Ruby Franke Children

Case background and investigation

On August 30, 2023, a 12-year-old boy climbed out of a window of a house in Ivins, in Washington County, Utah, and went to a neighbor for help. According to the Washington County Attorney's Office, the neighbor saw duct tape on the boy's ankles and wrists, serious wounds and signs of malnourishment, and called the authorities. Officers who went to the house, which belonged to Jodi Hildebrandt, found the boy's 9-year-old sister hidden in a closet, the office said. Some news reports have given slightly different ages for the younger child.

The children's mother was Ruby Franke, who had run a YouTube channel about her family called 8 Passengers, launched in 2015. Hildebrandt was a mental health counselor and the founder of a counseling and life-coaching business, ConneXions, with which Franke had become involved. Both women were arrested that day. According to the Deseret News, each was originally charged with six counts of aggravated child abuse, a second-degree felony.

Franke pleaded guilty to four counts on December 18, 2023, and Hildebrandt pleaded guilty to four counts on December 27, 2023, according to the county attorney's office. The remaining two counts against each were removed under the plea agreements, and the Deseret News reported that Franke agreed to testify against Hildebrandt. In her plea, Franke admitted to withholding food and water, holding her son's head under water, keeping the two children isolated and making her daughter walk barefoot in the heat, the newspaper reported.

Prosecutors described the abuse as including deprivation of food and water, forced physical labor outdoors in extreme heat, beatings, binding and isolation. The county attorney's office said investigators concluded that the two women were motivated by extreme religious beliefs and held that the treatment would make the children repent.

On February 20, 2024, Judge John J. Walton of Utah's Fifth District Court sentenced each woman to four consecutive prison terms of one to 15 years. Utah law limits consecutive sentences of this kind to 30 years, so the effective sentence for each is four to 30 years, which the county attorney's office described as the maximum for the offense. At sentencing Franke told the court that the charges against her were just, the Deseret News reported. The length of time each woman actually serves will be decided by the Utah Board of Pardons and Parole.

KUTV reported in July 2024 that the board had postponed the women's first hearings from September 2024 to December 2026, ordered mental health reviews due by November 1, 2026, and required both to take part in a cognitive behavioral therapy program beforehand. Today.com reported in December 2025 that both were being held at the Utah State Correctional Facility in Salt Lake City. Wikipedia's article on Franke states that her husband, Kevin Franke, filed for divorce in November 2023 and that the divorce was finalized in March 2025.