Left inset: Ruth Miller (Tuscarawas County Sheriff’s Office). Right inset: The boat dock at Atwood Lake in Tuscarawas County, Ohio, where a woman allegedly drowned her 4-year-old son after causing her husband’s death, cops say (WKYC/YouTube). Background: Ruth Miller in court for her Monday bond hearing in Ohio (WKYC/YouTube).
An Ohio mother accused of commanding her husband and 4-year-old son to “jump” in a lake as part of an alleged “spiritual delusion,” resulting in both of their drowning deaths, was denied bond at a hearing on Monday, after police officials provided more details about how it all allegedly went down.
“God spoke to her and told her to throw Vincen into the lake and she did,” said Detective Adam Fisher, with the Tuscarawas County Sheriff’s Office, about Ruth Miller’s alleged drowning of her 4-year-old son Vincen Miller at Atwood Lake in east-central Ohio.
Miller is also accused of killing her husband, Marcus Miller, by ordering him in the water as well. Her bond hearing was streamed by NBC affiliate WKYC.
“She described watching Vincen go under the water and pop back up,” Fisher said. “At that moment, God spoke to her, questioning why she was still looking for Vincen after she had given him to God.”
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Ruth Miller — a 40-year-old Millersburg resident who is reportedly a member of an Amish church — is accused of killing her husband and son “because God was speaking to them” and wanted the pair to “prove their worthiness,” cops say. She was previously being held at a secure hospital for a mental health evaluation before being booked into the Tuscarawas County Jail earlier this month and charged with two counts of aggravated murder, two counts of domestic violence and one count of endangering children. Miller was at the mental health facility from Aug. 23 to Sept. 1.
“[Miller] was supposedly hearing voices that she believed were God,” Tuscarawas County Sheriff Orvis Campbell said at a press conference after Miller’s arrest.
“That led her and her husband to go out and jump in the lake first,” Campbell said. Police officials have also accused Miller, who has allegedly confessed, of crashing a golf cart into the water with her three other children inside.
At Monday’s hearing, Fisher and others described how witnesses saw the golf cart crash and Miller praying on the dock.
“It was very intentional,” Fisher alleged. “They witnessed her drive through the lighthouse and the marina and down through the grass and over the wall into the water.”
The detective laid out the alleged events leading up to the double murder, including how their family was having “fun” together earlier in the day.
“The family had gone on the pontoon boat,” Fisher explained. “She said they had a great time. They were cruising around the upper end … the upper end of the lake, and the kids were fishing. She said it got dark, but that she and Marcus didn’t want to end the fishing trip early or the fun that the kids were having.”
The couple didn’t get back to their camper until about 10 p.m. that evening before going to bed. At about midnight, Miller said that “she and Marcus were awoken by God,” according to Fisher. “They began to pray and read the Bible and the two made the decision that they were going to go back to the boat,” the detective said.
Ruth said that “she and Marcus were both nervous about getting in the water initially,” per Fisher, but they allegedly got in anyway. “They were to float on their backs at one point and Marcus began to sink during this,” Fisher alleged. “So they swam back to the dock.”
Marcus Miller, according to Ruth, was supposed to be able to pull her from the water onto the dock, but after three failed attempts, she had to swim to the back of the boat and climb out using its ladder.
“She said that Marcus … started to sink because of his lack of faith and that he was not able to pull her out of the water because he would not ask God for any strength to do that,” Fisher said.
Once they were both out of the water, Miller began asking her husband “just to suffocate her,” per Fisher.
“[Miller] said that Marcus would not suffocate her and made some suggestion that he had spoke of suffocating her in the past,” the detective told the court. “Presumably from some kind of feuds that they may have had in their relationship.”
Ruth allegedly told police that they went back to their camper for awhile before eventually returning to the lake at around 5:30 a.m. to keep testing themselves.
According to Miller, she commanded Marcus Miller to get back into the lake — where he ultimately drowned — as part of another “test” from God, according to cops. Miller said she believed he had failed the initial tests “because he didn’t have enough faith,” per police. She then allegedly demanded that Vincen go in afterward as punishment.
“She believed that she and her husband had to pass these tests to show their faith, and when they didn’t, then Vincen became the price to pay for that,” Campbell told reporters after Miller’s arrest. “What she says is that she and her husband went to this dock, and they jumped in the water because God was speaking to them and telling them to do things, things to prove their worthiness to God, to show their faith is complete. And they didn’t do very well in those.”
Police say some of the tasks Marcus Miller was given were “bizarre,” with many of them being “swimming exercises.” Ruth Miller allegedly told investigators that God asked her at one point to be “swallowed by a fish.” Marcus Miller’s final alleged test, according to Ruth Miller, was swimming to a nearby sandbar.
Marcus Miller was last seen at the Atwood Lake dock at around 6:30 a.m., according to witnesses. His wife was allegedly spotted at around 8 a.m. driving “very dangerously” with Vincen in the area of the dock before he drowned.
“She states that she went to the dock and that she threw the 4-year-old in because that’s what she needed to do as an offering to God,” Campbell told reporters. Ruth Miller was then allegedly seen picking up her 15-year-old daughter and twin 18-year-old sons, whom she also allegedly made perform religious tasks.
The children told cops that Miller allegedly made them “all lay down on the dock with their hands in the water to pray for their little brother and father because they were gone and had gone to heaven.” She allegedly crashed the golf cart with them inside shortly after, Campbell said.
“[Miller] heard the voice again telling her to drive into the lake,” Campbell told reporters.
After the crash, a witness offered help, but Miller allegedly refused.
“She suggested … not to help her, to just pray,” Campbell said.
Police have described the Millers as members of the Old Order Amish Church and living in Holmes County. They were reportedly visiting Atwood Lake as part of a weekend trip, which Campbell says began like any vacation.
“I do not think it was a plan,” the sheriff concluded. “I believe that based off detailed conversations with the family, that they were just going to the lake.”
A Tuscarawas County judge denied Miller’s bond on Monday after deeming her a “substantial risk of serious physical harm to any other person or community.” She has pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity.
