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Lori Vallow Daybell had a message for her only surviving child, and went about delivering it in an untraditional way.
Vallow Daybell — who was convicted of killing two of her children and conspiring to kill others, including her fourth husband and a romantic rival, after adopting a bizarre set of religious beliefs — reached out to her only surviving son, Colby Ryan, at CrimeCon 2025 through the media.
Journalist Nate Eaton shared during a September 5, 2025 panel at the true crime convention, held in Denver, that Vallow Daybell had sent him a cryptic message from behind bars intended for Colby, who was a panel guest.
“She found out we were going to be here today, she sent me a message this morning,” Eaton said in a short video clip posted on X.
Eaton — who had already gotten permission backstage from Colby to share the message — then went on to read Vallow Daybell’s words.
“If you talk to Colby, please tell him that I love him very much, NO MATTER WHAT,” Vallow Daybell wrote. “You can ask him about Matthew 25.”
Eaton explained to the crowd that the New Testament bible chapter referred to the “parable of the wheat and the tares and the parable of the ten virgins.”
“Any idea what that scripture reference means?” Eaton asked Colby, who spoke to Dateline for an episode that aired in March.
Colby told the CrimeCon audience that he believed the message was his mother’s latest attempt to prove she was a righteous person.
“It’s her trying to talk about the wicked versus the good being sifted apart, basically,” he told the crowd. “So, it’s her way of trying to say she is still good and basically godly.”
Eaton asked Colby whether he ever wanted to talk to his mother again.
“No,” Colby simply replied.
“Ok, well, let’s not talk about her anymore today,” Eaton responded as the crowd erupted into cheers.
What crimes did Lori Vallow Daybell commit?
Vallow Daybell is currently behind bars in Idaho after receiving multiple life sentences for a string of killings.
The violence began in July of 2019 when Vallow Daybell’s estranged husband Charles Vallow was shot and killed in her Arizona home by her brother, Alex Cox. Cox — who later died in December of that year — claimed he killed his brother-in-law in self-defense and initially no charges were filed in the case.
Weeks later, Vallow Daybell moved her family to Rexburg, Idaho, to be closer to Chad Daybell, a religious author who often spoke about the end times.
Not long after making the move, Vallow Daybell’s 16-year-old daughter Tylee Ryan disappeared, followed just weeks later by her son, 7-year-old Joshua “JJ” Vallow. Then in October of 2019, Daybell’s wife, Tammy Daybell, was found dead in her bed.
Just weeks after Tammy’s death — which was initially thought to be the result of natural causes — Daybell and Vallow Daybell secretly tied the knot in Hawaii. But their crimes soon came to light after JJ’s grandparents reported him missing in November of 2019.
Authorities eventually recovered the bodies of both children buried on Daybell’s property. Both deaths were declared homicides. After a closer look into the case, a medical examiner also determined that Tammy had died of asphyxiation.
Vallow Daybell and Daybell were later convicted in separate trials for their roles in the deaths of Tylee, JJ, and Tammy. While Daybell was sentenced to death, Vallow received life without the possibility of parole.
In July, Vallow Daybell received two additional life sentences in Arizona for conspiring to kill Charles and her former nephew-in-law Brandon Boudreaux, who survived an attempt on his life in October of 2019.
What has Colby Ryan said about his mom, Lori Vallow Daybell?
Colby delivered an emotional victim impact statement at his mother’s sentencing, describing “the horror” of losing his family members in remarks captured by KPTV.
“I had to do something I’ve never done and that was fight to stay alive after the pain,” he said. “There are no words for what I experienced and I had to choose to fight and to stay alive for my children and for my wife.”
He concluded his statement with some pointed words directed at his mom.
“It must be a very sad life to smile your way through all the pain you caused,” Colby said. “Rather than being able to acknowledge the pain that she has caused, she would rather say that Charles, Tylee and JJ’s death were a family tragedy and not her evil doing. And I will say this, if you want to see darkness, look at the murdering cult who claims God has commissioned their mission to kill my family and others. Quite frankly, I believe that Lori Vallow herself is the family tragedy.”
In comments to Eaton Friday before taking the stage at CrimeCon, Colby said he felt “relief” in the wake of the legal proceedings.
“Now that there’s not like a looming case, I think you feel so much relief and you can actually move on and not have to think about it all the time and you can work your actual trauma side of it,” he added.
