Main image: Kevin Franke speaks to the Santa Clara-Ivins Police in August 2023 (Washington County). Inset left: Ruby Franke (YouTube).
Parenting influencer Ruby Franke will serve up to three decades in prison for abusing her children in a “concentration camp setting” — after the abusive underpinnings of her highly-cultivated Mormon mommy vlogger persona from the once popular “8 Passengers” channel on YouTube finally caught up with her.
In August 2024, Franke’s emaciated and wounded 12-year-old son — referred to as “E” for privacy reasons — escaped from a residence where he had been starved and bound with duct tape. The youngest Franke, a 10-year-old girl — referred to as “R” — was found in a similar condition after the boy found help and police searched the house.
In newly-released police audio and video files, Kevin Franke — Ruby Franke’s husband — reveals some shocking hindsight warning signs and cracks in the facade.
Claims to prophecy
“Have you found the pen papers?” Kevin Franke asked Washington County investigators in a follow-up interview after he had already been ruled out as a suspect. “Ruby wrote detailed notes of everything.”
The ancillary interview was being conducted, police said, to ferret out information about the “dynamic” between Ruby and co-defendant Jodi Hildebrandt, who is serving the same sentence after both women pleaded guilty to four counts of second-degree felony child abuse in December 2023. They were each originally charged with six counts.
Hildebrandt is a wellness warrior and the founder of ConneXions Classroom, a human potential movement-like self-help group which Ruby Franke increasingly latched onto as both the image and reality of the happy Franke family dissolved before the internet’s eyes.
In the interview, police express some confusion about the leather-bound book they are being advised to find and consult — saying they do have Ruby Franke’s journal, which covers the relevant dates.
“These things are going to be so — she wouldn’t write — the stuff she wrote in the pen papers she would not write in her journal,” Kevin Franke says. “The stuff she wrote in the pen papers was not intended to be read by anybody until God would decree them to be written in Scripture for the whole world to read.”
The term “pen papers” was how Ruby Franke referred to the writings, Kevin Franke said, which spanned “hundreds of pages” in a notebook roughly three inches thick. The papers described visions, trances and other Hildebrandt-inspired supernatural phenomena.
“It’s something Jodi would not want found,” Kevin Franke told police in the interview. “But she wouldn’t want to destroy it.”
A me-first cult
In the interview, Kevin Franke says Hildebrandt described the ConneXions governing ethos as: “If you want to help your child, you have to help yourself first, and then you’ll know how to help your child.”
In the summer or fall of 2019, Kevin Franke was finally convinced to attend his first conference put on by Hildebrandt’s group.
He did not like what he found.
“This is absolute craziness,” Kevin Franke recalled of his first ConneXions impression. “This is a bunch of man-hating women that are just looking for excuses to tear down their husbands.”
Eventually, after much prodding from friends, Kevin Franke begrudgingly joined a “men’s group” run by Hildebrandt in January 2020 — agreeing to an initial commitment of three months. Soon enough, he realized he was in an addiction recovery group.
“I don’t belong here,” he thought — but said he was pushed by his friends to remain involved, so he continued on.
“I went through my obligatory three months and I was ready to leave,” Kevin Franke told Washington County investigators. “And then I got challenged to sit down and have a ‘vulnerable conversation’ with my wife and ask her how my ‘lustful choices’ have affected her. And, you know to me, that was, like, a loaded question. I thought, you know, I still didn’t see what I had done — or anything that would constitute any form of, like, you know, abuse or anything like that.”
Still, he took up the challenge. For two hours, Ruby Franke emotionally shared her thoughts about their marriage. Issues that came up during this talk were Kevin Franke’s requests for sex from his wife and for her to wear lingerie. Kevin Franke said his wife’s words “touched” him, so he stuck with the ConneXions men’s group and attended weekly meetings.
Fault lines
At first, their marriage seemed to be getting “better and stronger,” Kevin Franke said. But then their entire life “got weird.”
In May 2020, Ruby Franke posted YouTube videos about their eldest son Chad sleeping on a bean bag which “blew up in her face,” Kevin Franke said. Hundreds of thousands of TikTok users began criticizing her parenting methods and their hit YouTube channel was “burned down.” The family “lost 90%” of their income overnight, Kevin Franke added.
At this time, Ruby Franke was “really distraught” and needed someone to “validate her,” which she found in Hildebrandt, Kevin Franke said.
“All the stuff she did with Chad was because of Jodi,” Kevin Franke told the police. “So it makes sense she would go to Jodi for emotional support when she felt like her world was burning down.”
Deeper in
So, the couple went to more and more ConneXions conferences and meetings together. Kevin Franke said he was initially under the impression they would just be attending the events but was later encouraged by Ruby Franke to speak in front of everyone about his Damascene conversion from a naysayer — recalling his “man-hating” thoughts — into someone who genuinely found value in the group.
Things came to a head in March 2021 after a conference in St. George, Utah. Kevin Franke told police that during an “inner circle” dinner for people “being trained” as “mental fitness coaches and such,” Hildebrandt offered a shocking revelation to a group of women.
“She believed she was being tormented and haunted by shadow figures every night,” Kevin Franke said. “And that was spooky.”
Hildebrandt then went off with another couple for six weeks. Accounts dramatically differ as to what happened in that house.
“They tried to introduce her to a new cult lady,” Kevin Franke said. “They wanted to merge their cults into one.”
Hildebrandt’s relationship with that couple, however, had “always” made Ruby Franke jealous, he said.
“This goes back to her childhood,” Kevin told investigators. “She wanted to be the best friend. She wanted to be the most-liked. She wanted to be the one that everybody knew. And, so it hurt her that it felt like she was being excluded.”
Satan’s bride
Hildebrandt returned from the other couples’ house “a hot mess,” Kevin Franke said and reached out to Ruby Franke for help.
The Frankes began spending significant amounts of time with Hildebrandt in her house beginning in May 2021. Ruby Franke pushed to intervene and help Hildebrandt, Kevin Franke said, while he suggested sending her to church figures. By August 2021, Hildebrandt’s bishop had had enough of “fighting evil spirits” and “casting demons out.”
Then came the suggestion for the Frankes to take Hildebrandt in at their own house. At first, Kevin Franke was adamantly opposed.
“I was beaten over the head with it,” Kevin told police. “Like: ‘That’s really insensitive … and she has needs.””
So, he relented.
Things quickly got out of hand, Kevin Franke said. Hildebrandt more and more frequently started going into trances and having visions. Over time, this led to Ruby Franke and Hildebrandt sleeping in the same bed together.
Asked to describe the visions, Kevin Franke recalled a few.
In one instance, Jesus Christ gave Hildebrandt a lesson on how to walk on the water. In another, she had a massive, pet lion named Charles that she could ride while walking with “heavenly father and heavenly mother” which helped her learn about herself.
Many of the visions were satanic, Kevin Franke told police.
“The voices would say: ‘She’s ours. We’re not letting go. She is Satan’s bride. She’s mine. I am going to marry her,’” Kevin Franke said.
Final straws
Around October 2021, Kevin Franke — who was responsible for keeping the children in the basement during spiritual meetings at the house — upset Hildebrandt because Chad and his friends were in the backyard during a so-called “intervention” being held by the women’s group.
The Frankes first separated soon thereafter — starting with an in-home separation.
Kevin Franke told police he was allowed to leave the house whenever he wanted, but could not come back without permission. He also said he wasn’t allowed in the kitchen to eat without permission — or to speak to his wife without permission. The entire second story of the house was cordoned off for Hildebrandt, Kevin Franke said, and off-limits to him.
The first separation ended around the holidays in 2021, Kevin Franke said. Hildebrandt moved back to her own home in January 2022. By this time, however, Ruby Franke was preparing to legally give “8 Passengers” over to Hildebrandt in exchange for becoming a ConneXions employee. The family’s manager advised against the arrangement and was fired.
Kevin Franke said he was frustrated, too — warning his wife against giving away her multimillion dollar brand. Ruby Franke replied that money did not matter, he said, because they were doing God’s work.
In the summer of 2022, Ruby Franke, Hildebrandt, and another woman went on a trip to Arizona to buy prescription drugs, Kevin Franke said. When they returned in July 2022, Ruby Franke asked Kevin Franke to leave.
That was the last time he saw his kids.
Then, the torture began at Hildebrandt’s home in Ivins, Utah.
Under suspicion
In body-worn camera footage from August 2023 released by the Santa Clara-Ivins Police, the visibly distraught father reacts with horror as the details of the abuse is described in detail. At this time, he was still considered a suspect and is asked what he knows.
“I haven’t seen them for over a year,” Kevin Franke says.
He filed for divorce last November and is currently seeking custody of his four youngest children.
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