Jurors began deliberating Monday afternoon in the Arizona trial of Lori Vallow Daybell, an Idaho woman accused of conspiring to murder her estranged husband in suburban Phoenix. The trial, which started two weeks ago, presented two vastly different versions of Charles Vallow’s death at her home in 2019.
Prosecutors claimed that Vallow Daybell and her brother, Alex Cox, planned to kill Vallow to collect his $1 million life insurance policy and to marry her then-boyfriend, Chad Daybell, an Idaho author known for writing religious novels about prophecies and the end of the world. “What we see is a very planned out, premeditated murder,” prosecutor Treena Kay told the jury during her closing argument.
Vallow Daybell, who is defending herself without legal representation, maintained that her estranged husband’s death wasn’t a crime. “This was a tragedy,” she said Monday. “Don’t let them turn my family tragedy into a crime.” She has pleaded not guilty and faces a life sentence without the possibility of release until serving at least 25 years if convicted.
The jury heard a recorded conversation between Vallow Daybell and the life insurance company, where she believed she was the beneficiary of her estranged husband’s policy. In the recording, she is heard saying that Vallow had been shot and that “it was an accident.” Vallow Daybell’s brother, Alex Cox, who fatally shot Vallow, died five months later from a blood clot in his lungs. Cox’s account of acting in self-defense was later questioned.
Vallow Daybell has already been convicted in Idaho for killing her two youngest children and conspiring to murder a romantic rival, for which she received a life sentence. The trial in Arizona marks the first of two criminal trials for Vallow Daybell. She is scheduled to go on trial again in early June on a charge of conspiring to murder Brandon Boudreaux, the ex-husband of Vallow Daybell’s niece.
Trial Background
Charles Vallow filed for divorce from Vallow Daybell four months before his death, citing her infatuation with near-death experiences and claims of living numerous lives on other planets. He also alleged that she threatened to ruin him financially and kill him, leading him to seek a voluntary mental health evaluation of his wife.
During the trial, Adam Cox, another brother of Vallow Daybell, testified on behalf of the prosecution. He stated that he had no doubt his siblings were behind Vallow’s death, which occurred just before he and Vallow were planning an intervention to bring Vallow Daybell back into their shared faith in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Adam Cox also testified that before Vallow’s death, his sister had told people that her husband was no longer living and that a zombie was living inside his body.
