Lori Vallow Daybell was sentenced to life in prison yesterday after three years of being convicted for the gruesome murders of her children, Tylee Vallow, age sixteen and Joshua “JJ” Vallow, age seven. She has been dubbed as the “Doomsday Mom” and “Cult Mom” after the story became public.
Lori Vallow Daybell
Lori Cox was born on 26th June 1973 in California. She had three siblings- Summer Cox, Adam Cox and Alex Cox. Lori was always known to be quite spiritual and married her high school boyfriend at the age of 19. She shortly divorced him and married again at 22. She had a son with her second husband William Lagioia and named him Colby. They then divorced in 1998, two years after Colby’s birth.
In 2001, she married Joseph Anthony Ryan Jr who adopted Colby. Ryan and Lori had a daughter, Tylee Ryan. The couple divorced in 2005, when Tylee was 3, claiming that Ryan had been abusive to the children and Lori. In 2006, Lori went on to marry Leland Vallow and the couple shortly adopted Vallow’s grandnephew, Joshua “JJ” Vallow. The Vallow family moved to Hawaii after this.
Chad Daybell and Lori Vallow
Lori became very interested in Chad Daybell’s book series he wrote “Standing in Holy Places” around 2015 and they met in 2018 in a convention. Chad spoke to Lori there for the first time and told her that they had been married for seven lifetimes before this and that they were destined to be together and start the new world after the Doomsday Apocalypse that would apparently happen in 2020.
He told her that they were the chosen ones by God and that it was in their hands that the good people of this world would survive. Chad Daybell was already married to Tammy Daybell and Lori would communicate with him privately after they first met. They would constantly talk about the forthcoming Doomsday Apocalypse and their plans to start the new world order.
In October 2019, Tammy Daybell died suddenly and the police did not autopsy the body and took Daybell’s word for truth about her being terribly sick the previous night and having passed away in her sleep. But the body was later exhumed during the investigation of the murders of Tylee and JJ Vallow and found that there was a definite foul play and Tammy Daybell had been asphyxiated to death.
Tylee and JJ Vallow
Tylee and JJ Vallow were removed from their school by Lori and her reasoning on this was that she would homeschool her children. Tylee and Colby were very close to each other. There were Venmo payments made from Tylee’s account to Colby and that was the last time he ever heard from her. Chad and Lori got married two weeks after Tammy Daybell’s death. When the grandparents of Tylee and JJ did not hear from them for months even after requesting Lori to have the kids call them. The police did a wellness check on JJ after his grandmother’s insistence but could not find the children with her.
Image Source: News Nation
The Arrest and Conviction
Lori Vallow was arrested on misdemeanors and desertion of dependent children in February of 2020. In June of 2020, the police did a search of Chad Daybell’s home and discovered Tylee and JJ Vallow’s remains. Chad and Lori were imprisoned and they were charged with first degree murder in May 2021.
Lori claimed in one of her statements that Tylee and JJ had become “zombies”. She was sentenced to three lifetimes in prison with no chance of parole. Chad Daybell has also been convicted. Colby Ryan says in his statement that Tylee and JJ were two of the most important people in his life. What happened never should have happened and it did because of Lori Vallow and Chad Daybell’s blind beliefs.
