Law&Crime Sidebar - Ruby Franke Prosecutors Seek New Hearing for Accused Child Abusing Mom

Episode Date: December 12, 2023

New court hearings are in the works for former YouTube “momfluencer” Ruby Franke and her business partner Jodi Hildebrandt. The two are accused of abusing at least two of Franke’s children, who were found bruised and emaciated in Hildebrandt’s Utah home. The Law&Crime Network’s Jesse Weber gets details on the latest court motions from KUTV2News reporter Brian Schnee.SPONSOR: Go to https://zbiotics.com/SIDEBAR to get 15% off your first order when you use SIDEBAR at checkout. You can also sign up for a subscription - so you can stay prepared no matter the time or occasion. ZBiotics is backed with 100% money-back guarantee so if you’re unsatisfied for any reason, they’ll refund your money, no questions asked.HOST:Jesse Weber: https://twitter.com/jessecordweberLAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokePodcasting - Sam GoldbergVideo Editing - Michael DeiningerScript Writing & Producing - Savannah WilliamsonGuest Booking - Alyssa Fisher & Diane KayeSocial Media Management - Vanessa BeinSTAY UP-TO-DATE WITH THE LAW&CRIME NETWORK:Watch Law&Crime Network on YouTubeTV: https://bit.ly/3td2e3yWhere To Watch Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3akxLK5Sign Up For Law&Crime's Daily Newsletter: https://bit.ly/LawandCrimeNewsletterRead Fascinating Articles From Law&Crime Network: https://bit.ly/3td2IqoLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. Jody Hildebrandt and the panelists are going to help you understand the difference between honest and emotional honesty. Is it possible the Ruby Frankie case could be wrapped up before the end of the year, we have to talk about what could be very important hearings, and who better to join us than KUTV 2 News is Brian Schnee. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by law and crime. I'm Jesse Weber. Well, we have a legal update for you in the Ruby Frankie case out of Utah that is, I will say, very interesting. It is. So Frankie, of course, is the former

creator and star of her now defunct YouTube channel called A Passengers, where she doesn't sold out controversial parenting advice. Only now, she and her business partner, Jody Hildebrand, are each charged with six counts of aggravated child abuse with respect to two of Ruby's young children who were found in Hildebrand's home. In fact, to be a little bit more accurate, while Frankie's daughter was found in the house, her son actually escaped the home and ran to a neighbor who called 911. 911 on the address of your emergency.

I just had a 12-year-old boy still up here at my front door asking for help. We know there's been problems at this neighbor's house. He's emaciated. He's got tape around his legs. He's hungry and he's thirsty. The boy was reportedly emaciated and he also had wounds and evidence that he'd been tied up. The daughter reportedly found in similar condition she was taken to the hospital to be treated from malnourishment. Now they're technically set to go to trial, but are they? Like I said, we have an interesting development. And when we talk about Ruby Frankie, who better to bring in, then anchor and reporter for KUTV2 News, Brian Schnee, who has been following this case.

From the very beginning, Brian, always good to see you. Thanks for taking the time. You have an interesting update for us. Tell us what's going on. Well, it's interesting when you say legal update because there haven't been many over the course of the last few months. So when anything drops of significance, of course, that peaks our interest, right? So what happened this week is the deputy Washington County attorney,

decided to request a waiver hearing for both ruby frankie and jody hildebrent there are two separate hearings they're proposed to be later this month rubies would be before jodies rubies would be in about a week and a half jodies would actually be after the christmas holiday but they propose these two waiver hearings and you can imagine it means that there's movement finally in terms of both sides potentially coming to some sort of an agreement on something now As you know, in a situation such as this, it could mean a plea deal. It could mean even just a status hearing, which they would call for it, but we're waiting and see.

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sidebar to get 15% off of your first order when you use sidebar at checkout. You can also sign up for a subscription using my code so you can stay prepared no matter what the time or occasion. And one more thing, Zbiotics is backed by 100% money-back guarantee. So if you aren't happy for whatever reason, they're going to refund your money, no questions asked. So head over to zbiotics.com slash sidebar and use code sidebar checkout to get 15% off. Now, Brian, before we even go over any further, people are probably like, what's a waiver hearing? Let's start right there under Utah law. What is a waiver hearing?

Waiver hearings can actually be called a number of times. throughout the course of court proceedings. And it's typically when people want to meet both sides to come together, the prosecution and the defense. And in this situation, you can talk about where are we now and what happens next? Now, in a waiver hearing, you could, in theory, come up with some sort of a plea deal.

It could have been already discussed, and now this is a formality, or it could be kind of more of a status conference and they move forward to a preliminary hearing or even a trial at this. point so it could be a number of things right and let's take a step back because basically what they would be saying is do you want to waive the preliminary hearing the hearing to determine if there's enough evidence to go forward with a trial now i'm wondering about this and before

even get into the idea of plea deals and we could probably talk a whole show about that the idea that either ruby or jody would want to waive a preliminary hearing is fascinating to me because from a legal point of view. That's the time you can hear the prosecution's evidence. That's the time, technically, you could get the case dismissed if the judge says, I don't see there's enough here, kind of hold the prosecution, their feet to their fire a little bit. And it's, you know, the defense can even question some witnesses usually, as we've seen in preliminary hearings. And I would be very surprised, you tell me, what would be any reason, other than, you know, trying to work out a plea deal, any reason you could see why either Ruby or Jody,

would not want to have a preliminary hearing? I can't see a reason to it, honestly. And it's one of those things that I spoke to briefly, the attorney for Ruby Frankie about a week ago. And I said, hey, anything coming down the pike you want to let us know about, obviously we've been following the case. And they said, we hope to have a statement

in the next few weeks when we're able to basically reach some sort of agreement. And then when I got that email about a week later, this request for a waiver hearing comes out. So it makes me think there's been the dialogue. There's been something, right? And obviously the prosecution took forever to look over the, quote, copious amounts of discovery in this case. And a lot of people that comment, obviously, on your streams and all of our posts, they say, what is taking so long?

Well, this, to me, seems like it's the discovery finally coming to an end. We've seen everything we've got. And now this could be an opportunity for people to kind of show their cards, so to speak. but you're right though it is interesting that a waiver hearing in theory means hey i'm going to waive the right to have my preliminary hearing and we move forward from there which then yes you're right to be talking about a plea or it could just be we wave a preliminary hearing and we want to go forward to the rest of the criminal process which the only way i could imagine the only thing that i'm thinking is if you didn't want a preliminary hearing because you didn't want all that evidence to come

out now, right? I mean, obviously you have to select a jury, and maybe they're already getting terrible PR, but I will tell you, there's, I mean, they're accused right now. We haven't heard anything about a defense, but we also haven't heard more of what the prosecution has, more about what investigators have. Perhaps, Brian, they're nervous, either Ruby or Jody, about this all being exposed at preliminary hearing. And I'm wondering if that could be something. You know, they don't want to everybody to know everything about the case at this point. Although, I don't know, still doesn't sit well with me. You're right though.

There's so much speculation about what this means for the future of this case. And it means if things are going to be cut short, right? Or if we do see more things pop into the court document situation here, which this case has been so thin when it comes to looking at updates and things be playing itself out through the process, other high profile cases. such as Corey Richens, for one, that you may be familiar with. There are things that seem to be popped in there almost every other day, some with significance, some with reporting significance, some not.

But we haven't seen anything come forth in this case in terms of being placed into the court system here in Utah in over two months. So to see something come out now just before the holidays, just after I get that email from Ruby Frankie's attorney saying, hey, maybe in the few weeks we've got something for you. To me, that gets my wheels turning here a little bit, saying, oh, okay, there's a little bit more significant movement finally in this case. After so many things happened, the Washington County jail down there decided to restructure their jail. So we never got to see where they moved

from and two. We've talked about that. There's been ways where they've almost been hidden from the public eye over the last couple of months, with the exception of Ruby Frankie being in court virtually for a traffic citation as we talked about and of course you know another big development that we talked about was the fact that uh uh kevin frankie ruby's husband has filed for divorce seems a separate issue now uh to be clear in a preliminary hearing it's a very low standard to actually you just have to show that there's probable cause so by all accounts this would have been successful uh and prosecutors would be able to move forward the case now let's talk about what you mentioned the possibility of a plea deal have you heard anything to indicate either ruby or joe or

you're considering that, what it might look like. It is interesting that Ruby would go first, and her hearing is first, and, you know, Jody's a second. The only thing that I have heard, which I have tried to get insight from obviously both sides of this, either of the prosecution there with the Washington County Attorney's Office, and the last time I've had good dialogue with them was a few weeks ago. But the one last week with Ruby Frankie's attorney,

by the way, I've never heard from Jody Hilda Brant's attorney with repeated requests. I've tried my darndest with it. I can tell you that. But when looking at Ruby Frankie's theme there that's kind of just trying to work through the facts or the evidence in the case that will be presented to them, I do find it interesting that they said, hey, we're actually going to give you a little bit of a timetable on this, where this case has had no timetable, with the exception from the beginning, where there were motions to expedite certain pieces of the process, and everything slowed way down from

there. So the only thing of interest to me, after seeing this waiver hearing come out yesterday, a request with nothing set in stone, was the point that, oh, Frankie's attorney says, hey, we may have something going here and we hope to be able to give you something soon. And I'm going to pull up the language for you, if I can find it to the exact language that was used in that, because it is something that I found to be, oh, you feel confident about things right now that you're saying there will be something maybe even before the Christmas hot. holiday to move forward here in terms of where the case stands now, which we've heard next to nothing, Jesse.

You know, this has been so quiet. I know. We're all reading the tea leaves. And I'm going to filibuster here as you look for the exact language. This is me filibustering. But I will tell everybody as Brian looks it up. So my understanding is Frankie's waiver hearing is requested for December 18th. Hildebrandt's hearing requested for December 27th.

Again, all before the new year. Brian, I am curious, as you look up this language, and correct me if I'm wrong here, but in Utah for this waiver hearing, if they waive a preliminary hearing, if they decide to take a plea, could at that hearing the whole case be wrapped up? We have sentencing also here. I kind of was reading that, that these waiver hearings, maybe we may have an answer as to this case. What happens by the end, but before 2024? Before I answer, I'm not an attorney. So I did go to a criminal. defense attorney to ask that very question. I was told yes. In theory, if everything falls in line in this waiver hearing where it comes down to, hey, we've decided, we've seen everything that you guys have. This is kind of where we want to go forward with. Both sides have come to the agreement. You know how much happens outside of court. And then, of course, yes, sentencing can

happen that day, which for now, for Ruby Franke, if this actually gets scheduled and it goes that way, it could be December 18th. For Jody Hildebrand, if it goes that way, it could be December 27th and things are just done. And I can't imagine that happening in this because of how much has been put out. You mentioned such a load of PR against these two. It just to me would baffle me that this doesn't move forward in the process. But then again, it's all depends on what they have. Now I do want to read you that email, because I do have it in front of me.

So this was dated Wednesday, November 29th. So we're looking more than a week now when I last was able to hear back from Lamar Winward's crew there in St. George, Utah. Our firm will be making a statement in the upcoming weeks or so on Ms. Frankie's behalf. We are hopeful to reach a resolution shortly and we'll reach out with a statement. So when I heard waiver hearing and then that's in my brain, Waiver hearing could be more significant than anything else that we've seen so far and could, in theory, wrap this whole thing up. Oh, my goodness.

Well, here's a thing that I... Good, like purely speculative, you know? Yeah, here's a thing that I want to address with that. Resolution. So now I'm wondering, could prosecutors offer a deal with minimal or no prison time for these? I mean, I can't imagine it. I can't imagine, based on what we've seen so far in this case, about these kids, aggravated child abuse, malnourishment, severe, severe torture that the prosecutors would put something on that would, that Jody or Ruby would accept, maybe? I don't know.

I mean, we are talking about serious charges here that could be, you know, if you get convicted of the most and it runs concurrently one after another, they could be consecutive. one after another, they could be imprisoned for a long time, but I can't imagine they would accept the deal without prison time. I can't either, but the term resolution to me, I'd imagine everything, if everything gets thrown out, I would be so surprised, obviously. And I think you would be too, and I think so many people would be too based on everything else that has been put out so far. Now, we're still waiting on a lot of the interesting visual, right, of the day of the arrest and how both of that looked, you know, from the point of view of the law enforcement officers that were there. But the term to me, you're right, resolution. What does that mean

as far as the attorneys here are looking at this case? I don't know. And that's what's interesting because a waiver hearing can mean so many different things. Now we just need to make sure it happens and see what happens in that hearing. And it could change the whole that really could change the entire game of this case. Brian Schnee, apparently we will be talking a lot before the end of the year now because these hearings could be everything that we've been looking into with this case.

My goodness, what a development. And listen, if you want to follow more great reporting from Brian at KUTV2 News, I encourage everyone to do that. Brian, please let everybody know your Twitter where they can follow you, get more updates, and learn more about the cases that you're covering, including Ruby Frankie, This is very interesting, let everybody know.

Of course. Well, as always, it's a team effort here at two news. So a lot of the things, including the divorce filing, was a colleague of mine, some of the prior conversations, another. We've got everybody kind of checking on things and looking at new developments, but you can find me on Twitter at Brian underscore Schnee, Brian Schnee TV on Facebook. I'm pretty much everywhere, and there aren't too many Brian Schnee's out there. So you're the first I've met. And I think we'll be talking on December 18th and December 27th. I will see you then, Brian.

Thank you so much. Really appreciate it. It's a good chance. December 18th from St. George, Utah. There you go. Good chance. All right, everybody. That is all we have for you right now here on Sidebar.

Thank you so much for joining us. And please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. You can binge all episodes of this law and crime series ad free right now on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.