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A new murder trial begins for “Doomsday Cult” mom Lori Vallow Daybell, the convicted woman Arizona prosecutors allege helped plan her fourth husband’s death months before she murdered her children.
Vallow Daybell, who was found guilty in May 2023 for the murders of her two children and romantic rival, stands accused of first-degree murder for the shooting death of then-estranged husband number four, Charles Vallow, 62, according to NBC News. Charles Vallow died on July 11, 2019, in Chandler, Arizona, after he and Vallow Daybell’s brother, Alex Cox, reportedly got into a heated altercation when Vallow visited his ex’s home to pick up their adopted son, Joshua “J.J.” Vallow.
Lori Vallow Daybell was charged in 2021 with conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, but those charges were later amended to the more serious offense, NBC News reported.
The murder trial’s opening statements were heard Monday, April 7, 2025 at a Phoenix courthouse, where Vallow Daybell represented herself before 12 jurors and four alternates, according to The Associated Press.
What did Vallow Daybell say in her opening statements?
Lori Vallow Daybell has long maintained that her brother killed Charles Vallow in self-defense, and she remained steadfast when speaking inside the courtroom.
“Self-defense is not a crime,” she said, according to The Associated Press. “Family tragedy is not a crime, it’s a tragedy.”
There is no argument that the defendant’s brother, Alex Cox, shot Charles Vallow in the head. On the morning of the shooting, the confessed triggerman told police, “He was just yellin’ at me.”
Lori Vallow Daybell told police her 16-year-old daughter, Tylee Ryan, reportedly armed herself with a baseball bat upon hearing an argument inside the home. Ryan reportedly stated to police she wanted to protect her mother from Charles Vallow (who was not her biological father), but then Charles Vallow gained control of the bat.
“Charles lifted up the bat to hit Tylee,” Vallow Daybell said in Monday’s opening arguments, per NBC News. “Alex then intervened.”
Cox died in December 2019 of an apparent pulmonary embolism, five months following Charles Vallow’s death and a year and a half before authorities ruled it wasn’t self-defense.
Charles Vallow was murdered for his life-insurance, according to prosecutors
Prosecutors on Monday argued Lori Vallow Daybell and Alex Cox conspired to kill Charles Vallow to cash in on his life insurance policy, per The Associated Press. At the time, Charles Cox grew increasingly concerned for Vallow Daybell’s mental health, once telling police she “lost her mind.”
By then, Vallow Daybell had already begun following the teachings of her future husband, Chad Daybell, a self-proclaimed prophet based in Eastern Idaho with extreme Mormon-founded principles pertaining to the Second Coming and the belief that he would lead a charge of 144,000 survivors in the end days, as widely reported by Oxygen.
Chad Daybell lived just outside Rexburg, Idaho, 900 miles north of Chandler, Arizona, when Vallow Daybell and her brother moved with the children in August 2019, weeks after Charles Vallow’s shooting death.
Chad Daybell was still married to Tammy Daybell when the relocation took place.
Lori Vallow Daybell eventually married Chad Daybell in a private ceremony in Hawaii on November 5, 2019, two and a half weeks after Tammy Daybell died in her bed on October 19, 2019. It was initially believed the former Mrs. Daybell died of natural causes until authorities exhumed her body and amended the cause of death to asphyxiation by homicide.
What happened to Tylee and J.J. Vallow?
In September 2019 — weeks after Lori Vallow Daybell and her relatives moved to Idaho — her two youngest children disappeared. Witnesses reported the mother of three refer to her children as “zombies,” part of the apocalyptic delusions that earned her variations of the nickname “Doomsday Mom.”
Sixteen-year-old Tylee Ryan was last seen on September 8, 2019, during a family outing at Yellowstone National Park. The youngest, 7-year-old J.J. Vallow, was last seen weeks later on September 23 at his elementary school before Vallow Daybell announced plans to pull him out in favor of homeschooling.
The children’s bodies were found buried on Chad Daybell’s Idaho property on June 9, 2020.
Prosecutors said the teen was dismembered and set on fire, while the boy was discovered with a plastic bag duct-taped around his head.
The high-profile case went on for years in the public eye.
Lori Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell convicted of kids’ murders
Eventually, on May 12, 2023, an Ada County jury in Idaho convicted Vallow Daybell of first-degree murder for the deaths of Tylee Ryan and J.J. Vallow, as well as conspiracy to commit murder for the death of her husband’s previous wife, Tammy Daybell. She was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole.
One year later, Chad Daybell was also convicted for all three murders. He was sentenced to death in June 2024, according to The Associated Press.
Last month, Vallow Daybell sat with NBC correspondent Keith Morrison for an explosive Dateline interview — available to watch now on Peacock — offering a shocking claim that victim Tylee Ryan murdered the younger child.
“I was not there,” Vallow Daybell said in her interview.
What’s next for Lori Vallow Daybell?
Lori Vallow Daybell will continue representing herself in court as the Charles Vallow murder trial continues.
Following her opening statements on Monday, jurors heard the testimony of two police officers and a firefighter who responded to the scene after Charles Vallow’s shooting death, according to CBS News. Testimony is expected to continue on Tuesday, April 8, 2025.
Vallow Daybell is expected to face yet another trial in May, this time on conspiracy murder charges in connection with the October 2019 attempted shooting of Brandon Boudreaux. As reported by NBC Salt Lake City affiliate KSL-TV, Boudreaux was the ex-husband of Vallow Daybell’s niece and someone close to Charles Vallow and the murdered children.
On October 2, 2019 — weeks after the children disappeared and 10 days before Tammy Daybell’s death — Boudreaux reportedly returned from the gym to find a Jeep parked near his Gilbert, Arizona home, according to CourtTV. He claimed to see Vallow Daybell’s brother, Alex Cox, open the window before pulling the trigger.
Boudreaux was unharmed in the drive-by, and Cox would die months later before he could face charges.
In that case, Lori Day Vallow has pleaded not guilty, per CBS News.