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Ruby Franke case: New bodycam footage reveals YouTuber's 'petrified' daughter refusing to leave closet for 4 hours before rescue
New details have been released in the child abuse case against former family vlogger Ruby Franke.
Trigger Warning: The following article contains references to child abuse.
Ruby Franke, a disgraced Utah momfluencer, and Jodi Hildebrandt, her business partner, were both sentenced to up to 30 years in prison in February on four counts of child abuse. The 12-year-old Franke, who was famished and bruised, had shown up at a neighbor's door pleading for food and water, and this led to a troubling judicial drama that ended with the sentencing last summer.
New bodycam footage shows Ruby's daughter petrified in a closet
According to recently made public bodycam footage, Ruby Franke's kid was "petrified" and spent four hours in a closet after police discovered her during a search of Jodi Hildebrandt's Ivins, Utah, house. A trove of evidence in the Franke case was made public by the Washington County Attorney's Office, including footage showing officers discovering her 9-year-old daughter—who is identified by the initial "E"—sitting still and by herself in a dark closet.
After Franke's 12-year-old son, known as "R.F." in court records, fled the house on August 30 and went to a neighbor, who then called for assistance, police were sent to the residence. In one video, two police officers are examining several rooms in the house when they discover E sitting still in a large, empty closet, cross-legged.
While the other officer asks the girl, who is extremely thin and wearing enormous clothing, if she is okay, the first officer introduces himself as a police officer. The officers keep attempting to talk her out of the closet, but she doesn't answer.
The county attorney’s office said in a statement regarding the evidence release, "The officers responded to Ms. Hildebrandt’s home, placed her under arrest, and conducted a search of her sizable property where they found Ms. Franke’s 9-year-old daughter, petrified and hiding in a closet."
Timestamped footage from the numerous publicly available recordings indicates that the girl spent almost four hours sitting in the closet with little movement and minimal speech. A number of emergency personnel, such as police officers and EMTs, make an effort to talk to the girl to reassure her that if she chooses to leave the room, she will be in good care.
The girl is given a drink and a personal pizza after spending almost two hours in the room. In an apparent effort to help her feel more at ease, the cops also play music, including "Payphone" by Maroon 5.
The two youngest children of the former were held in a "work-camp-like setting," according to the prosecution. From what the attorney's office could tell, the two were frequently refused food, water, mattresses, and nearly any kind of entertainment. In addition to being chained following an earlier escape attempt, Franke's kid was also beaten. Asserting that the minors were instructed to “repent for imagined sins,'" the prosecution linked the abuse to "religious fundamentalism."
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