A jury in Idaho has sentenced Lori Vallow Daybell to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the murders of her two young children and conspiring to kill her fifth husband’s first wife.
Daybell, 41, was convicted in May of two counts of first-degree murder for the deaths of her 7-year-old son, Joshua, and her 5-year-old daughter, Tylee.
The jury also found Daybell guilty of conspiracy to commit murder in the death of her husband, Chad Daybell, who was also convicted of the murders and sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
Each of her three sentences will be served consecutively, while the judge added two additional life sentences and a 10-year sentence for grand theft, all to be served concurrently, CNN reported.
Prosecutors said that Daybell killed her children because she believed that they were zombies and that they were going to harm her. She had become obsessed with a doomsday cult that predicted that the world was going to end in 2019.
“Murder is the most serious offense, and the most unimaginable type of murder is to have a mother murdering her own children, and that’s exactly what you did,” Judge Steven W. Boyce said when handing down Vallow Daybell’s sentence. “You were involved in and guilty of conspiring to murder … Tammy Daybell, who had children of her own. And despite the jury convicting you with overwhelming evidence, you still sit here before the court today and said you didn’t do it.”
The judge noted that Vallow Daybell showed no remorse for the murders.
Colby Ryan, Vallow Daybell’s oldest son from a previous marriage, wrote in a victim impact statement that “Tylee and JJ brought so much light into this world.”
“Tylee will never have an opportunity to become a mother, wife, or have the career she was destined to have. She’ll never be able to have the life she deserved,” he wrote in the statement, which was read by prosecutors on Monday. “JJ will never be able to grow and spread his light with this world the way he did. He will never have a chance to grow up.”
“I want them to be remembered for who they were,” Ryan added, “and not to be just a spectacle or a headline to the world.”
“I was shaking.” JJ’s grandfather Larry Woodcock sharing his thoughts after Lori Vallow Daybell was sentenced to 3 consecutive life sentences. @12News #LoriVallow pic.twitter.com/RDDCTKJ2Qd
— Erica Stapleton (@EricaReportsAll) July 31, 2023
