Merged: Missing children, fugitive parents, and drive-by shootings/Lori Vallow in court.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Mike!

... Zulema Pastenes!

How would one pronounce that last name? It looks like "past tense" to me...

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ce-family.html

I didn't see anything in that link about Lori and Zulema knowing each other

[William Parcher]

Originally Posted by Mike!

... Zulema Pastenes!

How would one pronounce that last name? It looks like "past tense" to me...

I don't know but I would pronounce it...

"Pass teh ness"

[StillSleepy]

Pas tay nays, 'ay' being pronounced more softly than normal.

[Mike!]

Originally Posted by Thermal

I didn't see anything in that link about Lori and Zulema knowing each other

Not that one, no. They were ALL (Chad, Lori, and Zulema) at several of the same "cultish" seminars together over the last couple years, if memory serves. It also seems I recall Lori being quoted directly mentioning/praising her* in one article or another...
It's getting harder to keep all the various event documentation in order at this point, there's just soooo much going on.

* Something along the lines of her having, "special abilities and magical powers", seriously.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Checkmite

It's too much worldbuilding for me.

I don't have any problems with "Chad and Lori share a religious delusion and decide to cast off their former lives to accompany each other to the end of the world". The bizarre culty beliefs were noticed by too many people independently - Charles in his divorce filing, Brandon Boudreaux before his divorce to Melani, Lori's friend in Hawaii - for me to be willing to dismiss them as insignificant or irrelevant.

I think it's more world building to put so much weight on this cult thing. There is zero evidence of either of them being involved in any such cult, and the PaP group seems like a mildly new agey Mormon group. Those who claim that there was a cult have pretty self serving interests: husbands filing for divorce and people perhaps not familiar with LDS beliefs.

It's also fairly world building to paint Chad as going from perfectly normal Mormon lifestyle to Leatherface psycho with no run up. Alex had a history, and Lori some apparently sociopathic leanings. Not so for the Chadster.

Quote:

I think it's this simple: Chad and Lori had planned the entire situation from the beginning.
Lori had her brother kill Charles, and then moved to Idaho. Chad waited a few weeks to build time between the two deaths and then killed his wife, and then promptly joined Lori and got married out of state to keep the situation quiet. In between these, Lori disposed of the children, either by killing them (possibly with Alex's help, possibly without) or by sending them off to a more unscrupulous friend than the one she tried to get to lie for her in Arizona.

That's a lot of world building, especially giving Chad so much agency before the fact. I don't see any evidence of even much contact with the rest of the cast before the marriage. Seems more opportunistic of Chad to me to bag a fresh wife. And who was he keeping this relationship quiet from, since they were living together after the Kauai wedding?

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Was Brandon really shot at, or did he make it up? I'm inclined to believe it really happened, firstly because so far the Daybells et al are the only characters in this story that have already proven to have lied and committed criminal activity, including leaving a trail of bodies in their wake, one of whom was also shot, so one more isn't an extraordinary claim; secondly, because a week after the alleged attack on Brandon, Tammy Daybell (just over a week before she died) called 911 to report that a masked man had shot at her with a "paintball gun", and it strikes me as entirely possible that it was a silenced rifle and the sound of the silenced shot is what convinced her it was a paintball gun.

No way on the paintball gun/silenced rifle recreation. Silenced rifles are an extreme rarity, and painfully regulated. Stuff of comic books to most people (a few NFA exceptions aside). I can only think Tammy said paintball gun because there was a paint splatter remaining. Silencers don't work like in the movies; you would not mistake one for the soft pop of a paintball gun. Plus that rifle bullet would likely hit something close by.

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But whether or not it really happened, Brandon's claim set the police snooping around Chad, Lori, and Alex. The police impounded the jeep, and then days later came back to ask about JJ, and the couple were spooked by the pressure and ran, probably after they couldn't convince Lori's Arizona friend to lie to the police about having JJ. I don't buy that Chad is some naive or feeble-minded fool who was befuddled by the police scrutiny and spontaneously and reflexively lied in a way he thought might "help Lori" without understanding what was going on; that theory fails to account for why he also lied to the police about being only casually acquainted with Lori; the two were legally married, and if he was completely ignorant of the criminal conspiracy he would have absolutely no innocent reason to think he had to lie about that relationship just because police were looking for JJ.

Not befuddled: duped by a lying Lori. Think about it: from an evidentiary standpoint, Chadley never saw those kids, and presumably wasn't buddy-buddy with the family, so anything at all he even suspected about those kids came from none other than his blushing new bride, who ran around carefree from state to state with no apparent kids to care for. This accounts well for his being vague with Rexburg police. He didn't know what was going on, as we do. As far as he knew, the kids that Lori actually didn't have responsibility for were just...skmewhere else. And he may have been reluctant to tell police anything at all, good or bad. I certainly am, and I almost never serial kill.

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Alex died on December 12, a day after it was announced Tammy's death was ruled suspicious and her body was being exhumed. Since the Daybells had been in Hawaii since December 1st, there was nobody left to kill Alex; he probably committed suicide due to the police closing in. As far as I'm concerned that's the end of the story.

Alex dying is a more difficult one, in any scenario. He evidently associated with killers in jail (soliciting info and pics of Ryan for a hit), so his death might be genuinely unrelated to the rest of the killings. I am only confident he was knowingly on the lam from someone dangerous, because he took his wife's name. That's so odd that I'm sure it is a duck and cover.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Mike!

Not that one, no. They were ALL (Chad, Lori, and Zulema) at several of the same "cultish" seminars together over the last couple years, if memory serves. It also seems I recall Lori being quoted directly mentioning/praising her* in one article or another...
It's getting harder to keep all the various event documentation in order at this point, there's just soooo much going on.

* Something along the lines of her having, "special abilities and magical powers", seriously.

As far as I know,, Alex's new wife was some kind of cover for him to vanish. If she was involved with PaP, that would have me rethinking how much of a role the culty thingy played.

[StillSleepy]

Lori and Chad knew each other and were cheating on their respective spouses before Charles died back in July (I don't remember if Lori's end was contextualized in terms of the divorce).

The red flag for me is that when the police questioned him on 26 November he stated that the last time he had seen JJ was in October in an apartment by the time of the questioning was now almost entirely empty (apparently Alex's?). Both the wedding in Hawaii and his misrepresentation (along with Lori) to his parents of Lori being an "empty-nester' occurred in November before investigators came knocking. He and Lori left town the same night the welfare check occurred and pestered Lori's friend to lie about JJ. Now, all of this is circumstantial, but I'm not really buying that Chad didn't know anything about the kids.

As far as Lori not knowing Alex's wife goes, Lori, Alex, and Melani all lived in the same apartment complex. Take that as you will.

[Thermal]

Alex wasn't married when they all lived nearby, and Zulema wasn't even in the picture.

Chad answered about where he thought he last saw JJ. But we don't know how the police asked it. Did they say 'Loris son is reported missing' or anything that clearly indicated that she was responsible?

See, if the police said 'we are here for a welfare check on one JJ Vallow', then Chad might be vague, saying the last time he saw him was months ago at the other families residence. It is possible that Chad thought the police were acting on a harassing complaint from other family (if Lori said so) and so was vague and noncommittal, because Chad genuinely didn't expect JJ to be at Loris apartment

[quadraginta]

Originally Posted by abaddon

The grandparents initiated the welfare check. They live still.

And it does not matter.

When ones kids become old enough to challenge whatever idea, one best pay careful attention.

As a parent, I love that my lunatics challenge anything I say. Because it gives rise to wild philosophical conversation about the most unexpected topics. To me, this is success as a parent. Those mad bastages can present a cogent argument for whatever might be topic du jour.

I can hurl the Kalam argument for the hell of it, just to see how they will deal with it. And I have learned from their response to it. I teach them and they teach me.

Why anyone would not? I cannot understand that, but it seems to happen often.

Oh, I don't disagree.

I was responding to the Liam Neeson tough guy on a rampage scenario. By 'immediate family' I was excluding grandparents.

The grandparents you're referring to took three months to get around to calling for help. Not really proactive Liam Neeson types.

[Checkmite]

Originally Posted by Thermal

I think it's more world building to put so much weight on this cult thing. There is zero evidence of either of them being involved in any such cult, and the PaP group seems like a mildly new agey Mormon group. Those who claim that there was a cult have pretty self serving interests: husbands filing for divorce and people perhaps not familiar with LDS beliefs.

Brandon did not file for divorce; his wife filed it against him. And in the Dateline special, Lori's Hawaii friend was asked point-blank to compare Lori's religious revelations with normal Mormon beliefs and she answered that Lori's beliefs were far beyond. Whether she is familiar enough to make that determination or not, she is an uninvolved third party with no reason to lie who has independently corroborated Charles' description of Lori's beliefs, settling that question.

Originally Posted by Thermal

It's also fairly world building to paint Chad as going from perfectly normal Mormon lifestyle to Leatherface psycho with no run up. Alex had a history, and Lori some apparently sociopathic leanings. Not so for the Chadster.

Except according to victim Charles and Lori's Hawaii friend, Lori's apocalyptic beliefs did not emerge until after she began associating with Chad Daybell - it was a very distinctive change, and meeting Chad was the only new life circumstance that could have catalyzed it. Chad's former wife is dead so we really have no idea of what his lifestyle was like (e.g., how "perfectly normal" it was or wasn't) before he met Lori. What we do know is that he wrote specifically apocalyptic-fiction novels, indicating that he was already preoccupied with that kind of thinking, and rendering it unlikely that Lori's shift in belief toward a heavy emphasis on the apocalypse after becoming involved with him was purely coincidental.

Originally Posted by Thermal

That's a lot of world building, especially giving Chad so much agency before the fact. I don't see any evidence of even much contact with the rest of the cast before the marriage. Seems more opportunistic of Chad to me to bag a fresh wife. And who was he keeping this relationship quiet from, since they were living together after the Kauai wedding?

He kept it quiet from the police when they asked about JJ, even though their marital status was irrelevant. That was not a spontaneous decision.

Originally Posted by Thermal

No way on the paintball gun/silenced rifle recreation. Silenced rifles are an extreme rarity, and painfully regulated. Stuff of comic books to most people (a few NFA exceptions aside). I can only think Tammy said paintball gun because there was a paint splatter remaining. Silencers don't work like in the movies; you would not mistake one for the soft pop of a paintball gun. Plus that rifle bullet would likely hit something close by.

These subsonic suppressed rifles sounds exactly like paintball guns to me:

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How "painfully regulated" silencers are, does not matter. This is America, and it is simply the nature of American gun culture in many locales that if you have a good-ol-boy buddy who has a silencer then you have a silencer.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Not befuddled: duped by a lying Lori. Think about it: from an evidentiary standpoint, Chadley never saw those kids, and presumably wasn't buddy-buddy with the family, so anything at all he even suspected about those kids came from none other than his blushing new bride, who ran around carefree from state to state with no apparent kids to care for. This accounts well for his being vague with Rexburg police. He didn't know what was going on, as we do. As far as he knew, the kids that Lori actually didn't have responsibility for were just...skmewhere else.

Then why did he tell police he last saw JJ at Lori's apartment in October? If Lori's kids were "somewhere else" and that was the end of it, as far as he knew, why did he not just say that? If he had never seen them before ever, why not say that? Why make himself a witness of interest by claiming to have seen a kid the police are looking for that he doesn't know anything about and hasn't actually ever seen?

And why did he pretend to be only a casually-acquainted neighbor of his wife while standing in front of the apartment they shared? The "Lori lied to him about the kids theory" continues to not explain that. And the "I don't know nothing about no kids" theory falls a little flat when surveillance video seems to have Chad and Alex together on camera moving children's bicycles into the storage unit on October 28, before he and Lori went to Hawaii to get married.

If my wife has never told me about JJ, and the police come to my door asking to speak to my wife about the whereabouts of "JJ", my answer is going to be "who's JJ?". If my wife has told me about JJ but has always maintained that he left her life before we got married, my response to the police will be "JJ has never lived with us". My response is not going to be "Lori, who's Lori? Oh wait, I think I know a Lori, she lives in that apartment over there..."

Chad both positively lied to police, and asked Lori's Arizona friend (separately from Lori) to positively lie to police about where JJ was. That's two lies-to-police too many for "I'm just an innocent victim here" in my book. He is complicit. He lied to send police in the wrong direction in order to give he and Lori enough time to flee the state.

Originally Posted by Thermal

And he may have been reluctant to tell police anything at all, good or bad. I certainly am, and I almost never serial kill.

There's a difference between not volunteering information, and straight up positively lying to the police when giving answers to their questions. I certainly hope, for your sake, that you know the difference...

If I am not aware that my wife has been doing anything illegal, I'm not going to try to stop the police from talking to her about a missing kid, whether I'm personally "reluctant to talk to them" or not. Even if I'm completely under the impression that she isn't responsible for the child anymore, I would expect that she might have at least an interest in knowing the fact that he's missing and the police are looking for him.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Alex dying is a more difficult one, in any scenario. He evidently associated with killers in jail (soliciting info and pics of Ryan for a hit), so his death might be genuinely unrelated to the rest of the killings. I am only confident he was knowingly on the lam from someone dangerous, because he took his wife's name. That's so odd that I'm sure it is a duck and cover.

Alex's death could easily be a coincidence. If it's true that the woman he married is another friend of Lori's, that is not a coincidence.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Checkmite

Brandon did not file for divorce; his wife filed it against him. And in the Dateline special, Lori's Hawaii friend was asked point-blank to compare Lori's religious revelations with normal Mormon beliefs and she answered that Lori's beliefs were far beyond. Whether she is familiar enough to make that determination or not, she is an uninvolved third party with no reason to lie who has independently corroborated Charles' description of Lori's beliefs, settling that question.

I didn't see the tv thing, and I don't see any clips on the thread, so a little hard to argue this. Don't know how much weight some unknown's thoughts on Lori's spiritual life pack in terms of evidence, but whatever. Wouldn't a friend on Kauai predate Lori's alleged cult conversion by years? She lived there with Dead Charles when he was still Alive Charles.

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Except according to victim Charles and Lori's Hawaii friend, Lori's apocalyptic beliefs did not emerge until after she began associating with Chad Daybell - it was a very distinctive change, and meeting Chad was the only new life circumstance that could have catalyzed it.

Holup. How do you know Chad 'caused the change'? Is it impossible that she had some culty revelation and consequently gravitated towards PaP and Daybell later? 'Lori's Hawaii friend says' doesn't give us much to evaluate credibility in a thread discussion.

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Chad's former wife is dead so we really have no idea of what his lifestyle was like (e.g., how "perfectly normal" it was or wasn't) before he met Lori. What we do know is that he wrote specifically apocalyptic-fiction novels, indicating that he was already preoccupied with that kind of thinking, and rendering it unlikely that Lori's shift in belief toward a heavy emphasis on the apocalypse after becoming involved with him was purely coincidental.

I'll let Stephen King's wife know she better high-tail it.

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He kept it quiet from the police when they asked about JJ, even though their marital status was irrelevant. That was not a spontaneous decision.

These subsonic suppressed rifles sounds exactly like paintball guns to me:

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How "painfully regulated" silencers are, does not matter. This is America, and it is simply the nature of American gun culture in many locales that if you have a good-ol-boy buddy who has a silencer then you have a silencer.

Dude...no, just no. First off, now you are talking about supressed rifles with subsonic ammo when Tammy reported a guy with a paintball gun. Here is her version, with the link:

Originally Posted by Tammy Daybell

“I had gotten home and parked in our front driveway. As I was getting stuff out of the back seat, a guy wearing a ski mask was suddenly standing by the back of my car with a paintball gun. He shot at me several times, although I don’t think it was loaded. I yelled for Chad and he ran off around the back of my house.”

https://www.eastidahonews.com/2019/1...picious-death/

You are saying the guy stood at the back of her car, a few feet from her while she was unloading the back seat, cracking off a supressed rifle with subsonic bullets that missed her, her car, and her house, and left no shell casings?

I must respectfully disagree.

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Then why did he tell police he last saw JJ at Lori's apartment in October? If Lori's kids were "somewhere else" and that was the end of it, as far as he knew, why did he not just say that? If he had never seen them before ever, why not say that? Why make himself a witness of interest by claiming to have seen a kid the police are looking for that he doesn't know anything about and hasn't actually ever seen?

You keep saying this. What is your source? From page 4 of the affadavit, section 10: "Chad responded that the last time he had seen JV was in apartment #107 in October" (Lori lived in #175).

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And why did he pretend to be only a casually-acquainted neighbor of his wife while standing in front of the apartment they shared? The "Lori lied to him about the kids theory" continues to not explain that. And the "I don't know nothing about no kids" theory falls a little flat when surveillance video seems to have Chad and Alex together on camera moving children's bicycles into the storage unit on October 28, before he and Lori went to Hawaii to get married.

It shows what appears to be Alex, but no way can you determine if the other is Chad. Are the police saying this or you?

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If my wife has never told me about JJ, and the police come to my door asking to speak to my wife about the whereabouts of "JJ", my answer is going to be "who's JJ?". If my wife has told me about JJ but has always maintained that he left her life before we got married, my response to the police will be "JJ has never lived with us". My response is not going to be "Lori, who's Lori? Oh wait, I think I know a Lori, she lives in that apartment over there..."

And if you had very briefly seen somebody you were told was JJ over in apartment #107 a month previously that you only recall vaguely, your response would be...

Quote:

Chad both positively lied to police, and asked Lori's Arizona friend (separately from Lori) to positively lie to police about where JJ was. That's two lies-to-police too many for "I'm just an innocent victim here" in my book. He is complicit. He lied to send police in the wrong direction in order to give he and Lori enough time to flee the state.



There's a difference between not volunteering information, and straight up positively lying to the police when giving answers to their questions. I certainly hope, for your sake, that you know the difference...

If I am not aware that my wife has been doing anything illegal, I'm not going to try to stop the police from talking to her about a missing kid, whether I'm personally "reluctant to talk to them" or not. Even if I'm completely under the impression that she isn't responsible for the child anymore, I would expect that she might have at least an interest in knowing the fact that he's missing and the police are looking for him.

But that's my point. The affidavit does not say the police were looking for a missing child. They said they were there on a welfare check. I don't see anywhere that the police said JJ was supposed to be at #175 (the cops found the men outside), or in Lori's custody, or was even considered missing.

Do you recall earlier in the thread that you asserted that the grandparents did not have the correct legal standing or something to report JJ missing? So why do you now assert that the police were investigating a missing person? They were not, so did not say they were to the Chadster.

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Alex's death could easily be a coincidence. If it's true that the woman he married is another friend of Lori's, that is not a coincidence.

well, if they all hung out with the same crowd of loonies, I could see a lot of marital and social overlap. But do we have any evidence at all that Alex's new squeeze was in any way connected to Lori or PaP or cults? I don't see anything.

[StillSleepy]

Lori tried to recruit the friend from Hawaii.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by StillSleepy

Lori tried to recruit the friend from Hawaii.

For those of us who didn't watch the show, who is this Hawaii friend? When did they know each other? Over the last six months? 2014?

[StillSleepy]

New article:
https://www.eastidahonews.com/2020/0...-lori-daybell/

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by StillSleepy

New article:
https://www.eastidahonews.com/2020/0...-lori-daybell/

all I see is a woman named april Raymond, who gives two lines or so about lori believing she was one of the 144,000. Is that it on her?

[Mike!]

Originally Posted by Thermal

I didn't see the tv thing,
[Snip]
But do we have any evidence at all that Alex's new squeeze was in any way connected to Lori or PaP or cults? I don't see anything.

It's in the Dateline episode at the one hour mark and going forward about 4 minutes, in the details on Alex Cox. According to Lori's friend April, she was told by Lori that Zulema "...had powers... & ...could control the elements..."

https://www.nbc.com/dateline/video/w...ildren/4114704

ETA...

Originally Posted by Thermal

all I see is a woman named april Raymond, who gives two lines or so about lori believing she was one of the 144,000. Is that it on her?

April Raymond is Lori's friend from church (In Hawaii?), she's interviewed throughout the Dateline special (Details at about 13 minutes in or so) as well. They were apparently friends for some time. She notes there was a distinct "change" in Lori at some point.

[DragonLady]

Is it just me, or does Chad look a lot like Michael Dunn?

[Checkmite]

Originally Posted by Thermal

I didn't see the tv thing, and I don't see any clips on the thread, so a little hard to argue this. Don't know how much weight some unknown's thoughts on Lori's spiritual life pack in terms of evidence, but whatever. Wouldn't a friend on Kauai predate Lori's alleged cult conversion by years? She lived there with Dead Charles when he was still Alive Charles.

She visited Kauai during the time when Charles was applying for divorce. Early on in the case, it was noted that she stole several thousand dollars from Charles' business account and went missing for a few weeks, before eventually returning. In the Dateline special, Lori's Hawaii friend reveals that Lori visited the island during that time, and it was during that visit that the friend became aware of Lori's shocking new religious beliefs.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Holup. How do you know Chad 'caused the change'? Is it impossible that she had some culty revelation and consequently gravitated towards PaP and Daybell later? 'Lori's Hawaii friend says' doesn't give us much to evaluate credibility in a thread discussion.

Yes it's my speculation. The timeline has Lori meeting Chad first, and then people noting the shift in her beliefs afterwards; Occam's Razor.

Originally Posted by Thermal

I'll let Stephen King's wife know she better high-tail it.

If Stephen King's wife suddenly starts telling her family that she has discovered that God is actually a monster-clown who demands to be fed children, yes I'm going to deduce that belief came as a result of her contact with King and his works, and was not purely coincidental.

Originally Posted by Thermal

You are saying the guy stood at the back of her car, a few feet from her while she was unloading the back seat, cracking off a supressed rifle with subsonic bullets that missed her, her car, and her house, and left no shell casings?

I must respectfully disagree.

New-to-me information; it's compelling.

Originally Posted by Thermal

You keep saying this. What is your source? From page 4 of the affadavit, section 10: "Chad responded that the last time he had seen JV was in apartment #107 in October" (Lori lived in #175).

Chad and Alex told police that Lori was in apartment #107. Since after checking there, they came back and found Lori in #175 after Chad was noted leaving but nobody else was noted arriving, it's safe to presume she had been there the whole time and the men were consciously lying to police about her whereabouts.

Originally Posted by Thermal

It shows what appears to be Alex, but no way can you determine if the other is Chad. Are the police saying this or you?

I am; again, Occam's Razor. Chad and Alex are the only two adult men known to us at this time to be associates of Lori Daybell who were present in Rexburg and/or in the vicinity at the times in question.

Originally Posted by Thermal

And if you had very briefly seen somebody you were told was JJ over in apartment #107 a month previously that you only recall vaguely, your response would be...

Neighbors confirm that JJ lived in apartment #175, having moved in with Lori. Paragraph 24. No credible witness has ever placed JJ at #107. Additionally, neighbors reported their children were told by Lori in late September that JJ had moved away, and he was never seen again since that time. So Chad could not have seen JJ at #107 (or anywhere else at the apartment complex) in October. It was a bald-faced lie.

Originally Posted by Thermal

But that's my point. The affidavit does not say the police were looking for a missing child. They said they were there on a welfare check. I don't see anywhere that the police said JJ was supposed to be at #175 (the cops found the men outside), or in Lori's custody, or was even considered missing.

If the point of the visit was to conduct a welfare check on JJ, it is contextually obvious that they went to apartment #175 because they expected to find him there, and asked specifically to speak to Lori because she was his parent. If you're a police officer and I ask you to perform a welfare check on a relative of mine who lives at a certain address, do you knock on a door four houses down and across the street, or do you knock on the door of the address I gave you?

Originally Posted by Thermal

Do you recall earlier in the thread that you asserted that the grandparents did not have the correct legal standing or something to report JJ missing? So why do you now assert that the police were investigating a missing person? They were not, so did not say they were to the Chadster.

In paragraph 10, which you have already cited, the detective explicitly refers to the communication from JJ's grandmother as a "missing child report".

Earlier in the thread, we did not know that, and at the time the speculation was concerning why the police had not "acted more quickly" (so far as we can tell). The affadavit clarifies that it was indeed a missing child report, and also describes the police as quite actively investigating his disappearance after the welfare check failed to pan out, laying out many facts about the investigation that we did not have access to then.

Originally Posted by Thermal

well, if they all hung out with the same crowd of loonies, I could see a lot of marital and social overlap. But do we have any evidence at all that Alex's new squeeze was in any way connected to Lori or PaP or cults? I don't see anything.

It was contended by another poster. If there's evidence I'm not aware of it; hence the "if it is true".

[Checkmite]

Originally Posted by StillSleepy

New article:
https://www.eastidahonews.com/2020/0...-lori-daybell/

Quote:

What we do know is Chad and Lori are or have been members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and they are also affiliated with several informal groups whose teachings go contrary to what one would hear in a typical Latter-day Saint congregation.

We reached out to several people in east Idaho who were or are part of these semi-secretive groups. Several have agreed to go on the record with their names, and others have agreed on the condition of anonymity, as they are still active Latter-day Saints or fear retaliation from other members of these groups.

(snip)

She came to the conclusion that her experience with the extremist group had been like an abusive relationship.

“I sat down with an active LDS friend, and she was dumbfounded by what I told her,” she said. “She told me I had been involved in a cult and none of this stuff was OK and that it was abuse. I didn’t believe her.”

She said it wasn’t until later that she realized that she had become involved in something that was contrary to what most Latter-day Saints experience or believe.

Boom.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Checkmite

...Chad and Alex told police that Lori was in apartment #107. Since after checking there, they came back and found Lori in #175 after Chad was noted leaving but nobody else was noted arriving, it's safe to presume she had been there the whole time and the men were consciously lying to police about her whereabouts.

See, you are still asserting this. The affidavit says that only Alex said that only JJ might be in #107, and later that Chad said the last time he saw JJ was in October in #107. Neither party says anything about where Lori lives; the police had her address from the grandparents, but had met and questioned the two men who they found outside.

I'm trying to picture how this went down, given the scant information. My guess is that Rexburg PD got a call from grandparents that say they haven't heard from their grandkids in a while. This is not an intensive investigation; I'm guessing it was a bit of an eye-roller for the responding officers, who were nevertheless professional, probably because they already had Lori under intermittent surveillance over the Arizona/Jeep thing. But based on the wording used, I doubt they ever used the word 'missing' when speaking to the men. It was flatly declared a welfare check requested by gramma and grampa.

Quote:

I am; again, Occam's Razor. Chad and Alex are the only two adult men known to us at this time to be associates of Lori Daybell who were present in Rexburg and/or in the vicinity at the times in question.

See, that's the thing. We are erroneously trying to pin all actions on the actors we are aware of. I'm guessing they had multiple friends /acquaintances / subcontractors, that we may not even know about. Having an unknown person in the mix should absolutely not compel us to shoehorn an existing person in the roll. Unknown is unknown, like paintball guns versus suppressed rifles with subsonic ammunition. We can't just change facts to better suit a narrative.

Quote:

Neighbors confirm that JJ lived in apartment #175, having moved in with Lori. Paragraph 24. No credible witness has ever placed JJ at #107. Additionally, neighbors reported their children were told by Lori in late September that JJ had moved away, and he was never seen again since that time. So Chad could not have seen JJ at #107 (or anywhere else at the apartment complex) in October. It was a bald-faced lie.

Negatory. The affidavit specifies that #107 was the humble abode of one Alex Cox (p5, sec 17). JJ could absolutely been with uncle Al the last time Chad saw him. Recall that Lori was known to dump the kids with others while she galavanted.

Of course, Alex also said that he thought JJ lived over at #107, which is ridiculous as it was Alex's own place. But I am taking about what Chad may or may not have plausibly known. Alex has, I believe, the dirtiest hands here.

My point here, btw, is to remove the assumed narrative and see if the facts can be interpreted a different way.

The only evidence we have of the Chadster lying is Melanie Gibbs, the Arizona alibi, claiming that they each called her. Gibbs, of course is what is being described as an apocalyptic cult nutjob, so how much cred does she really have?

Quote:

If the point of the visit was to conduct a welfare check on JJ, it is contextually obvious that they went to apartment #175 because they expected to find him there, and asked specifically to speak to Lori because she was his parent. If you're a police officer and I ask you to perform a welfare check on a relative of mine who lives at a certain address, do you knock on a door four houses down and across the street, or do you knock on the door of the address I gave you?

They talked to the two men they found outside. They talked to the men, checked the address that we now know that Alex (and only Alex) was clearly lying about. Chad drives off (he was already outside, indicating he was going somewhere), and he is stopped and gives them Lori's number.

Quote:

In paragraph 10, which you have already cited, the detective explicitly refers to the communication from JJ's grandmother as a "missing child report".

Yes, likely what they are referring to it as in hindsight. The first line of p4 sec 10 states unequivocally that the officers went to #175 specifically to conduct a welfare check. There is zero reason for us to assume the words 'missing child' were used at this point.

Quote:

Earlier in the thread, we did not know that, and at the time the speculation was concerning why the police had not "acted more quickly" (so far as we can tell). The affadavit clarifies that it was indeed a missing child report, and also describes the police as quite actively investigating his disappearance after the welfare check failed to pan out, laying out many facts about the investigation that we did not have access to then.

Yes, they checked out and followed up with Melanie Gibbs right pronto. Still, at the time they spoke to Chaddy and Alex (this is the very beginning, remember), they had zero reason to use the words 'missing child'. They were not there yet. They were checking on a grandson that gramma and grampa haven't heard from in a while.

Quote:

It was contended by another poster. If there's evidence I'm not aware of it; hence the "if it is true".

Agreed, significant if evidenced. I don't see it evidenced, or even reported.

eta: yes, it is reported on the Dateline broadcast by a woman who claims to be in the know

[Mike!]

Originally Posted by Thermal

[snip]

Agreed, significant if evidenced. I don't see it evidenced, or even reported.

It's in the Dateline episode. Did you not see my post, #216?

http://www.internationalskeptics.com...&postcount=216

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Mike!

It's in the Dateline episode at the one hour mark and going forward about 4 minutes, in the details on Alex Cox. According to Lori's friend April, she was told by Lori that Zulema "...had powers... & ...could control the elements..."

https://www.nbc.com/dateline/video/w...ildren/4114704

ETA...



April Raymond is Lori's friend from church (In Hawaii?), she's interviewed throughout the Dateline special (Details at about 13 minutes in or so) as well. They were apparently friends for some time. She notes there was a distinct "change" in Lori at some point.

Ok, I see that Zuzu was a culty and Lori knew her, confirmed. Also that Dead Alex was in the same cult, didn't know that.

Also remember why I stopped watching TV. The ads, the ads, my god...

eta: actually tried to watch it last night but the ads fought me tooth and nail. Had to damn near reprogram my browser to drop enough safegaurds for the advertisers to be happy.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Checkmite

Boom.

Alternatively, with suppressor and subsonic evidence:

Peep.

[Mike!]

Originally Posted by Thermal

Ok, I see that Zuzu was a culty and Lori knew her, confirmed. Also that Dead Alex was in the same cult, didn't know that.

Also remember why I stopped watching TV. The ads, the ads, my god...

eta: actually tried to watch it last night but the ads fought me tooth and nail. Had to damn near reprogram my browser to drop enough safegaurds for the advertisers to be happy.

You should have seen what I went through trying to track down the time points in the show to make the post. Every few too many back up clicks and re-watches would generate a 6 commercial block there was no getting around, and trying to get around it would simply restart the block... So, you're welcome.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Mike!

You should have seen what I went through trying to track down the time points in the show to make the post. Every few too many back up clicks and re-watches would generate a 6 commercial block there was no getting around, and trying to get around it would simply restart the block... So, you're welcome.

Christ, how about it? Every time I tried to find the one hour mark (that wouldn't display), they said 'naw, let's watch a few more ads instead!' Goddamned maddening

[Checkmite]

Originally Posted by Thermal

I'm trying to picture how this went down, given the scant information. My guess is that Rexburg PD got a call from grandparents that say they haven't heard from their grandkids in a while. This is not an intensive investigation; I'm guessing it was a bit of an eye-roller for the responding officers, who were nevertheless professional, probably because they already had Lori under intermittent surveillance over the Arizona/Jeep thing.

I'm betting there wasn't even the slightest eye-roll. Imagine being a police detective who has spent weeks surveilling Lori's place in connection to a murder investigation, only to get a phone call days later from an Arizona department saying an old lady has called them to report that she hasn't heard from their grandson who lives with Lori in over two months, and realizing that you never saw a kid even once during your surveillance. I'm picturing an eyebrow raise, not an eye-roll.

Originally Posted by Thermal

See, that's the thing. We are erroneously trying to pin all actions on the actors we are aware of. I'm guessing they had multiple friends /acquaintances / subcontractors, that we may not even know about.

And that is that world-building I cautioned against earlier.

Speculating about a known individual's motives, or the timeline, isn't world-building. Adding completely new characters without a positive reason to do so, is.

Everyone except Chad was brand new to Idaho, having only moved there a month previous and having no known prior connections to that area. They most likely did not have very many "friends/acquaintances/subcontractors" in town because they'd just moved there and didn't know anyone yet.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Negatory. The affidavit specifies that #107 was the humble abode of one Alex Cox (p5, sec 17). JJ could absolutely been with uncle Al the last time Chad saw him. Recall that Lori was known to dump the kids with others while she galavanted.

It could not have been in October. JJ was gone before the end of September, according to witnesses. Additionally, when misdirected toward that apartment, the detectives observed that the apartment was "completely empty and vacant", meaning Alex wasn't actually living there either - at least, not at the time of the welfare check. Chad was most likely aware of that fact.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Of course, Alex also said that he thought JJ lived over at #107, which is ridiculous as it was Alex's own place. But I am taking about what Chad may or may not have plausibly known. Alex has, I believe, the dirtiest hands here.

It does not strike me as plausible that Chad was unaware that Alex's statements to the police were substantially untrue, given all the lies Chad himself told.

Originally Posted by Thermal

My point here, btw, is to remove the assumed narrative and see if the facts can be interpreted a different way.

A couple of posts ago you were claiming you were doing this because the narrative "didn't make sense". It actually makes perfect sense and fits all of the facts, and every subsequent fact as it is discovered or publicized supports rather than compromises that narrative; this exercise of crafting alternative theories that fixate for some reason on explaining everything in a way that exonerates Chad specifically, is arbitrary and gratuitous. Chad willingly and substantially lied to police; he's in it up to his neck.

Originally Posted by Thermal

The only evidence we have of the Chadster lying is Melanie Gibbs, the Arizona alibi, claiming that they each called her. Gibbs, of course is what is being described as an apocalyptic cult nutjob, so how much cred does she really have?

No; Chad very definitely lied about seeing JJ at the apartment complex in October. He could not have seen him there at that time. He also very definitely lied about being only casually acquainted with Lori, and not knowing her phone number. Chad was caught in a whole web of lies. It was not random that he consciously misled police about his relationship with Lori when they came round to ask about Lori's child.

Regarding Melanie Gibbs; she has plenty of credibility simply because her statement that she was asked to lie is consistent with the facts: Lori did in fact tell police that the children were with Gibbs; Arizona police did in fact discover that was not true. Gibbs' statement was volunteered to the Rexburg police completely unsolicited in a phone call made expressly for that purpose, it was not concocted during police questioning as some kind of deflection or excuse. There's no more reason to impugn this witness's testimony than there is to impugn Charles (the victim who was shot to death) by proposing that his concerns about Lori's bizarre religious beliefs were lies concocted to make his wife look bad in a divorce proceeding.

Originally Posted by Thermal

They talked to the two men they found outside. They talked to the men, checked the address that we now know that Alex (and only Alex) was clearly lying about. Chad drives off (he was already outside, indicating he was going somewhere), and he is stopped and gives them Lori's number.

No, Chad was lying about having seen JJ there in October. Also, he initially claimed to not know Lori's number (also a lie) and only admitted that he did after he was stopped later. Chad was telling a whole book of fairy tales to the police.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Yes, likely what they are referring to it as in hindsight.

I disagree.

Originally Posted by Thermal

The first line of p4 sec 10 states unequivocally that the officers went to #175 specifically to conduct a welfare check.

And the fourth line states unequivocally that the grandmother specifically had "called in a missing child report". So now what? Why does the first unequivocal statement get to be true and accurate on its face but the second unequivocal statement gets to be a hindsight recharacterization?

Originally Posted by Thermal

Yes, they checked out and followed up with Melanie Gibbs right pronto. Still, at the time they spoke to Chaddy and Alex (this is the very beginning, remember), they had zero reason to use the words 'missing child'. They were not there yet. They were checking on a grandson that gramma and grampa haven't heard from in a while.

Whether the word "missing" passed the lips of either of the detectives at the time is a minor point that makes little difference; the police certainly conveyed that they looking for a child whom they clearly believed should have been there, and Chad understood that.

He also knew for a fact the child was not there and did not live with Lori because he lived there and was married to Lori; but he didn't tell police that, he hemmed and hawed and "I think mighta I saw him over there somewhere in October...Lori? Oh yeah I kind of know a Lori...but not all that well - no I don't have her phone number or anything. Oops, gotta go..."

[Checkmite]

Moving on: now we know the "cult" is real, that even other Mormons called it a cult, and that it was not as I originally presumed "just Chad and Lori and their immediate associates", but an actual, independently-existing thing outside the family.

In my opinion, this ever-so-slightly widens the sliver of hope that the children might be alive by a micron or two; because now, there's third parties that the children may have been passed on to that are actively concealing them. I would call it a dim hope, however, given that one alleged member of this group has already come to police to report that the Daybells had tried to get her to lie regarding the whereabouts of the children, which at least suggests that "lying to cops about missing kids" its not one of the group's tenets.

[StillSleepy]

New document in Brandon and Melani's custody battle, probably the main takeaway is that Brandon alleges Melani's current husband reported to law enforcement that she said she and Alex conspired to have Brandon killed.

https://www.eastidahonews.com/2020/0...urt-documents/

https://www.eastidahonews.com/2020/0...aybells-niece/

[Checkmite]

Originally Posted by StillSleepy

New document in Brandon and Melani's custody battle, probably the main takeaway is that Brandon alleges Melani's current husband reported to law enforcement that she said she and Alex conspired to have Brandon killed.

https://www.eastidahonews.com/2020/0...urt-documents/

https://www.eastidahonews.com/2020/0...aybells-niece/

From paragraph 6:

Quote:

[Melani's] new husband has even provided statements to law enforcement that [Melani] told him shortly after their marriage that she conspired with her uncle to kill [Brandon]. [Melani's] new husband has even given up his own parenting time out of fear of what [Melani] may do or have done to his children.

Yikes and a half. Maybe Brandon didn't make up that whole shooting thing.

[StillSleepy]

There's more on that in paragraphs 15 and 18.

[Checkmite]

Originally Posted by StillSleepy

There's more on that in paragraphs 15 and 18.

If this is true, it certainly sounds at least as if Melani herself is under the impression that Alex was responsible for the attack on Brandon - even if her bragging to her new husband about being personally involved in it was just tough-talk.

ETA: When Brandon's lawyers in the filing say that Melani is "involved in a cult where numerous members, adults and children alike, have been being killed off like flies", I wonder if he's talking strictly about the situation with the Daybells' immediate family (implying that they believe the children have in fact been killed), or if they're alluding to other cases that we don't yet know about. This is the first time for instance that I've heard about Melani's new husband, let alone that he has been giving statements to the police that are decidedly not favorable to Melani.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Checkmite

I'm betting there wasn't even the slightest eye-roll. Imagine being a police detective who has spent weeks surveilling Lori's place in connection to a murder investigation, only to get a phone call days later from an Arizona department saying an old lady has called them to report that she hasn't heard from their grandson who lives with Lori in over two months, and realizing that you never saw a kid even once during your surveillance. I'm picturing an eyebrow raise, not an eye-roll.

You make a good point, but come to the wrong conclusion, I think. They were intermittently watching her at the request of Arizona. Now they were about to formally tip their hand to Lori that they had a more active interest. So either they were high-fiving each other, knowing they were about to get off surveillance duty, or they were m-fering, knowing that they were forcing her hand.

Wow. Seems like that would've been a great night to keep her on some of that thar surveillance. Wonder why they didn't? Half price shots at Bubba's Roadhouse that night?

Quote:

And that is that world-building I cautioned against earlier.

Speculating about a known individual's motives, or the timeline, isn't world-building. Adding completely new characters without a positive reason to do so, is.

Everyone except Chad was brand new to Idaho, having only moved there a month previous and having no known prior connections to that area. They most likely did not have very many "friends/acquaintances/subcontractors" in town because they'd just moved there and didn't know anyone yet.

Yet we know that Lori had cult friends that spanned to at least Arizona. Why do you think someone close with the big speakers/writers in a cult wouldn't know anyone else? I'd think she sounded pretty popular with the Doomsday crowd.

Quote:

It could not have been in October. JJ was gone before the end of September, according to witnesses. Additionally, when misdirected toward that apartment, the detectives observed that the apartment was "completely empty and vacant", meaning Alex wasn't actually living there either - at least, not at the time of the welfare check. Chad was most likely aware of that fact.

Nope. He was last seen in late September. Seems he was only seen sporadically, so we have no reason to believe that was his last day above ground. He was last seen on a doorbell cam, playing outside, IIRC? Unless he was seen every day on that cam, then never again, the late September date doesn't actually mean anything. He could have well been kicking around that largely empty apartment complex for weeks.

Quote:

It does not strike me as plausible that Chad was unaware that Alex's statements to the police were substantially untrue, given all the lies Chad himself told.

Just noticed that you accidentally snipped out where I asked you to back up your repeated claim that Chad said Lori lived in #107. Mistake, I'm sure. Do go on.

Quote:

A couple of posts ago you were claiming you were doing this because the narrative "didn't make sense". It actually makes perfect sense and fits all of the facts, and every subsequent fact as it is discovered or publicized supports rather than compromises that narrative; this exercise of crafting alternative theories that fixate for some reason on explaining everything in a way that exonerates Chad specifically, is arbitrary and gratuitous. Chad willingly and substantially lied to police; he's in it up to his neck.

I think that so many murdering psychos running around is somewhat implausible. I think fewer of them might make more sense, so I am removing the narrative to see if the evidence supports this. Kind of like the opposite of reading a report that a paintball gun was fired and speculating that it was in fact a silenced rifle with subsonic ammo. Or declaring unknown persons to be specific ones. Or claiming actors said things they demonstrably did not say. Stuff like that.

Quote:

No; Chad very definitely lied about seeing JJ at the apartment complex in October. He could not have seen him there at that time.

Yes he could. We don't know exactly when JJ disappeared; we only know the last day he happened to be seen.

Quote:

He also very definitely lied about being only casually acquainted with Lori, and not knowing her phone number. Chad was caught in a whole web of lies. It was not random that he consciously misled police about his relationship with Lori when they came round to ask about Lori's child.

Again, you're making things up to support a narrative. The police said he acted like he did not know Lori well, not that he was only casually acquainted. Surely you know the difference? And if you asked me my own kid's cel numbers, that I actually pay the bill for, I couldn't tell you. That's the thing about contacts on phones.

Yes, he was certainly being evasive and uncooperative with Rexburg Pd. He was clearly hiding something. Might it have been something else? Fear of some other legal trouble? I'm just not ready to book 'em Dano just yet. There's a whole cult out there, remember? Lots of players just waiting their turns.

Quote:

Regarding Melanie Gibbs; she has plenty of credibility simply because her statement that she was asked to lie is consistent with the facts: Lori did in fact tell police that the children were with Gibbs; Arizona police did in fact discover that was not true. Gibbs' statement was volunteered to the Rexburg police completely unsolicited in a phone call made expressly for that purpose, it was not concocted during police questioning as some kind of deflection or excuse. There's no more reason to impugn this witness's testimony than there is to impugn Charles (the victim who was shot to death) by proposing that his concerns about Lori's bizarre religious beliefs were lies concocted to make his wife look bad in a divorce proceeding.

Ok. Try this on for size: What if Lori was telling the truth, or cult-related partial truth, and the kids were with cult members in Arizona, being bunkered down or whatever from the coming apocalypse?

What if Melanie is also lying to police while the kids are relocated? A lot of this narrative relies on her testimony (as a culty leader) being truthful. What if it is not?

Say they have an agreement to relocate at the drop of a hat at the first whiff of trouble, and to give conflicting stories to confuse the police? Considering this is some kind of Doomsday cult, is this entirely implausible? If Cult mama Melanie Gibbs is also lying, we have big problems in the narrative. Her statements to police support the narrative; if untrue, they upend it.

Quote:

No, Chad was lying about having seen JJ there in October. Also, he initially claimed to not know Lori's number (also a lie) and only admitted that he did after he was stopped later. Chad was telling a whole book of fairy tales to the police.

I disagree.



And the fourth line states unequivocally that the grandmother specifically had "called in a missing child report". So now what? Why does the first unequivocal statement get to be true and accurate on its face but the second unequivocal statement gets to be a hindsight recharacterization?

Hey, you were the one insisting that no one had standing to file or report a missing person under Idaho law. The police have stated repeatedly, in the press and in the affidavit, that they initially went there for a welfare check.

Perhaps you could explain how they could be searching for a missing person before they even determined that he was ******* missing? First you have to establish that he is not to be found. Not calling grandma for a while does not meet that bar.

Quote:

Whether the word "missing" passed the lips of either of the detectives at the time is a minor point that makes little difference; the police certainly conveyed that they looking for a child whom they clearly believed should have been there, and Chad understood that.

He also knew for a fact the child was not there and did not live with Lori because he lived there and was married to Lori; but he didn't tell police that, he hemmed and hawed and "I think mighta I saw him over there somewhere in October...Lori? Oh yeah I kind of know a Lori...but not all that well - no I don't have her phone number or anything. Oops, gotta go..."

Factor the Doomsday culty thing in here. How cooperative with police would you expect Gods to be? Perhaps just a secular force to be avoided? Maybe?

[Checkmite]

Originally Posted by Thermal

You make a good point, but come to the wrong conclusion, I think. They were intermittently watching her at the request of Arizona. Now they were about to formally tip their hand to Lori that they had a more active interest. So either they were high-fiving each other, knowing they were about to get off surveillance duty, or they were m-fering, knowing that they were forcing her hand.

It was not only passive surveillance. Police actually seized the Jeep, which was in Lori's possession; so the Daybells were already aware at that time that the police were actively investigating them. That may even by why Alex's apartment was empty when the police returned to perform the welfare check; he may have been preparing to skip town already, and the police expressing sudden interested in JJ prompted the Daybells to leave too. They were gone that very night after the welfare check.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Yet we know that Lori had cult friends that spanned to at least Arizona. Why do you think someone close with the big speakers/writers in a cult wouldn't know anyone else? I'd think she sounded pretty popular with the Doomsday crowd.

All of the non-Daybell-relative "cult members" interviewed so far have been entirely cooperative with police. Their cooperation so far implicates the Daybells, indicating their statements are not lies intended to help the Daybells avoid culpability for their actions or protect the image of the religious group.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Nope. He was last seen in late September. Seems he was only seen sporadically, so we have no reason to believe that was his last day above ground. He was last seen on a doorbell cam, playing outside, IIRC? Unless he was seen every day on that cam, then never again, the late September date doesn't actually mean anything. He could have well been kicking around that largely empty apartment complex for weeks.

When JJ was suddenly not seen outside anymore, one of the neighbors' children knocked on Lori's door to ask if he was home. Lori at that time told the child that JJ had gone to live with his grandmother. That was still in September. By Lori's own account he was positively gone at that point. Obviously JJ was not with his grandparents; but the fact that Lori was already beginning to fabricate excuses to explain his absence does establish that at that point there was in fact an absence that required a lie to explain.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Just noticed that you accidentally snipped out where I asked you to back up your repeated claim that Chad said Lori lived in #107. mistake, I'm sure. Do go on.

If you rebut something, and I don't reply to that point, that means I'm not contesting your rebuttal.

Originally Posted by Thermal

I think that so many murdering psychos running around is somewhat implausible. I think fewer of them might make more sense, so I am removing the narrative to see if the evidence supports this.

Such is your wont; but again, it's arbitrary and gratuitous. I don't feel that two murderers is "too many".

But even if Alex is solely responsible for all the deaths, it doesn't exonerate Chad. If we're comfortable with the concept that Alex killed Charles at Lori's request, and - if this new information is to be believed - that he attempted to kill Brandon at Melani's request, killing or attempting to kill Tammy at Chad's request isn't some kind of stretch.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Yes he could. We don't know exactly when JJ disappeared; we only know the last day he happened to be seen.

We have an established time period by which Lori had begun making excuses to explain JJ's disappearance. It was late September.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Again, you're making things up to support a narrative. The police said he acted like he did not know Lori well, not that he was only casually acquainted. Surely you know the difference?

To non-pedants there is none. Is this going to turn into one of those things like when you insist that several absolutely implies more than a few, even if you can't say by exactly how many? Maybe we should draw a "spectrum of familiarity" chart and let you plot where exactly "don't know them well" and "only casually acquainted" respectively lay on it so there'll be no more mistakes. I'm 100% serious.


Ha ha no I'm not

Originally Posted by Thermal

And if you asked me my own kid's cel numbers, that I actually pay the bill for, I couldn't tell you. That's the thing about contacts on phones.

Would you act like you don't know them very well and not admit that they are your children, too?

The "oops, not good memory" excuse is kind of out, since minutes later when he was stopped by police he admitted he actually did know the number and gave it to them on the spot.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Yes, he was certainly being evasive and uncooperative with Rexburg Pd. He was clearly hiding something. Might it have been something else? Fear of some other legal trouble? I'm just not ready to book 'em Dano just yet. There's a whole cult out there, remember? Lots of players just waiting their turns.

"Might it have been?" Yes. Again I will defer to Occam's Razor, however. Neither Chad nor Lori feared the cult enough to ask a cult member at least twice to lie to police for them about a missing kid. Neither Melani nor Alex feared the cult enough to not get married to members, after Charles and Tammy's deaths.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Ok. Try this on for size: What if Lori was telling the truth, or cult-related partial truth, and the kids were with cult members in Arizona, being bunkered down or whatever from the coming apocalypse?

Then she could have given police the names the actual friends the children were with, and told them that they had her permission to stay there for a time (which as the sole custodial parent she is legally allowed to give), the police in Arizona could then check and verify that the children are in fact there, and just like that the entire problem instantly and neatly vanishes in a puff of 'nothing to see here'.

...whoops! Except that whole attempted murder with a silenced rifle in the back of a Jeep thing. That probably wasn't going away. But, remember, Brandon surely made that up to make his wife look bad in the divorce, just like Charles when he claimed his wife had threatened his life before he was, you know, literally shot to death at his wife's house.

Originally Posted by Thermal

What if Melanie is also lying to police while the kids are relocated? A lot of this narrative relies on her testimony (as a culty leader) being truthful. What if it is not?

Why would she need to? When police talked to her on the night of the welfare check, she told them the children weren't there. Presumably the local police on the ground followed this up with a visit to see for themselves; but whether they did or not, that's it - the police were done with Melanie Gibbs. She wasn't involved. There would have been no need for her to call back a week later and start volunteering excuses that nobody had ever asked her for - and it is absolutely nonsensical that hanging the Daybells out to dry by directly accusing them of obstructing justice is part of the cult's grand plan to...help the Daybells out by sheltering their children from the apocalypse...

Plus, you are incorrect - not really any of the narrative is reliant on Gibbs' testimony. The fact that she reported the Daybells asked her to lie is at best a bonus and merely one more additional confirmation; police were already confident at that point that Lori Daybell had deliberately lied to them - as indeed most in this thread were before we learned of Lori's arrest.

Originally Posted by Thermal

They have an agreement to relocate at the drop of a hat at the first whiff of trouble, and t give conflicting stories to confuse the police? Considering this is a Doomsday cult, is this entirely implausible?

It might be plausible if it weren't for that whole "part of our fiendish plan of deceit will be to accuse our own members of attempting to obstruct the police investigation; that's sure not to attract any further police scrutiny" thing.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Hey, you were the one insisting that no one had standing to file or report a missing person under Idaho law. The police have stated repeatedly, in the press and in the affidavit, that they initially went there for a welfare check.

The affidavit also explicitly calls it a missing child report; so now what? I have no problem changing my speculation to match new evidence as it's presented. I've done it several times in this thread already.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Perhaps you could explain how they could be searching for a missing person before they even determined that he was *******missing? First you have to establish that he is not to be found. Not calling grandma for a while does not meet that bar..

That made sense to me at the time; but now I've read the actual detective's affidavit and he explicitly calls it a "missing child report" so...the actual professionals win on what counts as what; I'm not an expert.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Factor the Doomsday culty thing in here. How cooperative with police would you expect Gods to be? Perhaps just a secular force to be avoided? Maybe?

Except they're doing the opposite of avoiding the police. Of her own free will, after she's been cleared of involvement, Gibbs contacts the police on her own initiative to tell them the Daybells tried to get her to lie. Melani's new husband Ian, allegedly tells police that she told him she conspired with Alex to try to kill her ex-husband and he was so shocked that he won't support her attempt to win back custody of her children because he's afraid for what might happen to them.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Checkmite

...All of the non-Daybell-relative "cult members" interviewed so far have been entirely cooperative with police. Their cooperation so far implicates the Daybells, indicating their statements are not lies intended to help the Daybells avoid culpability for their actions or protect the image of the religious group.

So is this a dangerous doomsday cult, or do-right cooperative citizens? Seems to me, as I said earlier, that the culty thingy is a fairly irrelevant sidebar.

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Such is your wont; but again, it's arbitrary and gratuitous. I don't feel that two murderers is "too many".

I count at the very least four murderers and conspirators. If we consider Dead Charles to have likely been murdered, we should probably lump Tylee into the conspirator pile, as she witnessed it yet did not report to police that it was anything but self-defense, as Lori and Alex said. Zuzu would likely know something too, I suppose, but we know little about her.

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Then she could have given police the names the actual friends the children were with, and told them that they had her permission to stay there for a time (which as the sole custodial parent she is legally allowed to give), the police in Arizona could then check and verify that the children are in fact there, and just like that the entire problem instantly and neatly vanishes in a puff of 'nothing to see here'.

If you are in a doomsday cult with your children in hiding from the apocalypse, maybe you don't invite the cops to come strolling in to your compound? No?

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...whoops! Except that whole attempted murder with a silenced rifle in the back of a Jeep thing. That probably wasn't going away. But, remember, Brandon surely made that up to make his wife look bad in the divorce, just like Charles when he claimed his wife had threatened his life before he was, you know, literally shot to death at his wife's house.

Ok, we're down to you strawmannng now. Framing your spouse as a nut during divorce proceedings is a time honored tactic in these United States. I did not say he made it up to make her look bad. I think both Brandon and Dead Charles may have blown up the cult significance to make their divorcing spouses look nutty.

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Why would she need to? When police talked to her on the night of the welfare check, she told them the children weren't there. Presumably the local police on the ground followed this up with a visit to see for themselves; but whether they did or not, that's it - the police were done with Melanie Gibbs. She wasn't involved.

If the police believed her, sure. She's out. Neat and perfectly, she is not suspected of anything.

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There would have been no need for her to call back a week later and start volunteering excuses that nobody had ever asked her for - and it is absolutely nonsensical that hanging the Daybells out to dry by directly accusing them of obstructing justice is part of the cult's grand plan to...help the Daybells out by sheltering their children from the apocalypse...

Hm. A week later, you say? That was convenient that she waited till *checks timetable* the Daybells made it to Kauai! Good thing cult mama Melanie didn't remember that little detail sooner, huh? Might have ramped up police involvement while they were in reach.

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Plus, you are incorrect - not really any of the narrative is reliant on Gibbs' testimony. The fact that she reported the Daybells asked her to lie is at best a bonus and merely one more additional confirmation; police were already confident at that point that Lori Daybell had deliberately lied to them - as indeed most in this thread were before we learned of Lori's arrest.

The hell are you talking about? The police had no idea if they were being lied to about the kid's whereabouts prior to talking to Melanie...she was the freaking alibi. The police didn't have Lori lying about a single thing without Melanie. It was 100% the calls to Melanie Gibbs at the time of the welfare check. First they conveniently (for Lori) couldn't reach Mel. In the days of cel phones. It took them till the next day, after Lori had packed and rolled out to get Mel to answer the phone (more convenience for Lori). Then Melanie waits a week to say 'oh, now that they are off the continent, I have this other important information... '

And as you say, they are done with Mel and she looks like an angel. All the while having served Lori's needs at the time admirably.

Why rat out later, then, you ask? I pose that Mel knows where the kids are (both Mels, possibly). So she has to be painted as one of the good guys and tell the truth. After she neatly served Lori and Chad, of course, and the police suspect nothing.

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It might be plausible if it weren't for that whole "part of our fiendish plan of deceit will be to accuse our own members of attempting to obstruct the police investigation; that's sure not to attract any further police scrutiny" thing.

Scrutiny was unavoidable, given the existing circumstances. The trick for a bad guy is directing the scrutiny. Whether the kids are dead or in lockdown, Lori doesn't want them presented to the public. So it's basically too late for her. She needs to buy time. In that, she was temporarily successful.

While we are at it, why wasn't the Chadster arrested, too, if he misdirected police? That carries up to 14 years on it's own, according to the affidavit.

[Mike!]

Originally Posted by Thermal

[Snip]

While we are at it, why wasn't the Chadster arrested, too, if he misdirected police? That carries up to 14 years on it's own, according to the affidavit.

I wonder the same thing. I can only guess the authorities feel he may be more useful to the investigation wandering free at the moment, and they can always snatch him up and charge him when he's not... Or if it looks like he's going to try and flee the country itself. One thing about him being in Hawaii is, he's not going anyplace far by car.

[StillSleepy]

Is misdirecting police a crime worth extraditing over on Idaho's dime?

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by Mike!

I wonder the same thing. I can only guess the authorities feel he may be more useful to the investigation wandering free at the moment, and they can always snatch him up and charge him when he's not... Or if it looks like he's going to try and flee the country itself. One thing about him being in Hawaii is, he's not going anyplace far by car.

Right, but he's also pretty cut off from the rest of the cast (intentionally, IMO). Unless they monitor his phone/internet usage, don't know how much use he will be to them.

[Thermal]

Originally Posted by StillSleepy

Is misdirecting police a crime worth extraditing over on Idaho's dime?

It is if you use those 14 years as leverage to make Chadoromma squeal

[StillSleepy]

Tylee's aunt (Joe Ryan's sister) speculates that Tylee may have had a maturing trust fund from his death, JJ was last seen the day before Tylee's 17th birthday. She also notes some irregularities with Joe's death (such as his body not being found for a week), but doesn't believe Lori was his beneficiary of any life insurance he had.

(Second part of article)
https://www.eastidahonews.com/2020/0...-children-are/

Also a rumor from "sources close to the investigation" going around on Daily Mail and a few other sites that investigators intend to search Yellowstone but are waiting for snow to melt.

[Checkmite]

Originally Posted by Thermal

So is this a dangerous doomsday cult, or do-right cooperative citizens? Seems to me, as I said earlier, that the culty thingy is a fairly irrelevant sidebar.

The cult is obviously relevant somehow, since it is the way that Lori and Chad came together, and all of Lori's friends seem to agree that after getting involved with it, Lori's behavior changed drastically. So it IS important. Exactly how, will emerge with time.

The leap from "cult" to "doomsday compound" and "hiding children from the apocalypse" - these are all Hollywood elements that you are unilaterally injecting and then harping endlessly on because that's just what the hell you do whenever you get a-hankerin' to argue over something.

Originally Posted by Thermal

I count at the very least four murderers and conspirators.

I'll take raising the bar for $400, Alex.

Originally Posted by Thermal

If we consider Dead Charles to have likely been murdered, we should probably lump Tylee into the conspirator pile, as she witnessed it yet did not report to police that it was anything but self-defense, as Lori and Alex said.

She was a minor and likely compelled to lie.

Originally Posted by Thermal

If you are in a doomsday cult with your children in hiding from the apocalypse, maybe you don't invite the cops to come strolling in to your compound? No?

Except there is no compound and nobody in the cult appears to be hiding; these are inventions of your imagination (the worldbuilding, remember). Lori and Chad weren't hiding in a doomsday compound, they had an apartment in Idaho and then in Hawaii. Melani and her new husband aren't in hiding. Alex was, technically, hiding from police - but his now-widow is not. The newspaper was easily able to find cult members and interview them; they apparently all live at their regular homes and attend Mormon churches and interact with non-cult members regularly.

The link provided earlier in the thread actually quite concisely explains the cult's specific prepper mindset:

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“The big thing I took away from (the conference) was that from Ucon north, there was going to be a city of light or city of refuge for saints to gather and be protected as the calamities come and things begin to fall,” Jessica said. “The thing that surprised me at the gathering is I’d never seen so many people that believed in the idea of tent cities. There were so many people.”

She said many in the group believed that one day, there would be a “callout.” Local leaders would stand up in church and issue a call for all the members that had followed the directive to store up food, to gather it and take it to locations for the building of these tent cities.

“We believed there would be a time that we would be called out, and if we weren’t, there would be a time that these items would be needed,” she said.

The cult did not have "a compound". They believed that once the end-time calamity began, they would all gather the survival supplies they had been taught to individually stock up over time and only then bring them together to some currently undecided location that would be announced at that time.

And as of this point, I am finished with your completely silly diatribes and digressions about "doomsday compounds" and "hiding children from the apocalypse", until somebody posts a link to a news report giving even the slightest shred of evidence that this cult engaged in that sort of activity.

And that includes your utterly nonsensical hypothetical that the cult stashed Lori's kids and then later accused her, unsolicited, of asking them to lie to police for her as part of some grand apocalypse-survival plan. We've got the police actually on record saying that Chad lied to them. Feel free at any point to produce something equally as authoritative implicating Melanie Gibbs. Until you do, I consider my entertainment of this fantasy at an end. Put up or shut up.

Originally Posted by Thermal

Ok, we're down to you strawmannng now. Framing your spouse as a nut during divorce proceedings is a time honored tactic in these United States. I did not say he made it up to make her look bad. I think both Brandon and Dead Charles may have blown up the cult significance to make their divorcing spouses look nutty.

"I did not say he made it up to make her look bad, I'm just saying he exaggerated it to make her look bad. Before he ended up dead in her house."

Originally Posted by Thermal

First they conveniently (for Lori) couldn't reach Mel. In the days of cel phones. It took them till the next day,

Wrong. I suggest you re-read paragraph 14.

Originally Posted by Thermal

While we are at it, why wasn't the Chadster arrested, too, if he misdirected police? That carries up to 14 years on it's own, according to the affidavit.

Uh, no? Try reading again. Both the obstruction and criminal solicitation charges are listed as misdemeanors, which in the US are almost always good for less than a year IF there's any jail time at all. There's very few exceptions; but there isn't a single misdemeanor in the country that will get you up to 14 years in prison.

Lori faces up to 14 years for each felony charge on her sheet. She is the big fish, simply because she is the one who had the legal obligation toward the kids. Chad probably hasn't been arrested because Idaho isn't interested in spending money on an extradition process over a misdemeanor.

There could also be charges forthcoming. I speculated early on that police could eventually decide to charge Lori with child desertion and that turned out to be what happened, but it was also a completely wild guess from an uninformed layman and the actual arrest and the charges were a surprise to me when they were announced. The police could surprise me again with new charges, against Chad. We will have to wait.