so I really appreciated Judge Boreski's comment that a lot of people were unable to distinguish truth from falsehood in this world, right? In this world that Chad Dayball and Lori created, there was no truth in falsehood. There was only truth. And it was the truth of zombies and possession and like portals, right? All this stuff that you and I have kind of, you know, brought to light over the years, but also kind of made fun of in a way. I mean, it's not funny. People were murdered, obviously. But

I mean, when you talk about portals, right, these people believed in portals. You got to laugh at the stupidity sometimes. When you believe in portals and, you know, I mean, yeah, you know what, I suspend. There's a certain amount of disbelief I have to have to watch a Marvel movie. You know, Dr. Strangelove and Dr. Strangelove, there were a lot of portals, you know, people were being transported all over the place and they're like different dimensions and times. And like, okay, you know, that was, that worked well in a Marvel movie or maybe it's DC.

I don't know. I'm getting confused here. Somebody can correct me. But, you know, yeah, the movie works as fiction. You know, it works if you're watching a Marvel comic about portals. But, I mean, in the real world, you know, I wish there were portals because then you could like portal home tomorrow morning in less than a minute, right? But because you live in the real world, you have to take a plane.

that's usually the way that's usually the way the real world works and not only you have to take a plane but you have to pay for it so it's expensive and time consuming and inconvenient but not in their world in their world when they wanted to visit each other

they would just call up this portal and you know I talked about how my vision of the portal by the way was that it was like in the back of Chad's closet and there was like a little bull's eye back there and Chad would like you know get a running start or Lori, they'd get a running start and just like dive into the portal somehow.

And I guess the closet would open up. But they did say it was in the closet. That is true. Yeah. Yeah. And I guess, you know, you have to hit the bullseye exactly right if you want to make it work. And you have to have a certain amount of velocity I would imagine to hit the portal correctly.

But this is an important idea. I mean, I know I'm kind of making fun of this because it's absurd. But it's an important idea because Judge Boreski starts off with the idea. of truth and falsehood. And basically reminds us and reminds Lori, because Lori goes off on this, we'll talk about Lori's statement in a little bit, but she goes off on this tangent

that she always goes off on about how the legal system is rigged, and God's warriors are all going to reconvene at the end of days, and they're all going to walk out of prison. I mean, it's the same story, more or less, right? And it's the same fantasy. It's all fantasy.

Judge Boreski reminds us that when you take 12 people from different backgrounds, different ethnicities, different socioeconomic status, that are more or less chosen randomly, I mean, I guess there is some element of randomness, but when you take 12 people and you put them in a room and they're all from these different backgrounds and you present them with evidence, they're responsible for determining what's true, for determining a verdict. And, you know, the amazing thing about that is oftentimes they get it right. I think most of the time they get it right. Yeah.

And that, by the way, doesn't mean people are happy about some of the verdicts that they reach. But, and you and I have covered cases where we've seen that. I'm not going to mention those cases because I want to focus on this case. The jury doesn't always get it right, but the majority of the time. I want to mention, too, that not only did Judge Boreski talk about this idea of truth, but K. But Kay Woodcock did several times. And I want to quote Kay here because I want this to set the stage for our analysis tonight. And it's so important.

You know, I think it's important that Kay and several other people did. But Kay, I think, really put a lot of emphasis on this. Kay said in this, again, I'm paraphrasing here a little. I'm going to be close. Maybe not exact. But Kay said, truth doesn't lie. And now the truth has destroyed you. Wow. Yeah.

When you go into a court of law and you have evidence and facts and judges that are bound by the law and responsible for dictating what evidence is important or counts or relevant, the idea is that you somehow or a jury somehow arrives at something that's accurate and true. And it doesn't matter what Lori's beliefs are. It doesn't matter how far-fetched or crazy they are. The jury can take that evidence and they can determine what's true. true. And it's worth noting that in all the trials that Lori has undergone, that she's been convicted in each one of them on every count. And so every jury has more or less, according to Kay,

and according to the judge, they've arrived at the truth. And so I think it's, it's encouraging to know that although you and I could have a long debate about some things that are happening in the legal system that have to do with influencers and defense attorneys and all that, we're not going to have that discussion tonight. It's encouraging to know that when you take 12 people, that the basis of our legal system is fundamentally sound. And when you take 12 people and put them in a room and have them look at evidence and come to a unanimous decision that they, for the most part, arrive at something we would label as the truth. Yes.

And I think that's important. So I wanted to lead with that. By the way, you were, so you were in the courtroom. I was. The camera was behind Lori. You know, when they, when they would, when the camera would pan over to Lori, we'd see the back of her head.

So I couldn't really, you know, there was no, there was no capacity to look at nonverbals here because, I mean, there was a little bit. She'd turn her head sometimes, but it didn't, look like she was like is typical it didn't look like she was so much emotion those of us in the gallery could also actually for the most part only see the back of her head okay you could see it when she turned as i think could the camera uh but you certainly saw when she moved more like when um crusha was discussing lory uh wanting you know being her a sister reincarnated uh she seemed really

animated and and i thought that she might even address that because she seemed so animated from behind, but she did not. And I would see her glancing over at Kay and K and Krescia, the main jurors, the main jurors that were, the jurors, sorry, they were in the jury box. The main witnesses giving the victim impact statements were sitting in the jury box. And so she could see them and they could see her. But for those of us in the gallery, including the media, we almost saw what you saw. We just had the ability to continuously look at everything and not have the camera angles change and the cameras did miss some things but she she had a TV screen in front of her and so when Larry was talking to her on the TV

screen she was looking right at right at him now this close but um not too many non-verbals except for she certainly does move her head and take notes when she's feeling something yeah it didn't it didn't look like she was getting emotional very much If at all. As a matter of fact, I would start this. So the time when I saw her the most was prior to the hearing, the sentencing. And this was interesting to me. So right before the sentencing began,

Lori was chatting with her attorney that was sitting to her right. And she was smiling. and she was giddy, it was really peculiar. You know, something this serious and this grave, right? Something this, you know, you're about to hear from all the victims that were, that's lives were shattered by these crimes.

And she's more or less, she's finding this lighthearted. She's smiling, she's giddy. It's almost like, it's almost like, And people talked about her need for attention, right? You and I have talked about that a lot, that a lot of this is attention seeking. And the judge mentioned that. Almost, you know, a number of the victims mentioned that.

And so it's almost, the way I thought of this, it was almost like she's a celebrity who's about to make another public appearance, right? Like, here I am, back in the spotlight. Right. And, and I mean, If you know nothing else about Lori Daybell, like just looking at those few minutes before she's about to get on stage,

she doesn't, of course, get on stage. She's behind the stage or on the side of the stage, but which, by the way, Kay, K in a brilliant analogy referred to it as a side show. We'll play that later, but that she was like a sideshow act. And I think that's interesting. right? Because that's kind of how it felt. But she saw herself as the star of this performance, not the victims. And so it was like she was a celebrity about to make a public appearance and sign autographs, right, and be in the limelight again. That's, if you want to understand Lori Debo, there you go. That's a predominant emotion before all of this is essentially joy. So sad. Her moment to spin her narrative. again. Yeah, right. She knows she's going to get to talk again, and she did. She, you know,

she, she did her thing and spewed a bunch of nonsense. But anyway, we'll get into that in a little bit. Let's talk about Colby. So Colby, you know, Colby gave a very emotional speech. Yeah, and really quickly, I just want to say, John and I both are aware everybody that Colby has not been doing well, that he's been hospitalized twice. He has shared publicly that he had a mini-stroke as meningitis, which is very scary. And so our hearts are with him. While he's local to the area, this has changed things for him. And he was not able to attend in person.

But I'm so glad that he was able to log in and go virtual. But go ahead. Yeah, and I'm glad you mentioned that. So obviously, we've been thinking about Colby and we hope he's on the men. You know, our prayers go towards Colby. We really hope that he's recovering. if he's at that place. And your mic...

I'm not saying anything. I'm good. Okay. So, you know, there are a few things Colby talked about that I don't believe he's mentioned too much publicly. He's mentioned it on his show, but not in an impact statement. He talked more about Charles, of course, because this was about Charles,

but that Lori had lied to him about how Charles died and said it was a heart attack. And then not only that, Lori turned Colby against Charles by telling him that Charles was having affairs and affair or affairs, and that Charles was this bad person who was cheating. And so Colby didn't speak to Charles

because of that. Colby believed his mother. And one of Colby, one of the, you know, more movie moments today was Colby essentially saying in tears that, you know, he really regretted the fact that he wasn't able to talk to his dad because his mother turned him against Charles. And he really, you know, he really felt like,

you know, that that was, that was, a travesty that he didn't really, that in some ways he was separated from Charles in a way that never should have occurred. So sad. And how he refers to Charles without hesitation as his father, too. He's touching to me. He always does. Yeah, Colby, I really appreciate Colby's emotional intelligence.

He's very emotionally intelligent and I really value that. Colby talked about JJ being confused, worried, scared, and frustrated. He talked about Tiley being scared, confused, angry, and broken. That those were things that he was seen in them prior to them being murdered. And, you know, I thought that was interesting that he sensed something was on the horizon, right? But he didn't quite know what, obviously he couldn't have anticipated. what was coming, but he knew he was feeling those emotions from his brother and sister, and I think he was very worried about it.

The last part, I think we have a clip, if we could maybe play that. Yes, we have it here. I'm here to tell you the effect that this has had on me. In simple terms, each one of my family members was taken from us all in one swoosh. My father was gone in an instant and later my sister and brother disappeared until they were later found in Lori Valo's new husband's backyard. This has affected me personally. I had to do something I've never done and that was fight to stay alive after the pain. There are no words for what I've experienced and I had to choose to fight and to stay alive.

From my children and for my wife. Now I'd like to address Laurie Valo. She claims to be Jesus' favorite. She claims to lead a spiritual life. And she claims that she loves everybody. And she also claims to have seen Jesus and visited with him. When did Jesus allow us to commit adultery? When did Jesus change the commandment of thou shall not kill?

When did Jesus allow us to steal money from our dead children? When did Jesus tell us to lie our way through life? It must be a very sad life to smile. your way through all the pain you've caused. Rather than being able to acknowledge the pain that she has caused, she would rather say that Charles, Tiley, and JJ's death were a family tragedy and not her evil doing. And I will say this. If you want to see darkness, look at the murdering cult that claims God has commissioned their mission to kill my family and others. Quite frankly, I believe that Lori Vala herself is the family tragedy. You're on a GLP1.

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A couple of things about that. That was very touching to me. And again, I know Colby, you know, I have, I'd like to think I have a good relationship with Colby. And, you know, this was very moving to me because. he's essentially telling us that he has to fight to stay alive after the pain. So just for, I mean, the idea that Kobe was going to harm himself over this is, you know, it's difficult to hear, right? And so I think it gives us, it gives me a sense for how deep this pain is, this pain.

We know that. We know Kobe's in tremendous pain. He's talked about it. But to say this in front of the world, that, you know, essentially he's thinking about harming himself because this pain is so deep and so immense. It was really, really touching. And then the last bit about, so that was important, I think. The last bit about how Lori avoids the truth by calling it a family tragedy when, in fact, she herself is the family tragedy. Colby just calling her out and putting blame where blame should lie, which is with her.

her, that she's the family tragedy, she's the cause of it. And, you know, to say that in front of her, I mean, I know he was on a call because of his health, but still, to confront her so directly about you're the tragedy, stop lying, right? Getting back to this idea of falsehood, stop lying. Kobe, when Kobe did his interview with Lori in jail, you know, I know all he wanted to to do was hear the truth. All he wanted to deal, right? All he wanted her. If he could get an apology, that would be great, right? But no, nothing. Like, it's, it's always comes back to this family tragedy idea. And so here, here, you know, here Colby is calling her out and saying, just, I don't care what you say anymore. This is you. You're the family tragedy. End of story.

and that's how he ends it, right? Colby's last word is take responsibility, right? Grow up. And again, and that takes us back to what we started with, is this woman, is this human being capable of comprehending reality? Is she capable of living in some measure of truthfulness about her life and about the world? I don't know.

I mean, right now I say the answer is no, but. well k woodcock agrees with you you haven't seen the press conference after or maybe you did watch it but i haven't k woodcock it was short but and to the point but k woodcock was asked do you think that lorry will ever take accountability and she did not hesitate a second and said no never absolutely not. No, she never will. She said in so many ways and so many answers, she does not believe she will ever

take accountability. And I tend to agree with her. And Colby agrees too. But Colby's last words to her are, you're the family tragedy. This is you. This is you. Own it, right? Like this is all Kobe's ever wanted from her.

It's just to say, you know what, I did it. I'm sorry. I did it. And she will, you know, she constantly evades that, right? She constantly pulls that away. And so I think it was really courageous and assertive and emotionally intelligent for Colby to tell her at the very end, this is you. I'm done with this, right? Stop saying this is a family tragedy. You're the damn tragedy.

Right. And so I really appreciated that. That was a great moment for me. So thank you, Colby. Yeah, thank you, Colby. Let's move on to Larry. So Larry also was via Zoom or via video. He was up on a big screen so we could all see him.

But I want you to know how it looked in the court. He was right in front of Lori as well. So we had him on two sides of the courtroom on a very large screen. There was like four of them on every side. But then Lori had him right in front. Larry. Let's talk Larry. Let's talk later.

He also could not be here. God bless you, Larry. We know that he's going through his own personal loss right now. It's kind and coming. Couldn't in the end. But, yeah. So I just want to say, and again, I have so much respect for Larry. I know Larry well, I think.

He's someone I consider a friend for sure. And so I found Larry's speech. be very moving as well because I think there was a lot of emotion in that speech. And he starts, so he starts with calling her a psychopathic murderer. I think he calls her a narcissistic psychopathic murderer. So he sets the tone with this anger. And that's going to be a persistent theme, by the way, for Larry in his entire speech. He's obviously very angry. You and I have known Larry for years, now, this crime is obviously these crimes have made Larry very angry. We know that.

But I think what that's not, however, what made his statement so touching to me. It was the pain beneath that anger. The thing that really stood out to me is this is anger laced with an immense amount of sorrow. the thing the reason why I think so if somebody you know I've heard a lot of them impact statements over the years that are just pure anger you know somebody just venting and calling people names and being really angry and a lot of times those don't land for me those don't really I don't find those that compelling because because I don't know that the you know I think they make the person saying

that feel better but I don't know that You know, I'm not sure any of these are going to be heard by Lori, by the way, or she's going to integrate or hear anything that's being said. But I feel like sometimes those statements aren't quite as powerful because they don't necessarily tell us much about the person and their experience of loss. Right? If you're just being angry in some ways, you're not kind of explaining how you're feeling. And, um, but this, this statement by Larry, there's so much pain.

Like, his emotion was overwhelming. There's so much pain and there's so much sadness there. And we know that from knowing Larry, but, but it's, he put it all out there. Like you can't, you can try, like, for me, you know, it was overwhelming in a way. Like, you could try to turn that off and say, that's too much for me. I can't hear that. But, but. but it's unavoidable.

Like you can't escape his sorrow and the depth. Like Colby, the depth of his pain. The depth of Colby's pain is such that he's thinking about self-harm. The depth of Larry's pain is enormous. And I think what makes this so compelling to me is just that sadness behind all this. And I think that, you know, honestly, like, When Larry was doing that, I was in tears for quite a bit of it.

You know, some of that might be because I know Larry, but also just it was, it was so compelling. Like, I couldn't stop listening to it because it was, it was cathartic in a way to me because it was so emotional. That is true. I call, you know, John and I were texting briefly during, but you were behind us. And so you just said, I'm watching. I need to focus. And right after when you and I finally. were able to talk after i went live on the at the press conference after court you we talked about

larries we were talked about several victim impact statements but i said larry's and he said you said yeah i i caught really emotional really affected yeah yeah uh we have a little clip from larry if if if we could maybe play that yeah let me pull it hold on i will never call speak your name again murderers. You will never get anything out of me again in your life. You are nothing. You are nothing. You killed Tiley. Did you enjoy it? Look at me, Lori. Did you enjoy it? Did you dance around the fire? Like you sent the videos to chat of you dancing around in your room for it? Did you enjoy it? and then the most precious thing a seven-year-old autistic, unbelievably God's present to K&I, to Todd.

Look at Todd. Turn around and look at it, Glory, because that's the last time you're ever going to hear my name out of your mouth. Look at Todd. have you said you're sorry. I know it is heart-wrenching. It is. And you write that picture,

dancing around the fire. Did you plan it? Dancing around the fire, dancing around her prison cell, dancing. There's this metaphor of dancing, by the way, for Lori, appears multiple times and over the course of this story,

there's the story about her dancing every night in her jail cell in Idaho. And there's the story of prior to the charges. There's the story of Lori dancing, right, sending Chad. Videos. She's dancing. I don't know how exactly, presumably, provocatively, right, dancing for Chad.

And then there's, he brings up the idea of dancing around the fire, like reveling, kind of like a very tribal idea, like this primitive idea. Like you just killed people and you're, you're celebrating or you're dancing around the file and firing kind of this really primitive tribal celebration, right? Like actually reminds me of we've talked about this on our Patreon a little bit, but Yellow Jackets, the show, for those of you have seen that show, like that's the image it comes to mind. Like this. I picture Lord of the Fly.

I don't watch Yellow Jackets. Lord of the Flies. Similar. Yeah. I was envisioning a Lord of the Flies type scene. Did you plan it? Did you plan it? What a question. Did you enjoy it? Did you enjoy it? Did you enjoy it? I mean, that just, that just knocked me down.

Yeah. Because he's saying, look at you're sadistic, right? And I agree with that. Like he's saying, you don't care. Like you're harming these people and you're finding joy in that. You're finding pleasure in that. Did you enjoy it? What a question. That's a question I would not have thought to ask.

But this sadistic component, you're killing people and then you're dancing to celebrate. What an image. What an image, right? Like that was, to me, I was like, whoa. And it makes you think. And I realized, yeah, I think she did enjoy it. There's a sadistic quality about her. Very sadistic.

And then right after that, right? Right after that, he jumps into, have you said you're sorry? Right? Like he's bringing up another really important point, which is not only you sadistic and celebrating like the deaths of these people, of these precious people, these precious victims, but you don't care. Like you're not remorseful.

You're not saying you're sorry at all. It's true. You know, you're dancing around and you don't, you have no empathy, even though she says she does later. You have no empathy. You have no remorse. You're not going to tell Kobe you're sorry. That's how Kobe wanted to hear from her.

It's all who wanted. So, you know, this bit from Larry was like, wow. I was just, I was like, you know, really taking aback. It was so powerful. And then, you know, he brought up a lot of people probably, I think we can talk about this, right, because we've talked about it before. but Larry told us a story in private that he initially didn't want us to make public, but then he said we could later.

Yeah, we recorded that years ago. Yeah, let me explain what you're about to say. Larry shared a story. He started it with, I've never told anybody but this story, but I'm going to tell you all. And he told us this story. And you can find that. In fact, if we have a moderator, troublemaker, somebody, if you can find the moonshausen by proxy with tyly we do put the story in there but larry told us

the story recorded and then later said don't share it i don't want it shared but then about a year later he said go ahead and we have now shared it it's a couple of places um but we'll paste the moon chowse and by proxy uh speculation with lori valid day ball it's in there but go ahead john yet share Share what you're going to talk about because Larry brought this up. That's what you're going to say. Larry brought. So here's what Larry says. He tells the world,

you tried to kill me, but I beat you. I beat you. You tried that he would have been a casualty. And what he's referring to is essentially that Lori and Kay were visiting Charles and Lori. when they were about to get on a plane and they were leaving. And Lori, according to Larry, made this really excellent fruit salad.

And she seemed really eager to give Larry this fruit salad, and he ate it. And then he started getting sick almost immediately. And by the time they were getting on a plane, he was throwing out. He was really, really sick. And he believed that he was poisoned. At the time, he didn't really have any reason to believe that. So he never went to the hospital. But he just wanted to get home.

But then he realized, in retrospect, especially looking at Lori now, he realized, like, I think, he believed he was poisoned. And so he brought that up. I mean, he didn't tell the story. He didn't have time during his statement. But, of course, you and I knew what he was talking about. Yes.

And if anybody wants to hear it straight from Larry, you can head to the episode of the Grayson Pindon. pinned and we'll have it in the description of this video and then pinned comments too. Right, he said, you tried to kill me. You tried to kill me too. I believe he was poisoned that day. I do. Just so you know what I believe.

Yeah, I believe so. The onset, the sudden onset of his symptoms that were consistent with poisoning. He was vomiting. He was, you know, he was vomiting in a, I believe it was, was it a New Orleans saint hat? when you know he was he was kind of making fun of the fact that he had just bought this baseball hat that was a new Orleans Saints hat and um and he vomit he ruined the hat he had just purchased this this expensive hat so um you know he was he was obviously upset that that he almost died but but he was he seemed equally upset that he this brand new hat that set

him back, I don't know, 35 bucks, was now something that he had to throw out. So that was Larry. Thank you, Larry, for that really incredible statement. Susan, Charles' older sister, the thing that stood out to me about Susan is, she said, I'm disgusted and pauled by your evil actions, but then in the next sentence, she said, I've forgiven you, Lori. I don't want any of this on my soul. So Susan was very forgiving, obviously upset and angry, but also willing to forgive Lori. I thought that was interesting that she had gotten to that place. Then we heard from talk.

who was JJ's biological father. I think we are. Yeah, go ahead. I think we were all just happy to see Todd and to have a chance to hear from him. We're very special that he was able to be here, by the way. Some special arrangements were made, and it's wonderful. One thing about Todd, I'm jumping ahead, but when Lori gave her impact statement, which we will talk about later.

Todd, who has suffered with addiction, when she was talking about what the jail and prison is like, Todd was over the jury box going like, yeah, what'd you expect? You know, yeah, but go ahead. Go ahead. I digress. Todd gave a very short statement, but let me just give the, let me summarize kind of the gist of it. He talked a little bit about the pain of, of giving up JJ because of some of his personal issues. but this was an extraordinary moment for me.

He said, I'm here to forgive you. So again, Todd, who's JJ's father, is forgiving Lori. And then he tells her, I know what it's like to be in prison. You're going to relive everything you did. So Todd recognizes that he knows prison, right? And he knows she's going there. And he knows in some ways it's going to be a huge punishment for her. to have to relive and rehash these crimes over and over again.

I would say to that, by the way, I think that would be true for like a normal inmate that has a conscience. I don't know if that will be true for Lori in the sense that I, you know, she's so caught up in this delusion that I don't know that she's some, I think she's going to be reliving the fact that, you know, prison is creating all of God's warriors. That's what she talked about. that'll be, you know, unleashed upon the world or the universe after the apocalypse.

So, you know, I'd like to think there's a part of Todd's statement that's true, that Lori will be forced to think about this for many, many years, for the rest of her life, obviously. Lori, by the way, doesn't think it's going to be for the rest of her life. She thinks that the apocalypse is imminent, so she thinks that's happening, like, in the next couple of weeks, apparently. but so he reminds her that she's going to relive all of this. And then he echoes this theme about truth again. So that's why I wanted to start it. He actually says,

I hope you understand the truth before you die. So all these people, you know, Kobe, K, they're all coming back to Judge Breske. They're all coming back to this idea of, get the hell out of your fantasy world. Right? Like there is something true here. And that is that you murdered human beings that matter to us.

You don't seem to care about that. So Todd returns to this idea of truth. The next speaker was Crescia. It's so good to have Crescia speak as well. She's never been able to give a victim impact to see him before, and it was just incredible. Crescia gave a very powerful statement. She reminded everyone that Charles was the cornerstone, one of the cornerstones of the Valo family. He had an infectious laugh. I think she, she kind of brought, she helped bring Charles

to life in a very vivid way. I appreciated that. He was there for other people. She had some lines that I thought were really great. One of them was that after he was murdered, that her grief turned, quote, her grief turned into a constant, the constant ache of injustice. That was a really, I thought that was a really interesting poetic line. That line really kind of stood out to me. It kind of touched me. She reminded us. She was the first person who spoke to remind us that the quote,

the well-known quote from Charles, that Love Always wins. She reminded us that that was Charles, one of Charles' foundational beliefs, and that love was important to him, no matter what, he would do whatever he could to help other people and to see the best in other people. And, you know, one thing I really appreciated about the sentencing today was that,

and I think I've always felt this, but you really get a sense of what a good guy Charles was. Absolutely. You really do. You really do. From everybody. I feel like it was such a deep loss for this family. He took care of all of them. I think it was quite the.

A leader She talked about this idea of how she I thought this was really insightful by the way. She talked about this idea that Lori, before Lori Debel was born, she had a sibling who passed away.

And essentially, so for those who don't know this story, essentially, when the sibling, when the, when Lori was born, born, Janet essentially told Lori that you're replacing the deceased sibling. Lolly. Lolly, right. And so, Crescia reminds us that in many ways, Lori didn't really have an identity because she was,

in many ways, just a replacement. It's an interesting way to say that she perhaps had no sense of self. Yeah. And Kreschus said that. She said, so she said, so you didn't matter. You didn't have your own life or identity. In other words, she was always just living someone else's life that her mother kind of burdened her. Janet burdened her with this loss, this trauma of losing this other child, lowly, that then became Lori.

And, you know, and that's, that's insightful. Like, that's a really interesting, that's a really interesting perspective. And I think there's a lot of validity to that. I think Krusha really nailed that one down, you know, that it's one thing to have a deceased sibling and then have another sibling and kind of, you know, treating them as their own entity, right, valuing them separately and individually. it's another thing to have a sibling, a deceased sibling, and then another, you know, and then another child, and then to say to them, oh, by the way, you're really just replacing this other child.

Like you don't really have your own individual identity. And to tell them that, also to tell them that, right? Like, that's bizarre. Yeah, and reincarnated too. There's this reincarnation idea. Right. So I thought that was really interesting. I thought that was very insightful on question's part.

And then she leaves us with this quote, you left behind a trail of unimaginable grief and trauma, reminding us that the impact of this was extraordinary and it's probably going to last for generations. It absolutely will. The impact will last for generations. has this ripple effect. It's going to affect so many.

Then we get to K. Kay probably gave the longest statement of the day. Kay said so much, it would be really hard to summarize a lot of it, but these are a couple of things that stood out to me. The Charles

was kind, he was loyal, he was generous. When he was around, you felt safe, you felt valued. Anytime you walk into a room, you felt his presence and you felt value. And this is the bit I really loved. The Charles loved fiercely. So that's a version of Love Always Wins, right? That she's reminding us that Charles really, really genuinely loved people.

And he protected people and he loved fiercely. So I love that line from Kay. she tells Lori that she's infamous but never famous and quote you spent your life chasing cameras of pause and validation like oxygen and the world sees what I see they see it was a liar a fraud and a murderer I thought that was wow doesn't mince words yeah and again I want to say the same thing case landed with me she had anger in her grief. She was angry. But it,

it landed with me. I felt it. I cried during K's. I was heartbroken. It was heart crushing. Listen to K. I felt her sorrow similarly to how you said you felt

Larry's, especially, of course, at the end. I think we have a clip. We have some clips from K. Do we have one or two clips from K? I think I've seen one. Let's play that. Oh, we do have two. We have two. We have two. We play in both. So you can continue making claims that no one understand because we weren't there, but make no mistake. We stand perfectly. We understand premeditation. We understand conspiracy. We understand fraud, insurance policies, and false alibis. We understand how long bodies lay in the ground while you danced vacation and manipulated. for attention. We understand the cost, emotional, financial, spiritual, that all of us have paid to

clean up the wreckage of your delusion. Therapy, loss work, trauma, panic attacks, courtrooms and funerals, ashes, and empty chairs. You are so selfish, so pathologically self-centered that you can't even see the shockwaves you created in every life around you. It's Daredevil. I'm right here. Don't miss the return of Marvel Television's Daredevil Born Again. So what's next? I'm going to take this city back.

In an all-new season, now streaming only on Disney Plus. They're hunting us. It's time we started hunting them. I can work with that. This should be tons of fun. Marvel Television's Daredevil Born Again, now streaming only on Disney Plus. When it comes to weight loss,

You don't need more advice. You need more of what works. That's Weight Watchers. With real tools designed to take the guesswork out of what to eat, how to move, and how to build habits that actually last. That's why Weight Watchers members lose more weight. Real people, real results. Weight Watchers Core Plus.

Get started at Weight Watchers.com. In a six-month clinical trial of over 370 people, those using Weight Watchers saw significantly better results than those following standard nutritional advice alone. See the 2025 in the AJCN. Yeah. So, you know, there were a lot of moments in Kay's statement that were just beautifully expressed. You know, there were moments that were poetic. I think this is one of those.

One of the things about that statement, I mean, that is so well put. But one of the things that you danced, vacation, and manipulated for attention, right? Like getting back to this idea of dancing, this is kind of picking up on layering. a little bit, right? That you're dancing, you're going to Hawaii, you're pretending like nothing's wrong. There's all these bodies in the ground. And, you know, you're just, you're, you're delusional. You're living in this fantasy. And it's,

and it's all for what? For what? For attention? And that she can't see, she can't see these shockwaves. You can't see the impact. She can't see the consequences. Right? She still doesn't. She never has. Yeah. So I thought that was a really, I mean, Kay's whole statement was really powerful and very well written. That was a moment in her statement that really stood out to me. I agree. Maybe now if you play the next one, I think, that would be, that's another part of her statement that I thought was really valuable.

Okay, here we go. Laura, you have noticed this courtroom is full. It's not because people admire you. It's not because they see instrument in God's hands. It's because you're a sideshow freak, a murderous carnival act. People come to gawk at the monster who thinks she's divine. They don't come to honor you. They come to witness the wreckage of your delusion and to see justice crush it.

You've always wanted an audience, but this audience isn't here to adore you. They are here to watch you fall, to watch you strip of the spotlight you crave, to see your false crown ripped away. You are not a goddess. You are not chosen. You are not powerful. You just thought you could play God and win. You just thought you could play God.

I mean, again, these are moments that I'm just absolutely, you know, floored me. That is so well written and expressed. It speaks to what I talked about earlier, that she begins this whole sentencing today with this kind of giddy, twirling her hair, laughing, right, lighthearted attitude. Yeah. And now Kay's saying, okay, you know, we know you want attention, but you're a sideshow freak. People call. to gawk, you're a monster, right? That people are coming to the circus to gawk at the monster and to gawk at the, to, you know, mock the wreckage of your delusions.

The audience is here to watch you fall and to have your false crown ripped away. Wow. Yeah. Those are some really powerful moments, I think. I don't know how those are going to land with Lori. Probably not at all, but truth. Truth bombs, right? Like, that's so powerful.

Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I agree. Yeah. And, you know, we talked about this, was it two days ago yesterday, how tragedy and grief can be anger. Like I said, I felt her anger, but I felt her sorrow too. and I felt descriptive nature of her words and them coming from a deeper place that she'd

been thinking for a long time. Yeah, and there's a difference between, I think there's a difference between this type of language and this type of imagery about a sideshow freak and gawking at the monster versus pointing your finger at someone and saying you're a pathetic loser. right like the language matters and i mean the language in the emotion the language in the emotion for k were so profound that i agree with k you don't it's not just that you know that there's anger it's also she's saying it in a poetic way and it's it's it's just it's laced with this underlying sadness like larry like you just you feel these people's pain yeah and that's that's quite different

than pointing the finger, if she turned around and pointing the finger at Lori and said, you're a pathetic loser who should die, right? Like, that's a very different expression of anger than calling her a side show freak. I mean, calling her a side show freak is obviously not kind, but it's more poetic. It's more poetic in the sense of it's, it's, it's acknowledging her underlying attention-seeking attitude. Whereas if you point the finger at someone and say you're a pathetic loser,

you're not really doing much for, you're not doing a lot for pointing out the attention-seeking qualities that someone has. And so I think, like, the reason why this statement, even though, yeah, there's anger here for sure, I think this sticks a little more because of the way Kay is doing it

and the language and the emotion. It all really is coming together. to be very powerful as opposed to just kind of landing a bunch of insults that show anger, but they're not, it's different, right? They're not quite as poignant as this type of language. So then Kay finishes her statement, and she then reads a letter that is from JJ.

And that was heart-wrenching. Yeah. And Kay, so I think she was able to contain a lot of her emotions for her statement. I mean, not, I mean, she was emotional. But you could tell that as Kay went along, she was getting more and more emotional. And by the time she got to JJ's letter that she wrote for JJ and JJ's voice, I think she was really overflowing with emotion. and it came out.

She was in tears. Her anger was increasing a little bit. The tenor of this was what happens when, you know, you took away my dad and this is what happens. This is what happens when you take away a father that protected me and love me. That, you know, when you take away someone like Charles and you're left with the likes of Chad Daybaugh and Lori Daybell, then you get murdered, essentially, was what, I mean, from JJ's perspective,

but that's essentially, essentially the gist of the letter that JJ wrote. Yeah, if you could play. So it's very emotional. In fact, one of maybe the most emotional moments in the entire sentencing today was the end of case, JJ letter. And so think of this emotion building to a crochet. and then this is what we get at the very end. On September 23rd, 2019, she murdered me.

Lori took my dad away. She took away the best man, the protector of me entirely. I am dead because she killed him. He never would have let her hurt me. And I know he died protected me. He took six years for me to be able to have a voice. have a voice to be here to say what the death of my dad did to me. I am not a domino that fell in her life.

I am Joshua Jackson Vallow. I am the son of Charles Vallow. I should be 13 years old now. The first of my father's death was my murder. And Judge, it is 13 years today. His adoption was finalized, and they moved him immediately right away to Hawaii. And the pool video missed. I don't think I realized that the pool video missed that moment.

So I can share a little bit about what was going on. I don't know what the pool camera captured and didn't capture. And by the way, the pool camera is the one camera that's allowed in the courtroom. And there was a camera allowed for sentencing court TV. Kay had tried to turn the camera towards Lori earlier in her, not the camera, excuse me, the microphone earlier in her statement to look at Lori and address Lori, like her husband Larry was technically able to do because he was on Zoom. And they told her no, that she had to face.

a judge in Arizona. Arizona is different than Idaho, where the Gonzalez family did that yesterday. And so then she continued to look at the judge. And then she finished that letter. And then she turned without turning the microphone. And so she turned her whole body. And she looked right at Lori.

And she screamed that right at Lori. And at that moment, Trina Kay got up to tell her to not do that. But she was done by that point and just walked in. And that was so raw. And I think one thing that gets to me is it's been six years. And Kay has talked to me about her grief a little bit, how she shuts things off. And she'll go kind of silent and she has to deal with it. pieces. And so to see for me, and like I said, I've talked about how like a lot of my grief

recently has been angered to see her so hurt, you know, six years later in front of her, knowing this is the end. And to feel that anger and that grief in her in that moment was, I don't know, just something to me. I'll say. Yeah, it's just listening to that again is so, difficult and so emotional and, you know, to reiterate, she said, the impact of my father's death was my murder, and she's getting more and more emotional. And at the end, she, near, and, you know, near screaming, says, I trusted you. Like, I, I, again, that was like one of those moments where I almost like the truth of that. The truth of that, I trusted you. Like, you murdered me. You were my mother, right? Like, our job, one of our biggest jobs as parents is to protect our kids.

And that's a theme that came up, by the way, with Brandon when he gave his statement over and over. But the thing that really impacted me with that line is the fact that it's so raw and so truthful in terms of every relationship, every healthy successful relationship is based on trust. That's the foundation. every parental relationship is based on trust. Human beings do not survive. We do not survive as infants without safety, some measure of safety, some measure of security, and some measure of trust in our parents.

We trust our parents to feed us, to shelter us. We put 100% of our trust in other people for our survival. And Kay is like touching that, nerve to the core. And I mean, if there's like one simple lesson of all of this, if I were to point out one statement and one lesson from all of Daybell, it was what she just said right there. These people trusted you. I don't know, there's no better way to summarize the basis of every human relationship, every healthiest human relationship is trust. And Kay is screaming. You've violated my trust. I mean, the most extreme way to violate somebody's trust is to murder them,

obviously, but, but I mean, it really speaks to this idea of, if I were to simplify this, distill this down to like some essential quality, it would be that right there. And I think that's what really, that's what so, and not just her motion, not just her raw emotion, but the truth of that, every relationship that fails, I could say, has some violation of trust, domestic violence, when you're violent to another human being, and we're going to see this with Brandon. If you push someone, if you're violent towards someone else, you're violating their trust. That's a breach of trust. If you're unfaithful, that's a breach of trust.

if you're belittling another person that you love or you're critical of that person, that's a breach of trust, right? I can't tell you how important trust is in relationships. And, I mean, there's been a lot of research on this. John Gottman has talked a lot about the importance of trust. And so, and John Gottman is probably the foremost researcher on healthy relationships and healthy marriages,

this summarizes that so succinctly and so beautifully with such emotion. Like, that's what this is. And Kay nails it right here. I mean, it was so touching. Yeah, it was so real and raw. Fill it. Felt it. Jerry Valo.

Jerry is Charles' brother. Oh, Jerry's was beautiful, in my opinion. I love the way Jerry described the relationship as that he described Charles as his best friend. Yeah. They grew up running around the bayou of Louisiana, which, you know, is, is, I grew up around a bunch of cornfields. So I can't, you know, it's like I would imagine that growing up in the bayou is, is probably a lot of fun. Like, I'm sure that would have been, I spent a lot of time around. creeks and you know, you know, digging out turtles and that kind of stuff.

Like, I'm sure being around a bayou would have been a whole different level of experience in terms of, you know, being a kid in that environment. But he talks about how they went camping, fishing, hunting, and exploring, and just having fun. Yeah. He said, we were just being kids. Right. I love that. Like, I got a real sense of Charles from that description because not only the

things they're doing together, but that Charles is protecting him and being a brother, right? Like bringing him on these adventures with them and just having a blast out in the bayous. I'm sure there's some stories. I'd like to know if there's some stories about running into some alligators, by the way. I'm sure there's got to be bayous. There are. Oh, yeah. I've heard some of Jerry's stories.

Jerry, I'll just say this, he loves his brother Charles, that's for sure. And I'm sorry, I am tired. Obviously, everyone knows it. This has been a long week, so I'm sorry if I keep going, John. Sorry. Jerry talked about how Lori keeps saying that she's an instrument of God. I think this is a really wonderful depiction when he said that she's the weapon. she's not an instrument of God.

She's the actual weapon of destruction. She's the one committing these murders. It was brilliant for him to use that. That was brilliant, actually, as he is a war veteran himself, you know, serving overseas. Yeah. And then I think we have a clip from Jerry. This was, I think this was another wonderful moment during the hearing. Do you have that clip?

Yeah, I'll pull that up. She's God's name like a weapon, lad in his name, killed in his name, and now she wants to stand in court and she claims she's doing the large work. She's not some misunderstood woman. She's not some grief-stricken mother. She's not a victim of this story. She wrote her own disgusting make-believe story, and she wrote it in blood. Yes. That's such a compelling description of, again, like if I had to find some really

succinct depictions of what happened in five years, that's about as close as you're going to get to describing Lori. Because Lori keeps saying she's misunderstood, right? The people don't, that you weren't there. Lori's so thinking, you weren't there, you don't understand. You didn't see it. this whole literal idea about having to have been there, having to have, the necessity of being present to understand. And Jerry comes back with, you're not misunderstood.

You're not a victim, right? You wrote your own disgusting make-believe story, and you wrote it in blood. Wow. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Actually, I think that, Jerry,

I actually, this was just like straight from the heart. actually thought this was beautifully written and said. And again, and in getting back to this idea of truth, you know, Jerry's saying, look, this is all make-believe. None of this is based in reality. None of this is true. Like you just, you made up this whole thing. And then you wrote this story in blood. Like, even if you made up some ridiculous story, you didn't have to write it in blood, right? You could have just pretended like it was some crazy story and lived, lived in that craziness. You didn't have to act it out.

Right. And so I think, you know, I think like the what really kind of frames that description for me is that she wrote this story in blood. She acted it out. That's where this becomes a problem. You know, you can, you can, there's a lot of people, every one of us has fantasies, you know. There's no, you know, I mean, every one of us has different perceptions of reality. but that doesn't mean that if our perceptions are somewhat skewed and our biases are somewhat skewed, that doesn't mean we're going to act them out in blood.

Well said. So that was the end of the valos. I'd like to say something. I want to just say something a little bit about Jerry too. Jerry has an interview with Hidden True Crime that I recommend everyone watching. he and Melanie Valo are our good friends, Melanie, his wife. And everybody knows how big this week has been. I did not want to miss today.

I did not want to miss the sentencing as we've covered this for six years. This was such an important day to be here. But I want you to know that we were covering so much and running out of steam and wondering if I can make it. And it was Jerry that called us up and said, Lauren, I want you there. And I just want to thank him. So I'm so glad to be here today. And to have witnessed his statement and all of the others has been kind of humbling for me. And this crime really is such a tragedy on so many levels and will affect generations.

And these victim impact statements today, um, We're so powerful. So anyway, I just want to say that. Yeah. And I feel like we've covered this crime from the beginning, and it's impacted us at so many different levels. I feel like this is close to the end. I don't, with Lori, you never know if something is at the end, right?

But I feel like while it would be difficult to say that there would ever be closure in this case, because it's so emotional and so complex, I do feel like this was an important day in terms of justice being served, obviously, and the victims really having a voice and having a presence, and that's so important. So I just feel like I was able to bear with. to some really powerful victim impact statements today. And so thank you, Jerry, for your last bit of encouragement to get here. Yeah. I would have missed it.

And thank you. I want to thank you, Lauren, for going and participate in part of something so incredible and so important to us. Yes. You're welcome. I don't I feel like we've gone on quite a while here so how long have we been on? We have been an hour and 22 minutes according to our streaming service. And we haven't even gotten to the incredible statements from the Boudreau's.

But yeah, maybe we can. I don't want to I don't want to give short shrift to the Boudreau's, but. The survivor's guilt was a profound moment. I think I'm going to have to kind of summarize these a little more and give them a little less intention just because of attention or time. But I want to, I think if I had to make one observation about the Bedro family's statements and Brandon's statement, and I'll talk a little bit about Brandon's in a little bit,

But it would be to recognize the impact of trauma in almost all situations, in almost all violent crimes, in almost all criminal activity. In other words, like, Bren survived, barely. The shot missed him by inches. Like, he could hear the bullet sailing past his head within inches of his skull, right? So he's lucky to be alive, obviously. But I think that, you know, sometimes people think, well, murder is the most severe trauma that a human being can experience. And obviously, losing someone forever is really traumatic.

And a human being that we lose is irreplaceable, right? but the Bidreau statements remind us of the impact of all types of trauma and all types of violent acts. You know, I sometimes think of, I've done a lot of work with sex offenders over the years. And in most cases of sex offenses, they're not murdering their victims. There are cases where they do murder, you know, they do murder them for, to try to, you know, evade detection. by detectives or whatever their motives are. But those victims are impacted immensely. Most of them are impacted immensely for their entire lives, right?

And you see this with the Bedro family. So this incident, this attempted murder that lasted maybe five seconds, you see the tremendous impact of violence on a family, on an individual on Brandon. Right? You see it on the community. It's just, I think it's really important to recognize how violence in general can impact a family and a person and individual and relative, like extended family, communities, right? And I think to me, that's an important element of the Bruegerald's statements, just to see all the things they talked about.

You know, the fear, the fear Brandon went into hiding, right? He was afraid that they were, that Alex Cox would come back for him. The anxiety. There's, there's the vigilance, you know, there's symptoms of PTSD here. Brock, who's his brother, who has a dental practice in Arizona. He says, he talks about how his dental practice is being affected, right? This is something you normally wouldn't think of. You wouldn't think, oh, you know, what's that got to do with Brandon?

Well, according to Brock, that people Google him and they find his name and they find that Brandon's his brother. And he's like, you know, maybe they don't want to go see him as a dentist. Maybe they don't trust him as much. He says, quote, our lives have become entangled with a story none of us wanted to be a part of. Right? I thought that was an incredible insight. that, you know, you have a brother that's a part of this story,

and yet it affects everyone. You can't escape it, right? So I think that was really interesting to me to just to see the ripple effect and the impact and how just the layers, the multiple layers of one, you know, one horrendous moment in Brandon's life, how it affects everyone. in that family immensely and the children and their children. So, so I think, you know, first of all, I want to recognize, you know,

the importance of Brandon in the story. And, and that's why, because the, this act has immense repercussions that I think sometimes might be overlooked here. And so I was glad that Dubedros were able to make these statements and to really bring home the fact that this trauma, thankfully Brandon's alive, right, but this trauma will follow him and it will follow this family according to them for many, many years. A story they never wanted to be a part of. Right, exactly.

I'll just go over a few things. Jenny, who's Brandon's wife, talked about. some of the impact. She said it it shattered Brandon's ability to fully trust. So again, this is this is echoing Kay's idea of trust being violated that the world isn't the same safe place. He thought it was that this, that his wife at the time,

Melanie, is wrapped up in this and here he's being shot at. when he thought he trusted her, right? So we'll see if anything happens there. She said, quote, he had countless sleepless nights and tears like nothing I've ever heard. So she talked about his survivor's guilt that Brandon would sometimes talk about

how he would willingly switch places with any of the other victims. I think that's important as an impact. You know, he survived. The other victims did not. And so he saddled with that the rest of his life. You know, you and I have not known Brandon as much. No, we don't.

We don't know him. We don't know him. And but he seems like a really good human being. And it seems like I really believe that the survivor's guilt is immense with him. And that I really think, from what I know of Brandon, that I think that's accurate. I think that he really does feel like he would switch places with any of these other victims if he could. The judge said himself that he has sat there, and I know we'll get to the judge's statements, but wondering about his survivor's guilt and seeing the pain on Brandon's face, like witnessing it.

And again, in the gallery, we're behind everyone. We can't see the faces. And so Judge Bereski is sitting there telling us he sees Brandon and, you know, to know that he had to, you know, identify JJ and did that on what was supposed to be his honeymoon. Yeah, that was the honeymoon. I know. That was that was very powerful. So Jenny ends with, again, I'm paraphrasing here, but something to the effect of we have to live with the scars. of attempted murder, but the truth has come to light.

And so I think, again, getting back to this idea of truth, this comes up again and again, that you have someone like Lori Debeau that's living in this fantasy world, and it's up to the justice system and up to the victims really to help discover the truth and to bring it to light. And then once that truth is known to heal, to begin to heal, because the truth has come to light and justice has been served. I do want to talk about Brandon. So Brandon was the last statement of the day.

I shouldn't say that because Lori talked. But we have a clip from Brandon if you could play that. The betrayal by someone connected to my family has left me battling overwhelming emotions over the years. I felt fear, paranoia. I lived with constant vigilance, loneliness, regret. sadness, depression, anger, heartache, and embarrassment, all whilst I'm striving to remain a beacon for my children. I didn't want them to see. Wow.

Wow. What a moment. So I want to thank Brandon for that level of honesty and vulnerability and openness. I wouldn't be able to summarize it better than he just did. Like every emotion he mentioned there, I think, is relevant to trauma, and it's something that victims experience. And he just summarized it beautifully. So just to recap, there's fear, paranoia, constant vigilance,

loneliness, regret, sadness, depression, anger, heartache, and embarrassment. There's something about those emotions, by the way, that I would like to point out, regret is interesting. Regret, right? So that speaks to Survivor's guilt. Okay. Interesting. That he's feeling, you know, because normally you'd say, well, why would he experience regret?

I mean, but he's telling us that he's got some regret because apparently he survived. He did nothing wrong. He survived, but he feels regret anyway. So I think that speaks to the Survivor's guilt. A lot of the other emotions would be quite typical of trauma victims, trauma survivors, with the exception of this is a very interesting one to me, embarrassment. So again, that's a very interesting word for him to bring up or emotion because he's done nothing wrong. And yet he tells us, I think what's really amazing about this is he says he's striving to remain a beacon for his children.

And quote, I didn't want them to see. He doesn't want them to see his pain. He doesn't want them to see his sadness, his depression, his anger, his heartache, right? And I think that's what he's saying is that part of his struggle is because he's trying to hide some of this and he's trying to be strong for his kids, he feels some embarrassment because he really doesn't know how to express it.

He doesn't know what to do with us. those emotions, right? And he has him. He can't avoid them. And yet he wants to be a beacon for his kids. And he feels somewhat embarrassed. And I thought that was really, I thought that was really sad in the sense that, you know, he's pointing out a dilemma that a lot of victims experience, which is how do you experience those emotions and that type of vulnerability and pain without impacting and infecting people that are dependent on you, children, family members, right? How do you have normal, healthy relationships when you're mired in all these negative emotions? And so I thought that dilemma and that conflict was really interesting.

For him to say that, I think, was really courageous. The honesty of that was truly amazing. So thank you, Brandon, for, thank you, Brandon, for being so honest about that. And I know we already talked about his wife, Jennifer, too, but, like, hers was really profound to be, too, talking about from the outside looking in how it's affected him. And he said as much in his, you know, so, yeah. He did, he talked about it was interesting. he cited some research on children that lose their fathers,

which shows the level of concern he had for his children and the level of commitment he has to his children as a father. According to him, children that lose their fathers, I haven't looked at this research exactly, but children that lose their fathers have a 30% chance, 20 to 30% chance, greater chance of suffering, depression. They experience a sense of abandonment, their sense of security is destroyed.

They have social withdrawal. They don't do as well in school. So there's a school impact. And later in life, they struggle more financially than children that have their fathers. And I thought that was really interesting research for him to cite, recognizing the importance of him being a committed father to his children. and, you know, that even though he's struggling with these really difficult emotions, he knows he needs to be engaged with his kids and the importance of that.

And obviously, that's really important to him. He brought that up multiple times. So I applaud him for that. And I think also there's sort of this sense of relief and that he survived, right? so his kids don't have to experience a fatherless upbringing. He says, after talking about some of the research, he says, there's no measurement, quote, there's no measurement system for our grief, pain, and trauma, unquote.

I agree with that. He too talks about, he says he's a believer for forgiveness. He's found relief in it, and he too has chosen to forgive Lori. so that he can be a better person for those in his life. Even though Lori has expressed no remorse, she's only expressed denial, shaming, and accusations. So, you know, that's pretty exceptional,

that he's able, willing and able to forgive someone who obviously has no concern for him or no desire to express any type of, remorse or empathy or apologies for him towards him because she could because he's the only survivor right so she doesn't she chooses not to and yeah he ends with a similar idea that we've been that i've discussed that many of the statements have brought up and that he says this was an assault on trust and the divine sanctity of the family. He says to the judge, I ask you to protect us and to keep us safe.

So again, we're getting back to Kay, Kay yells at Laurine says, you know, on behalf of JJ, I trusted you. And here again, Brandon is reiterating this point about trust and truth that this was an assault on trust and an assault on the sanctity of the family because of how trauma impacts everyone in our lives. Yeah. I think I have to kind of speed it up a little.

Yeah, a little bit. But Lori, and I don't want to because it's such an important day, but Lori's statement and Judge Boreskes afterwards. I want to talk about the judge. Yeah, let me just, I'll just run through Trina K. So Trina K. talked next. Trina was so important. Thank you.

She talked about this idea of tragedy. Just quickly, I'll run through her statement. It wasn't super long. She talked about the idea that Lori kept saying it's a family tragedy, and she said that tragedy doesn't involve premeditation. So I think that was a good point. For the victims, it's a tragedy, because they have no control over it.

And so in some ways it's insulting. She's pointing out, Trina's pointing out, it's insulting for Lori to call this a family tragedy because she planned it. It's not a tragedy if you can control it and if you plan it and if there's premeditation. So I thought that was a really useful insight to point out that, look, Lori, come on.

This is not, this is a tragedy for the people speaking, for the people giving victim impact statements, but not for you. You did this. You controlled this. You chose this, right? And so that was an interesting way for her to start. She also points to money.

She says that money and sex are the motives here. You and I often talk about what we call the true crime trio, which is essentially greed, lust, and revenge. There's no particular revenge component. of this crime but she's i think she's correct to point out the green and lust obviously played really important roles in in all of these crimes i get it though you know that you know it's easy to get lustful over chad dabel let me tell you sorry bad joke trying to line the mood yeah kidding um that loin fire i get it let's yeah yeah

Sorry, I know it's been serious. I finally just had to like diffuse a little bit. But yeah, I'll just never understand that lust, but keep going. Some of our viewers may not even know the loin fire reference, by the way. Lucky then. The ones that have been following us on this case for a while are going to know what loinfire means, but most may not. So, yeah, go check out chat. And loinfire.

No, don't, actually. Yeah, don't. Yeah, don't. Brianna Whitney, the woman who is now interviewed Lori Valadevil more than any other person on the news, did another one yesterday. And Lori started the interview by holding up a picture of her and Chad. We're having her on Monday, by the way. Brianna, Whitney will be on our show on Monday to talk about her final. Well, maybe her final.

Never say final interview with Lori. But yes, go on. Don't go look up blowing fire. Move forward in bliss if you don't know what that is. So let's move on to Lori then. So Lori Daybell was next. She, of course, starts off with some. some, you know, she goes on a tangent about her constitutional rights and the legal system.

I mean, all of this, by the way, is avoidance. So all of this about the legal system is denial. She doesn't want to hear what people, she doesn't want to hear what the victims are saying. She doesn't want to integrate it. She doesn't want to make sense of it. She's incapable of getting outside of her fantasy world. So one way she can do that is she can talk endlessly about the legal system and how the legal system. and how the legal system basically railroated her

and she didn't get a fair trial. And, you know, to her, that's going to help. That's going to help. If she has guilt, which she probably doesn't, that's going to help dissuade some of her guilt, maybe. She says early on, she says, I learned, when she was learning about the legal system, she says, quote, I learned that both parties

cannot tell their stories to which the judge said, yes, they can't. So Judge Breski interrupted and he said, not true. I forget exactly what he said, but basically he interrupted and he said, he basically said BS, like, yes, they, of course they can. Like, you're an ability to tell your story or put on your defense, that's on you.

That's your incompetence, right? And some of it may, by, I mean, part of what he's saying is some of that may be related to the fact that you had no defense, that you hadn't, you had no story to tell. So don't blame me because don't me that the evidence was so overwhelming that your story was irrelevant.

Not my fault. Like, blame yourself. You know, I think when people, so she goes on this tangent about the founding fathers did not intend. When people start talking about, like, the founding fathers, you know it's, you know, number one to tune it out,

and you know, number two, it's not going to be true. So, you know, she's arguing, I don't know, you know, it's, she's arguing nonsense that she thinks sounds intelligent and profound. And it's at the end, not only is it denied. My favorite though, while she's doing this, while she's thinking she's being profound,

I love the interjections from Judge Boreski. It was like, no, what did you say? I was sitting next to Matt Johnson from Court TV. And when he first did it, he just looked at each other. Not a correct stat. wrong wrong keep going it was like you're pushing a buzzer and okay keep going well he didn't you know to his credit his credit he didn't interrupt that much like if this if this was like some type of game show just twice this was yeah just twice right if this was some type of game show like

who wants to be a millionaire you know you get the answer wrong you hit the buzzer like oh game over right like people would have been hitting the buzzer a lot here. But he only had it twice. So to his credit, so the other time he hit the buzzer, by the way, so the thing about not being able to tell your story, he's like wrong.

And then she argued that only 2% of, only 2% of defendants are acquitted. And that's the other time he hit the buzzer. He's like, no, that's false. He didn't give us. the right statistic, but she was wrong about that.

So, I mean, there's something, one thing I would say about, just in general, about Lori's statement is there's something about her that there's just this naivete, right? There's this, she's got this really childlike quality. Like the world is overly simplistic. It's, it's like imaginary, right? There's this fantasy. She lives in this fantasy world.

She's in denial. She's just not capable, like a child. she's not capable of processing reality, which, by the way, and I'm not diagnosing her with narcissism, but, I mean, that's, narcissism to a large degree has something to do with that too. A lot of narcissists have this very kind of childlike quality where they want the world to be really simple, and they want the world to kind of exist in their imagination. And of course, it doesn't. So I think, you know, that came across, I think, to me pretty strongly that I felt like I was listening to a kid.

You know, I felt like I was listening to a child trying to explain the world in a way that was really silly and purely imaginative. She says, quote, she called it the unjust system, not the justice system. She said she's... That was good. The unjust system. She says it's inhumane. Here's another line that, you know, she said, you all of you have political aspirations,

raises, all of you, all your political aspirations raises and job promotions were at stake. So congratulations. So she's, she's, she's fine. She's implying that no one in the court, including the judge, can actually decipher reality except for her because they all have these biases from political aspirations, raises, and job promotions. Like all of that is somehow going to impede people's ability to discern reality and evidence and facts, right? But to her, I guess, you know, in the real world, people get job promotion. motions for doing a good job.

It doesn't mean they can't tell back from fantasy. Yeah. And then we have, then we have, I think you have this, you have, when we have what I think is probably the most important part of her statement. Do you have this clip?

I think you do, right? Yes, I do. Do I have the clip? I'm starting to wake up guys. Let's hear it. Let's hear it. Good.

Caffeine's kicking in. Getting my second wind. Here we go. I want everyone to know that I mourn with all of you. I am sorry for your pain. Losing those close to you is painful, and I acknowledge all of the pain, and I do empathize. I feel it too. If I was accountable for these crimes, I would acknowledge it, and I would let you know how sorry I was.

but I have witnessed for myself what it is like to leave this mortal existence and return home when I temporarily died in the hospital giving birth to my daughter, Tiley. When our spirit leaves our body and we return to the pure energy state in the spirit world, we immediately no longer feel hate, anger, envy, or resentment. I promise you. Okay, so, I just wanted to, ugh. I mean, had to slide into NDA, someone says, I always have to slide in that NDA that she never even had.

Summer Shifflet herself, her sister, who was there, by the way, says that wasn't a thing, this NDA, but always sliding in now. Yeah, near-death experience, sorry, not the NDA, the NDE. Let's unpack this statement. agreement. Let's unpack this statement, though, because there's a lot here. So basically, she's saying, look, you know, you guys got me wrong. I'm empathic. And I heard all you guys.

I acknowledge all your victim statements. I get it. I feel it too. The problem is, I'm not accountable. Right? She says, if I was accountable for these crimes, which she's not, according to her, I would acknowledge it. And I would let you know how sorry I was.

The problem is she's not accountable because she, according to her, she didn't do it. So, I mean, talk about a contradiction. So in other words, look, I would be empathic if I was accountable, but since I didn't do it, I'm not empathic. So in other words, she's not empathic because she's not taking any responsibility. Right. So she's saying she's not accountable. So she can't be empathic because she's not accountable.

So you're not going to, that's why Colby is not going to get an, apology or anyone's going to get an apology because there's nothing to apologize for because she's not accountable. Right? Like it's, it's, it's, it's, her logic is so contradictory and so, like, this is part of the problem, right? She, there's, there's nothing logical or rational about anything she thinks about the world. Her logic, I, I, I, I hesitate to call it logic.

I don't know what to call it. Let's call it fiction. Let's call it fantasy, right? But I mean, even reading. Logic, not not logic. Yeah. Even reading fiction is more coherent than this. And then she throws in, I'd much rather read fiction than listen to her, even if I think she's being fictional.

Like, give me fiction any day over this slop. Like, I don't know what she's, I don't know what she's talking about. All right. So she says when our spirit leaves her, she talks about her near-death experience. And when our spirit leads our body, we no longer feel hate. we just feel joy and well-being and deep empathy for those we left behind. So I guess what she's saying here is that murder is okay. I guess in a way she's saying, okay, yeah, JJ and Tiley were murdered.

But you know what? When our spirit leaves our body, we don't experience hate. We just experience this profound peace and well-being and joy. therefore, if I murdered them and they're experiencing peace, and they're busy, by the way, so she gets to this line later, she says, don't worry about them, they're busy, and they're in a happy place where everyone is engaged in projects they want to do. So, like, I don't know what that means to. So is heaven like a beehive where, like, the bees have their roles and their jobs

and they're, like, all performing. Like, it's so, I, this, it's so bizarre. are, right? Like, but well, whatever heaven is, it's a busy place. It's a busy and happy place where everyone is engaged. So don't worry about the fact that they were murdered or harmed or no longer here because they're really peaceful and happy and fulfilled the joy and they're, they're busy, right? As if like somehow being bored, I guess somehow being bored would be like, which, you know, boredom is like a part of the human condition. It's part of life. Like all of us get bored. a lot, but somehow being bored is a vice, right? Because if they were bored,

then that would be horrible. Like, never mind that they were murdered, being bored would be really bad. So her justification, she says, quote, they're busy and happy and peaceful. I mean, but her justification for the murder seems to be, the logic here seems to be, that it's okay we murdered them because they're happy. And they're busy and they're joyful, busy. I don't, again, I don't see how busy fits. Busy, busy, busy. Right, they're busy bees.

And, you know, and so. I mean, Utah is the beehive state. Did you know that when you said that? Mormon. Yeah, I know that. I know that. But like, I don't think the metaphor is meant to be for heaven, though, right? It's meant to be for like a well-functioning, well-oiled community.

Yeah. But it's meant for putting your shoulder to the wheel, though, which is what they sing at Tammy Davey Bell's funeral. And that song wasn't meant for a funeral. It was meant for pulling your hand card across the planes to make it to Utah with Brigham Young, not to send Tammy off after she was murdered. So right, go move on. But so whatever this logic is, like, I mean, so she's showing us how she thinks. Right. And the way she thinks is so, like, to the, like, for a normal, like, reasonably rational,

literate human being, this sounds really great. Like, it's, I can't make sense of it, right? But, like, if you get inside her mind, it makes perfect sense. Like, not only is she not accountable, but, like, it's okay. It's okay to murder them because, you know, they're so happy. So, and we're all going there anyway. We're all going to be a part of this apocalypse and we're all going to go to this, you you know, to have them where we can be busy and engaged and happy.

So who cares if they went early? Who cares if they were kids? Like at the end of the day, you know, they were a little bit of an inconvenience to Chad and I, so we murdered them. But don't worry about it. Don't worry about everything that everyone in that room said about how their lives have changed forever because of this trauma

and how they miss these people immensely and how everything is different, that they're all depressed and they're angry and they're lonely. Never mind any of that. That doesn't matter because all is well. They're now free of their mortal bodies and they're happy. So don't worry about it. Stop bothering me.

These murders are fine. You guys got it all wrong. That's what she's saying. I mean, what the heck? I just saw the best comment. and now I can't find it. We have a spicy shot. You guys, this chat's going so fast.

I lost it, but whoever just said, apparently heaven is like Santa's workshop and made me chuckle. Sorry I lost it. Well, I wouldn't be surprised, by the way, if Lori conflate Santa's workshop with heaven. I could see, I could see Santa being a part of Lori's version of the afterlife for sure. It would, it would definitely, you know, it would definitely brighten it up. Yeah.

Especially buddies there. Yeah, buddy. So just quickly, so she gets in, then she gets into, then now she starts getting into like the stuff we're all familiar with. So the thing she says about accountability and the near-death experience and tying it in to like the kind of the justification for murder, she doesn't say that quite as often. But this next part about how we're all God's warriors and God's going to show us great miracles, she gets into that, which essentially is her saying, and all the prisoners will go free because miracles will occur. What she's talking about is the apocalypse. So she's talking about the second coming here. The miracle is that God's going to intervene, free her, free check.

they're going to go reign, you know, Supreme in the New Jerusalem as the God and goddess over the New Jerusalem. I mean, this is kind of old. She's rehashed this stuff over and over, but she does it again here. Judge Breske challenges her on that a little bit, by the way, later. He says, well, that wasn't meant to be literal. I love that. I loved it. I was like, like, Judge Boreski is, like, taking a page from, actually from your book. Like, think.

Not so literal, Lori. Yeah. So she ends with Jesus will call his warriors from prisons and they will all walk free. So again, like what she's talking about is the apocalypse and how all of this really doesn't matter. And everything the victims are saying really doesn't matter. It's all trivial because at the, you know, at the end of the day or maybe not at the end, maybe in two weeks. I don't know. Like she thinks it's she thinks it's going to happen quickly, by the way. So she's not worried about a life sentence because she feels like she'll be released in the next couple of months, apparently. I don't know.

Well, Judge Boreski wanted to make that clear too. I loved it when Judge Boreski schooled him on scripture. I mean, we all remember years ago when we first learned Melanie Gibb with schooling her on scripture, right? When they had like that Bible bash in the midst of that infamous recorded phone call. well now it's judge boreski's turn and he doesn't have to like deal with her talking back and he's like let me make sure you understand Lori that when they say the prisoners will go free they don't mean now they mean when you die and you're not getting out and that's that was like such a moment for me was like he was like let let me clarify this scripture for you um as as a judge here when you die because you're spending the rest of your days in prison.

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outcomes vary. Investment management and advisory services provided by Wellfront Advisors LLC and SEC registered investment advisor. Investing involves risk to principle regardless of the strategy used. Task performance does not guarantee future results. And so that'll take us to, so that's the end of Lori's statement. I think those were kind of the interesting components of her statement. Again, I, you know, following her logic is like nearly impossible. but, and again, I hesitate to call it logic. I don't know what I'd call it. Her delusion, I guess maybe that's a better following. Her delusion is complicated,

but I think if you really pay attention, you can pull out some threads that make sense of it. So the way I take it is she's essentially saying, you know, what I did isn't that bad, and murder's fine because they're happy. Oh, and they're busy too. God forbid if they were bored in heaven. So don't worry about it.

it, right? And so that brings us to Judge Boreski. I've already mentioned a few things he said. This kind of the importance of truth in the courtroom. I appreciate that. I agree. I think truth is important, especially in the legal system, even though a lot of people apparently these days want to like have they want to play these games and shenanigans around truth and legality and whatever judge boreski reminds us that the end of the day jurors not the judge because more he wants to blame him but jurors are the ones responsible for rendering verdicts and finding their version of the truth um then we have a clip from judge boreski right we sure do I've seen many, many cases in my career where someone faces a long prison sentence for what amounted to one split second bad decision.

You are not that person. The amount of contemplation, calculation, planning, manipulation that went into these crimes is unparalleled in my career. Your powers of manipulation are profoundly destructive, one that undermines trauma. trust, distorts truth, and can erode the very foundations of healthy relationships and society. The impact of your manipulation has been devastating, insidious, and far-reaching, and perhaps still unknown. Yeah. I think that, everything we just talked about for the last few hours, if we've been going for, I can't see the time, so I think we've been going for a few hours. But going as long as LDS churches.

But you know what? We've been on this case for six years, and that's okay because it's a big day today. And I just do. Keep going. I think that's a beautiful summary and encapsulation of everything we've been talking about for the last two hours in terms of really kind of pointing out. for the last two hours in terms of really kind of pointing out what Lori's up to that this is not impulsive. This is not, so there's different types of violence, there's reactive violence, and there's more premeditated violence, violence that involves planning.

And he's basically saying, look, you know, I've seen a lot of crimes. where people will do crazy things impulsively or in the moment. And then I've seen those people, you are not that person. Right. He's like, you are not. This is not like reactive violence where, you know, somebody might get manslaughter because they weren't really thinking about what they were doing. You know, kind of the bar fight scenario where somebody says,

you know, I hate the Raiders, you know, being from Las Vegas, somebody says, I hate the Raiders, and somebody says, no, I love the Raiders, and they get into a fight. That's not what happened here. And, you know, so he points out that this was quite deliberate. He says it's unparalleled in his career. And he mentions her manipulation, the assault on trust and the distortion of truth. which we've been talking about now for the last few hours, and how all of that really undermines healthy relationships. So I thought that was a really profound moment. You know, Judge Boreski, I think, has showed a lot of wisdom

and a lot of restraint in dealing with Lori over this, you know. My hat goes off to him for, you know, my hat, you know, my hat. I have a lot of sympathy for what he's had to deal with, and I think he's done it very well. He's had a lot of patience. Like I said, a lot of restraint. I think he's the type of judge you want on a case like this because I think he shows a certain amount of wisdom and insight,

and he did with this statement. So I think that that statement is a really kind of wonderful summary of a lot of what we've talked about. The other thing, I think I'm going to end with this thought, but this is another thing Judge Breski says. So I think this is near the very end. He said the harm, and in the five years, six years, in the six years we've been covering this, this is another one of those statements, I think, that really distills things to the court, distills this crime to the core.

What he said was when he, before he gave the sentence, which was consecutive life sentences on top of the Idaho crimes, he imposed injunctions, meaning that there can be no contact between certain of the parties and Lori. There was restitution of over $200,000. But he says, before he imposes the final sentence, he says, the harm. The harm is immeasurable. Yeah. The harm is immeasurable.

And I feel that way. I feel like the harm. You saw it today. You saw it in that room. Six years later. Six years later. Six years later. You saw the harm.

You see the harm. You see the heartbreak. You see all of the emotions surrounding this. It was all on display today. The violation of trust, the assault on truth. truth, what happens when somebody lives in a fantasy world and acts out that fantasy? What happens when someone believes that people are dark or demons or possessed or zombies?

This is what happens. This is where you land. This is where you end up. When you dehumanize people. You end up at a place where, to quote Judge Boreski, the harm is immeasurable. and I hope that I hope we've contributed a little bit of insight and compassion and understanding here on this crime

because it certainly impacted us. I know it's impacted, you know, just hearing from a lot of our audience and our viewers, it's impacted a lot of our viewers. And, you know, I wish I had a solution. When harm is immeasurable, I think one solution is that whoever created that harm, you put them behind bars forever, right?

And that's what happened here. But there's no way to contain the radius and the periphery of harm for the victims and for the community and for all of us that have to deal with this after the aftermath of all this, the trauma, right? And so here we are. And I agree with Judge Brest. that the harm really is immeasurable.

And I wish there was a simple way to resolve it. But there's not. I mean, maybe one way is that we've talked about this. We've talked about this for six years. We've tried to make sense of it. We've tried to explain it. I don't know that there's a simple explanation. Well, I know there's not, right?

But part of our, I think, part of our process and part of our goal, at least, is to help make sense of it a little bit, even though it's totally senseless. And even though the harm is immeasurable, maybe in our own way, I hope we've helped to soften that harm a little bit, to all lay that harm. I don't know. I think we're all trying to do it in our own way. We are.

Thank you, babe. A couple things really quickly. I actually had about 10 things, but I just crossed eight of them out. Okay. All right. A couple things. This is, Angela writes,

I can't believe that all in one week, Koberger, Stearns and Lori, all gave no apology, took no real responsibility. All three of them did such heinous things. You can't just say, I'm sorry, it really cheers me up. I think this is profound because it's real and it's meaning.

In addition, this is exactly why this week has been so overwhelming I mean so busy. These are three cases that we covered. And I want you guys to know, and we're also covering the James Craig case, too. Unfortunately, our team is, you know, three, three in our moderators and some people that also help us, but, you know, Grayson, John, me, and we've been doing our best. And I also want to tell you that one case that was really important to us and that remains really important to us is Madeline Soto. We are the ones that interviewed, you know, Stefan Stern's parents.

And we wanted to cover that. We will be talking about that. I think we're probably going to do that elsewhere, though. Well, that's what I was going to bring up. So we missed that. But we will be bringing you an episode on patreon.com slash hidden true crime. So John and I will be recording that probably this weekend

about the plea here. for Stefan Stearns. So at patreon.com slash hidden two crime. And for those that do want more Dr. John and more boldness episodes, he has probably nearly, we're probably nearing 100 now, including one recently this week.

So that is where you'll find that update. And I'm, you know, we've been doing our best. And we are continuing to cover James Craig. There are no cameras in that court. Excuse me. There are no cameras in that courtroom.

and we are continuing to cover the James Craig trial. I also want to say that after court today, I didn't meet somebody who knows Judge Boreski fairly well and talked to this person for a while and Judge Boreski. He has a lot of empathy. That's what this person told me, that this case has affected him and his empathy is deep and wrong.

real and I think we've seen that and we saw it today. And I thought, I wanted to share that because we don't often hear about judges. They're clearly the most private figures in the courtroom and to hear this person share the empathy he has for people. I wanted to share that a little bit of information I learned about Judge Breske. We've certainly seen it. Yeah, and I would point out that he was quite emotional. during his statement. And I think that speaks to that issue you're discussing. Yeah.

And then I was able to show this person, my little pin that I have on my purse. I don't know if you can see it. It's a picture of Judge Breske and it says, are you done? And I want to say, people have been asking where I got this. I actually got this from a hidden gen named Kristen who actually. I saw her earlier in chat. And a lot of people are wanting them. So I will be working with Kristen.

I am not responsible for this wonderful little hen. But people are asking. So as far as my Labibu doll, you'll have to ask my son. He's the one that wants this on my purse. Although I said, I'll do a Labibu, but it's got to be in a Gucci jumpsuit. So my bag isn't Gucci, but my Labubu's, jumpsuit is fake one can one can one can drain yeah the labubu gets Gucci um and and just just on the lububu uh that that's the labo that's the labo that represents serenity by the way so

yes it is i think i think i think it was really important that you you randomly received right you bought a package and you didn't know which labuba was in it and it was serenity. I think that's something you, I think that's something you definitely have, has been important to try to find in the last couple of months. So, I agree. It's been a rough couple of months. We might talk about it one day. But it's been hard. I'm forgiving me that I was really tired at beginning of this. I also, just, you know, I woke up, John, you don't even know this, but I've had probably two hours asleep the last three nights and we are covering James Craig. It's so important. I woke up at

2.30 a.m. to finish the script and to record it and because we missed yesterday. And we might be a day behind tonight because we want to go see our wonderful friends. We actually, we're all getting together earlier and they're together, but we want to go see the Woodcox and see the Envig and others. And so if you guys don't see James Craig tonight's installment, we'll be. We will be sharing it tomorrow. So, yeah. So, but I've got my Labubu serenity with me, so everything's okay. It's the energy of the boo.

Our little guy got, he got loyalty, right? Yeah. He got loyalty, yeah. And then put him in a Gucci jumpsuit. So you can let our little guy know. And we got one for Grayson too. and Grayson got happiness, right? And I will say Grayson refuses to put hers on her purse.

So Grayson's like, no way. But Grayson's like, I am not with her. And I even got Grayson a Prada job suit. I was like, you can have a Prada bucket hat for yours. Like let's dress your Laboooooo. Grayson's now laughing and embarrassed. Yeah. See, here's Grace.

Here's Graysons. But Grayson, unlike me, unlike me, Grayson is like, there is no way in hell I'm putting that on my purse. And I'm just like walking around going, hey, everyone, this is me. And here's my Judge Boreski pen, you know, and mark my words, it is not a lafou, it's a la-booboo. I think it's important to point out, by the way, that I do not have a laboo-booboo. yet. Was that, were you a question that I buy you one?

No, I don't, I don't know. Did I miss your father's day request, but John really wanted to L'Boooooo? A month ago, I had no idea what a little L'Bubu was, but now I kind of yearn, now I kind of yearn for the secret. So for those of you who don't know what the Bubu's are, the secret is like, I don't know, the secret's really cool, I guess. Grayson just said that she can rent hers out to you. No.

It isn't a little parada gem suit though, so it's a little bit pricier. But yeah, yeah, no. Our Gen Z producer is like, what the hell are you doing walking around with that thing on your purse? And I'm like, dude, I'm a mom who's like, I had to buy this thing. I'm going to own it and I am going to wear it. Yeah. Yeah. So.

Okay. shame on me for not getting you a liboo-boobo. I think I know what we're doing when I get home. I'm bringing John a loo-bo. And for those of you that have no idea what a Labibu is, John just said he didn't know a week ago, but now he's an expert. A month ago.

A month ago. Just go Google. Just go Google. The secret is out and you will know. You've had that on your purse for like a month. Did you see what I did there? That was good. Yeah.

Yeah. I saw that. Not as poetic as the victim statements today, by the way. We're going to end. You know how you always end on profound things? It's something I love about you. John Williams is going to end tonight. Chad is a la-doodoo.

Agreed. Okay. All right. Thank you, everyone, for being here for two and a half hours. We are really late. I let my friends know we might be an hour and a half late, and now we're two and a half hours late. But it was good to see you and good to catch up.

And thank you, everyone. Wait, just a quick thought here. So if Chad is a la-dudu, what is Lori? La-vudu. No, I don't know. Oh, I was going to say a la-fou-foo. La-fou. I don't even know what that means, but something.

Yeah, that kind of works. A what? A lecou-cou-cou-a. A lacucoo. That's it. She's a lacuuku. That's what we need to end with. Michaela, you get the last word. Sorry, John. Williams. Yeah. John Williams. No. Yeah. Well, no, they both get the last word. They're both. They're both great. So. Lecucco. That's perfect. Love it. Yeah. All right, everyone. We'll see you. For the Lecuckoo, we need, rather than a fake Gucci jumpsuit,

we're going to have to go find someplace that owns like a prison suit with a number. I thought you were going to get like a straight jacket. That works too. Works too. All right. Well, I'm going to go take off with my, yeah, go meet some friends. And justice was served. And I was grateful and honored to have listened.

to all of these powerful victim impact statements. We'll see you everyone. Bye-bye. At my bank, I was literally getting pennies using wealthfront. Checking. Meet Angela, a wealth front cash account client since 2023. I lost my job, not having something else lined up yet. I was pregnant with my second.

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