Hidden True Crime - Juror #8 Drops Bombshell Moments From Court | Lori Vallow Daybell

Episode Date: April 25, 2025

Tass Reed-Tucker, known as juror 8 in the Lori Daybell trial, has graciously sat down with HTC to talk about being a juror on Lori's latest trial, what some of the big moments were, and what helped the jury decide their verdict. 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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Okay, so I have a question for you. Before we get into my questions for you as a juror, have you spent the last 24 hours sort of learning about this case, what you didn't know? Yes. Yeah, it's been a lot. How are you doing? I'm doing okay. It's crazy to see it all. And I'm just part of a small part of it.

Yeah. When we spoke right after the verdict, you said that your grandmother's jaw sort of dropped when she learned that you were a juror. or Lori Valo-Dabal, but you did not know anything about this case, and she kept a tight lip. Yes. Yeah. She struggled a little bit. She was like, oh, I wish I could tell you this. I wish I could talk with you about this.

And yeah. Yeah. And so did she finally start talking a lot after the verdict? Yes. Yes. Yes, I did. I actually, I didn't even get a chance to come home. We went from court straight to her.

house because my mom actually flew in for my sister's graduation. So you've been busy. You've been very busy. Oh my gosh. The second the second I got there, they instantly turned on the interviews that were posted. And that's about how my night went. Have you watched the Netflix documentary or anything about the backstory or anything you didn't know about this case? I did. Okay. And my husband, by the way, is in that Netflix doc. He is the psychologist. in the Netflix documentary, sins of our mother. Were you shocked to learn some of the things they didn't present in court about the woman you found guilty? Yes.

Yeah. What was the most surprising? Her past. Before this case. As in what happened in Idaho, her children? Yeah. Which brings me to some of the questions I have for you while in trial. Did you wonder where Tiley was as they presented evidence or why you weren't hearing from Tiley? Yeah. And something that I keep getting asked is that question. And if we talked about it during it, but we all wondered it. We just couldn't talk about it until deliberate.

So once deliberation came up, that's when that's when the whole, that's when the questioning came. Oh, and so you were able to ask one another during deliberation. And so did it, did you or anybody ask during deliberations where is Tiley? Yeah. They asked why one of the guys there asked why she didn't have anyone, like why Tiley didn't come, why J.J. didn't come. like any of her friends or anything like that. And none of us knew even. So there was nothing we could ask about it.

Right. So none of you even knew that answer to that question why Tiley wasn't even in court supporting her mother. Right. And at that point, the questions couldn't be answered. Yeah. Wow. When you got back to the deliberation room, Mm-hmm.

How did it, how did the start? We don't really understand the process. Those of us have never been jurors for a big case like this. What was, what happened? Can you take us through? From the start or from deliberation. The deliberation. Um, so we got sat down on Monday when we thought it was all going to happen when she said she didn't have anyone to back her up.

Um, and they sat us down in the juror room. and they were like, you can go home for the day, we'll pick up tomorrow. So we got there Tuesday, and they told us what was happening. They gave us all the evidence. So we got to have all the evidence in the juror room with us that we could look back through and talk about. And then two out of the 12 of us were still actually questioning, they were still on the fence about it. So we had to go through what they needed to see in order for us to come up with it. But we actually came up with it that same day within 30 to 40 minutes.

So, but it didn't take 30 to 40 minutes to deliberate or did you guys have your verdict in your mind before lunch broke or was it after? We did. And then we took lunch and came back and that's when we gave it. Okay. Okay. So you knew before lunch. This is what we're doing. but we'll come back, we'll talk, we'll sort of regroup and gather our thoughts.

Yeah. So there were two people that needed a little bit more evidence. What evidence did you go through in the deliberating? For one of them, it was when she went to Walgreens because she said she had to go to Walgreens because her entirely ran out of the house without shoes on. But if you watch that video, you can actually see her entering Walgreens with shoes on, with sandals on, and buying sandals and swapping them out by the time she gets back to the scene. So once the guy saw that, he was like, well, she lied about something as simple as shoes on your feet.

So like what makes anyone else think that the rest isn't a lie, you know? Yeah, right. And did you watch the entire interview with Lori after the shooting of the shooting of Charles occurred because she asked you to watch the full interview. And then Trina Kay sort of agreed and said, yeah, go back and watch that. Did you guys take the time to watch that full interview? Yeah, that's actually the first thing we did, just to start our deliberation off, because we wanted to see what she wanted us to see, you know? And Trina actually did a really good job showing the main points of the interview, because when we watched it through,

what we were shown is what the important part was. And what we weren't shown was her taking her sandals off, crossing her legs, sitting up in the chair, like she was at her own house, laughing, smiling, joking, you know. So I'm not sure why she wanted us to watch the whole thing because it just looked worse on her part. But, yeah. Right. So you saw her demeanor. Was there anything powerful that Trina Kay said to you during maybe her clothing statements that you thought, yeah, you know what?

You're right. Yeah. The part that was when she said the first shot wasn't, might have been self-defense, but he was shot twice. That's not self-defense when he's already down and helpless, you know? So it's just not self-defense. Right. It just can't be. Yeah. There was something else going on.

The two jurors that had questions, do you know what type of questions they had? Or is it just sort of getting that sort of solid, you know, finishing? Yeah, it was more or less clarification, more clarification. So even though there was hundreds of text messages, we actually went through them, back through them, to help him get his clarification and it worked out. Okay. They gave you more text messages than they read in court. Did you, did either, did any of you go through like the sort of love text between Chad Daybell and Lori Valo?

Yes. More? You did. Yeah. And they were pretty intense. I'm not sure if you guys have seen them or not, but they're pretty. I've read them all. Yeah.

They're pretty intense. Intense is a good word. Yeah. And it explains a lot of the background, right? I mean, not only is it almost like you get secondhand embarrassment and reading it, it's actually telling you this very specific timeline, in my opinion. So did that help you or any of the jurors reading that, those love texts? Yeah.

So the other guy that he was on the fence about was the messages. and he read through them, back through them, and then they asked if I would just read them out loud so everyone could just hear them again. And I was like getting read, even reading them because I'm like, this is intense. And I'm reading it to 11 of you. But yeah, yeah.

So they picked you back there to read out loud text messages between Lori and Chad. Yeah. You took one for the team. I did. Yeah. I'm glad there was no. cameras. Did you guys wonder about Chad, like where he was or what he was up to?

Yeah. And none of us knew. So there was no questions answered, you know, so until we got to leave and watch everything. So you're, so take me through coming back from lunch. You guys made up your mind before lunch, but you come back from lunch and what, what were, so I was there the whole day outside the courtroom. So we were just waiting patiently, which is why I think I'm so curious about what was going on that I couldn't see. So you come back from lunch and then what happens? That's when we were all kind of like show of hands who already knows their answer or who doesn't. And all of us, but the two people were raise their hands. And so we went over those quick things that they needed clarification on.

And then we chose the foreperson. It was down to me or the guy with the beard. And we did rock paper scissors and we did voting. And it came down to him. So once we got him picked and then they got clarification, we were like, let's just do it now. Let's stop wasting people's time. There's no point in saying that we'll be ready tomorrow, you know, like to sleep on it. Because there was another person that wanted to sleep on.

it and come back. We're like, if we know the answer, there's no point in wasting people's time. Yeah, if you know, you know. So we all just, we're like, sign that paper and let's go. Okay. Yeah. And you each came in and you each went around and said that this was your verdict. Did you feel good coming in and saying, yes, this woman is guilty? You did. Yeah, 100%. Because of everything that we saw and, you know, learned. Once they did say that she was guilty, we all kind of, or I did, we looked over at Charles's sister and family, and you could just tell that they were relieved and they finally got justice. And it felt good. So what were the faces you saw? Because the live fee doesn't pick up on what the surviving victims are feeling or Charles' family is feeling.

What did you see when you looked over at them? So you could see them kind of just like take a deep breath in and out, you know? Like you could tell that they were relieved. And then I saw that the person, the guy that was sitting behind Kay, he like tapped her shoulder and he was smiling. And it was a good feeling. Yeah. What was some of the most compelling? witness testimony for you during this trial?

The part that said, the part that was read in the text message that said he was dead before we got rid of him, that specific part that said before we got rid of him. And then when she said that they were both going to be like Nephi. Yeah. And did you understand the Nephi thing? I know that there was one juror who did grow up LDF.

Yes, did you have to ask her a lot of questions or did you, did any of you already understand what that meant, the Nephi story? A lot of us actually didn't. We had to figure out what it even was. I'm from a small town of like 4,000 people where you're like Christian or not, you know? So coming here and learning all these new religions, I had no idea what that was, but caught on very quickly that it wasn't actually a thing of how she was going about it, you know? And yeah. Yeah. And that juror, did she answer questions about the LDS faith at all for people that had questions?

After the fact, because we can't talk about it during until the deliberation. So after that, when it did come down to that, she did let us know. Before all of you walked out of the courthouse, you all knew about J.G. and Tiley and how they were dead and how there were multiple victims. You know, you guys just heard about one. How did you learn that? When people, so as we were leaving, there was actually people talking about, like, I can't believe they don't know that they're dead. You know, I can't believe they don't know that she killed her kids. It was just a lot of talk that we could hear while coming out. And that's when we were like, what is going on? Like, that's a lot more than what we knew.

Yeah. What were your thoughts when you learned about the children, about Tiley and JJ and others? It's extremely sad. I couldn't imagine. I mean, like, you can hate people. You can not like your family, you know, but there's still your family at the end of the day. And I couldn't imagine even going through that or even thinking of doing that. So it's extremely sad for the families that lost who they lost. You thought this was your run club era. Turns out it was more of a thinking about it. outrun club era. The good news, someone's marathon training is about to start. Sell your workout gear on Deepop. Just snap a few photos and we'll take care of the rest. They get their race day fit and you get a payout for trying. Someone on Deepop wants what you've got. Start selling now. Deepop where Taste recognizes taste. When you arrived back at your grandmothers,

And you were able to talk. What did you both say? What were the first things you said to each other? What did your grandmother start saying? What were you saying? We instantly turned on the interviews on the TV. And my mom and my grandma and my sister were all like, I can't believe you're famous. And she was questioning. She was like, what did you go through? Like, how are you feeling? Does it feel good to be where you're at right now? you know. That's so neat that the first questions your family is asking are about you and checking on you and making sure you're okay. And how are you feeling? I'm, I've had a day to decompress a little, a little bit. My social media is going insane. So it's kind of hard to get away from it. But I'm, I'm doing good now. I feel a lot better than when I did when we were actually in there.

What were you feeling when you were in there? Was it hard? It was. We didn't want to make any faces for people to think that we were judging or not or on one side or the other, you know. And just being extremely, you know, monotone, almost no reaction is hard for a little over two weeks to do daily. And nobody know what you're thinking and you can't talk about it. that's hard. It takes a, it takes a little bit of a toll on you. So, um, now being able to talk about it and, you know, just letting it sink in feels good. Good. Yeah, I will say it was very hard to read any of you.

I sat in the courtroom every single day. And the biggest question that many of my listeners had was, what is the jury thinking, feeling reacting? And I had to say every day, you know, I saw this slight facial expression, but for the most part, they are paying attention, but very hard to read. So if that was your goal and you guys worked hard to do that, you did it well. It was. There was a couple of slip-ups. I don't know if the jury, or I don't know if the audience could hear it, but there was

a couple of slip-ups, you know, when the don't flatter yourself slipped or came out and the green chili enchiladas, multiple questions. about them. We could hear each other chuckling, but we kept a straight face so that we didn't, you know, that nobody could tell. But there was a couple times we slipped up. Yeah. Well, no, those, both of those comments didn't pass anyone and we've been talking about them ever since. Nancy Johancock saying, don't flatter yourself. You guys, were you guys as thought that was as great as all as we did sitting in the gallery then? Yeah, we did. We did. We did.

It was hard to not get a reaction from that. Yeah, yeah. I thought it was well-played, Nancy Jo. It was iconic. It's going to live with her forever now. I agree. I agree. So you get home.

They're asking you how you're doing. And then you sit down, did you sit down that night to watch the Netflix documentary sins of our mother? Yes. And it was, it was. it was intense. It felt like real life of what we just went through, but something that they legitimately went through at the time, you know, and knowing that that's how Kobe felt and was feeling and went through is hard. I couldn't ever imagine going through that, and he did really, really well holding him holding his ground he did a amazing job and and i cut you off you i think

you said you're going to you watch netflix and something else what else did you yeah um on the youtube channel doctor insanity they also have something on there with her and um we watched that and it was basically this pretty much the same thing but charles's point of view and that was even more crazy because had had people have taken it a little more seriously when he came about it, you know, it probably would have ended a little different because he told the cops straight up that she said that she was going to murder him and they kind of just, they kind of swept it away. Absolutely. Absolutely. I'll send you a backstory that I did too. And we talk about that. And right, that body camera footage that they did not show you in court, were you shocked to see that then of him asking for help?

Yep. Yeah. Because I was like, why didn't they show that? Like, that's a big piece of evidence. Like, knowing he knew already that. And this was like months before. And they didn't show that. Right.

Right. I wonder too. I guess it is considered hearsay, but it was frustrating for me as well. Well, I've been reporting on this case for nearly six years and knowing that they didn't show that was so frustrating because it is such a giant piece of evidence. But the good news is with as little evidence as all of you had, you still came to a guilty verdict. It was very clear to all of you, it seems. You came back fast with your verdict. Yeah.

Yeah. That's because we all pretty much knew. We had enough, we had plenty of enough evidence to show it. And, you know, they gave us the gun. They gave us the bullets. They gave us the piece of floor and trim that the bullets went through. And we didn't really look into it because we already know that Alex did it. And that really had, I mean, nothing to do with what we were there for.

We were there for the conspiracy of her doing it, you know? So we already knew that he did it. It was what we needed was the text messages, the videos, the interviews, and stuff like that. Right. What did you think of her defense or lack thereof that this was self-defense that she didn't call witnesses nor testified? Any thoughts on that? Yeah. So I think we were all pretty mind-blown when she didn't have any witnesses, not even friends, you know? So we were all kind of like, oh, okay, it's just it's just done now, you know? And the self-defense thing, I know she says it was, but anyone, anyone knows that that's not self-defense if they're already on the ground and helpless, you know, so. Yeah.

Right. Right. Anything that was contradicting as well with the evidence. I mean, you mentioned the shoes explaining where she was or wasn't during the shooting where the kids were. Did it all make sense? you feel like there was a lot to this story and the shooting of Charles that maybe was uncertain? I think the whole bat thing, the swinging the bat around the trying to protect himself,

you know, she said that he was swinging it. And if that was the case, the bullet would have hit his arm and it didn't. So, which means his arms were not up swinging a bat. And the bat was actually on the opposite side of what it would have. have been if he did was doing that you know so um we we want to know a little bit more about that but yeah it helped to play a role in it yeah yeah um yeah gosh what did you think about oh excuse me um any other of the testimonies did adam sorry i should imagine adam k Nancy Joe, any other testimonies that affected you? Yeah. The one, so they all pretty much did.

They all played a big role in how we went about this. And they all did an amazing job at holding their ground, trying to be cracked, you know. And, but I think that Adams was, I think Adams was good because he, He told us that the whole Nephi thing and how she went about it isn't a legit thing. So we were all kind of like, oh, well, I mean, that's how she played it off. So if it's not actually how it is, then, you know. Yeah. Did she come across as combative to any of you or did she come across as sweet or how did she come across to the jury?

It was like she was oddly friend, like oddly, yeah, I want to say friendly because she would look at us and just stare at us and smirk while she looked at us, you know, roll her eyes, smirk. Like, it was no big deal. And the only time she would, she did it throughout the whole trial, but every time she did it, it was right after they showed or told a big piece of evidence. Wow. So this was actually a lot that cameras couldn't see because we would only see the back of her head during the live stream. So you're saying she would roll her eyes and smirk. Yeah. She would just sit there and like legitimately smirk at us. And, you know, when that happens, it was kind of like a, it was kind of like, who cares, you know? Like, it doesn't matter. Dismissive. Yeah.

Of what you guys are learning and seeing in there. Yep, exactly. So that affected you. Interesting. So would she look at the jury a lot? Yeah. Every time they said something important, she would look at the jury and be, like, wanted to see our reactions. When we were doing the exact same thing, we were looking at her to see her reaction.

and her reaction was smirking, you know. So we were like, why is she smirking at a time like this? Yeah. What did you think was the biggest motive in the end? Was it the money? Was it religion? Any thoughts? Or did you see a lot of motives?

So I think money played a role in it. I know she said it didn't, but a million dollars is a lot of money. And even though she is worth $2 million, dollars, a million dollars is still a lot of money. So her saying that she wasn't upset about it and then rereading the texts, you can tell she's upset about it. And I think money did play a role in it along with wanting to be with Chad rather than going about just divorcing.

And what did you think about the sort of odd religious? beliefs that they were bringing in? Did that play a role or was it just weird or what were your thoughts? It was weird to me. I never heard anything like that and something like a religious belief of like actually doing something like that is crazy to say the least. So I was I was shook, hearing about it, learning about it. It was a lot. Yeah. I know you need to run, Tosh. Let me ask you, what's next? Are you going to keep sort of learning about this case? I assume it'll be forever with you. You played a major role. I am actually going to school for criminal justice generalist. So in the midst of all this,

I'm going to school full time. But I'm still going to take the time to learn more about it. And I'm still going to continue to watch stuff about it. Wow. What an incredible background now you'll have to your education and criminal justice. Yeah. It's been an experience. Wow.

Wow. That's amazing. Well, I wish you the best of luck in your future and in your education. in your future career. And I will help you, I will send you a few things to get you started. How about that? Thank you. We're in touch now.

So I'll send you things and I know that my listeners, our gems, are so grateful that you took the time. I know that they have been asking, please, we just want to understand what the jurors have been through. And so thank you for sharing your story with us. Yeah. And of course, thank you. And one more thing.

I know she has another case coming up June or July, and I just want to say I will be there. I'm going to watch it from the other side and see what it's like to be on the other side of it. And yeah, I'll be there. Well, good. Well, let's sit by each other. Let's hang out. I'll be there too. Okay.

So we'll be in touch, Tosh. I'm glad you'll be there. And yeah, thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. You're welcome. We'll see you. See you. Did you know if your windows are bare, indoor temperatures can go up 20 degrees?

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