Newly released video shows the malnourished son of a parenting advice YouTuber approaching a neighbor for help on the morning that his mother and her business partner were arrested on child abuse charges.

The malnourished and badly bruised son of a parenting advice YouTuber politely asks a neighbor to take him to the nearest police station in newly released video from the day his mother and her business partner were arrested on child abuse charges in southern Utah.

The 12-year-old son of Ruby Franke, a mother of six who dispensed advice to millions via a popular YouTube channel, had escaped through a window and approached several nearby homes until someone answered the door, according to documents released Friday by the Washington County Attorney’s office.

Crime scene photos, body camera video and interrogation tapes were released a month after Franke and business partner Jodi Hildebrandt, a mental health counselor, were each sentenced to up to 30 years in prison. A police investigation determined religious extremism motivated the women to inflict horrific abuse on Franke’s children, Washington County Attorney Eric Clarke announced Friday.

“The women appeared to fully believe that the abuse they inflicted was necessary to teach the children how to properly repent for imagined ‘sins’ and to cast the evil spirits out of their bodies,” Clarke said.

  • Echo Dot
    2·
    9 months ago

    Don’t they read the Bible though. I don’t pay much attention to what they say but they definitely go on about the bible so surely they are Christian they’re just a different flavor.

    • FlaxEnglish
      11·
      9 months ago

      So do Muslims. They both claim the original ways got corrupted and they have a prophet who came back to restore the “true” faith.

      Although Mormons seemingly/arguably revere the Bible and Jesus more than Muslims do, the entire religion is basically alien to Christianity, even being polytheist (Islam is still Monotheist like Christianity)

      It’s like Joseph Smith wanted to create a religion for personal power, so just started with Christianity as a foundation and then completely distorted it beyond recognition, that it basically doesn’t resemble the original faith any more than Islam does