Lori Vallow Daybell, the “Doomsday mom” who was convicted of killing her children in Idaho, returned to court to once again face a jury – this time in Arizona on charges of conspiring to murder her fourth husband, Charles Vallow, back in 2019.
Prosecutors said during opening statements on Monday that the 51-year-old conspired to carry out the killing so that she could move forward with marrying Chad Daybell, an Idaho author who wrote religious novels about prophecies and the end of the world.
But Vallow Daybell, who is representing herself at the new trial, broke down in tears while giving her opening statements as she painted Charles as the aggressor in an incident that led to his death in which he, at one point, chased her with a bat.
“Spouses having insurance policies is not a crime. Collecting Social Security is not a crime. Self-defense is not a crime,” Vallow Daybell told the jury. “A family tragedy is not a crime – it’s a tragedy.”
Lori Vallow Daybell breaks down in tears in court on Monday during opening statements (East Idaho News)
Charles’ death was the first step in a wider plot by Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell to rid their lives of “obstacles,” meaning their spouses and her children, according to text message evidence presented at her 2023 trial for the murders of her children Tylee Ryan and JJ Vallow, along with the death of Daybell’s first wife, Tammy Daybell.
Four months before he died, Charles Vallow filed for divorce from Vallow Daybell, saying she had become infatuated with near-death experiences and had claimed to have lived numerous lives on other planets.
He alleged she threatened to ruin him financially and kill him. He sought a voluntary mental health evaluation of his wife.
Police say Charles was fatally shot by Vallow Daybell’s brother, Alex Cox, when Charles went to pick up his son at Vallow Daybell’s home in Chandler, a Phoenix suburb. Vallow Daybell’s daughter, Tylee, told police that she confronted Charles with a baseball bat after she was awakened by yelling in the house.
Tylee said she was trying to defend her mother, but Charles took away the bat, according to police. Cox told police that he fired after Charles refused to drop the bat and came after him.
Cox told investigators that Vallow Daybell and the children left the house shortly before the shooting. Investigators say she went to get fast food for her son and bought flip-flops at a pharmacy before returning home.
Cox, who claimed he acted in self-defense and wasn’t arrested in Charles’ death, died five months later from what medical examiners said was a blood clot in his lungs. Cox’s account was later called into question.
Charles Vallow was killed in 2019 (Leland Vallow Obituary)
During Vallow Daybell’s opening statements on Monday, she took the jury back to the night of Charles’ death.
She claimed Charles wrestled the baseball bat away from Tylee while she was trying to defend her mother and that a struggle between Charles and Cox led to Charles running after her with the bat.
While she ran outside with her daughter, her brother shot Charles in an act of self-defense, Vallow Daybell claimed.
Prior to Vallow Daybell’s opening, prosecutor Treena Kay argued that phone records, witness testimony and forensic evidence will show that Cox’s shooting of Charles was “not self defense.”
“Lori Vallow wanted to be Lori Daybell, wife of Chad Daybell, and in July 2019 Lori Vallow wanted to keep the same lifestyle that she had with Charles. And she could get all of this if Charles was dead,” Kay said. “She could marry Chad Daybell and become Lori Daybell. She would get a million-dollar life insurance policy.”
“Lori Vallow is why Alex was able to shoot Charles,” she said. “Lori Vallow is why Charles is dead.”
Vallow Daybell, who has pleaded not guilty, is already serving three life sentences in Idaho, for her children’s deaths and for conspiring to kill Tammy Daybell.
Joshua “JJ” Vallow and Tylee Ryan (AP)
After Charles’ death in 2019, she moved to Idaho with her children, who went missing in September of that same year.
Meanwhile, Chad Daybell called 911 in October 2019 to report that his wife Tammy Daybell was battling an illness and died in her sleep. Her body was later exhumed, and an autopsy determined she died of asphyxiation.
Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell left town a short time later, eventually turning up in Hawaii where they married without the kids. She was arrested in Hawaii in February 2020 on a warrant out of Idaho.
In June 2020, the children’s bodies were found buried on Chad Daybell’s property.
A witness at the Idaho trial said Vallow Daybell believes evil spirits have taken over people in her life and turned them into “zombies.”
In 2024, Chad Daybell was sentenced to death in the three killings.
Chad Daybell was sentenced to death in the three killings
The trial over Charles Vallow’s death will mark the first of two criminal trials in Arizona for Vallow Daybell.
She’s scheduled to go on trial again in late May on a charge of conspiring to murder Brandon Boudreaux, the ex-husband of Vallow Daybell’s niece, Melani Pawlowski.
Someone in a Jeep fired a gunshot at Boudreaux in 2019 outside his home in a Phoenix suburb, missing him but striking his car. The Jeep matched the description of one registered to Charles Vallow, who was killed nearly three months prior to the shooting outside Boudreaux’s home.
Vallow Daybell has pleaded not guilty. If convicted, she would face a life sentence.