A Utah mother who became a YouTube influencer thanks to her tough parenting advice has been sentenced to at least four years in prison for child sexual abuse.
Ruby Franke, 42, tearfully apologized in court when she learned her fate. She had previously pleaded guilty to starving and abusing her children.
She appeared in court along with her former business partner Jodi Hildebrandt, 54, who received the same sentence.
The judge sentenced her to four prison terms each ranging from her one year to her fifteen years.
The sentences are consecutive and are the maximum for each charge under Utah law. How much time each will ultimately serve will be determined by the state parole board.
Franke has 30 days to appeal this decision.
Utah prosecutor Eric Clark said in court that two of Franke’s children then ages 9 and 11, were living in “concentration camp-like conditions” and were a serious threat to the community.
He said it was a threat.”The children were regularly denied food, water, a bed to sleep in, and virtually any form of entertainment,” Clark said.
After the verdict, Franke burst into tears in the courtroom. She apologized to her children, saying,
I was so disoriented that I believed dark was light and right was wrong.”
“I was led to believe that this world was an evil place, filled with cops who control, hospitals that injure, government agencies that brainwash, church leaders who lie and lust, husbands who refuse to protect and children who need abuse,” she said.
The two women were arrested in August 2023 after Franke’s malnourished 12-year-old son crawled out the window of Hildebrandt’s home in Ivins, Utah.
Police said the boy then ran to a neighbour’s house and asked for food and water. Police records say the man was tied up with rope and suffered cuts.
The arrest ended a long and controversial career on YouTube. Franke has amassed more than 2 million subscribers on Channel 8 Passengers, which he launched in 2015.
It was a boom time for parenting video bloggers, and she told local news outlets that filming with her family helped her “live in the moment.”Their videos showed typical suburban Mormon families homeschooling, cooking, eating, and chatting together.
But in 2020, fans became suspicious after one of her sons said he was forced to sleep on a bean bag for seven months.
YouTube viewers combed through Franke’s archives and found other disturbing and disturbing stories Franke used, including withholding food, threatening to decapitate stuffed animals, and “cancelling” Christmas as punishment.