Officials this week released selected daily entries from YouTuber and convicted child abuser Ruby Franke that reveal the extent of her abuse of her own children.
The vloger was recently sentenced together with her former business partner Jodi Hildebrandt to several years in prison after four convictions for aggravated child abuse.
Before that, Franke gave first-hand accounts of several instances of harming her children, according to a largely redacted personal diary shared by the Washington County District Attorney’s Office.
Throughout the magazine, Franke focused mostly on two of her six children, redacted only to the letters “E” and “R.”
Violent family vlogger Ruby Franke seemed to be ‘in a trance’ when questioned by police: New 20/20 Episode
Ruby Franke appears in court for a hearing on December 18, 2023.
Ron Chaffin/St. George News via AP
In an early diary entry dated July 11, 2023, Franke recalled a “big day for evil” when she wrote that her daughter was “manipulating me”. In the same post, Franke later described a moment with her son “R,” where she told him to “stand in the sun with your sun hat on.” After claiming he was “defiant” and refusing to do so, Franke wrote that her son was a “demon that stays in the shade,” so she pushed him into the sun and later harmed him with a cactus.
“I’m back with a cactus stake. When I stab his back to come out into the sun, [R] he doesn’t even flinch,” Franke wrote. “I poke him in the neck. He is in a trance and seems to feel nothing. Jodi taps his cheeks to wake him up.”
The mother then asked her son if he knew his family and “savior” loved him, before dousing him with water after he continued to stay in the shade. “I take the water for wiping and go [R],” she wrote. “I’m showing [R] water. Then I pour water [R]. It’s hot outside. ‘It feels good, doesn’t it?’ That.”
Franke wrote that same day about pushing her son in the pool. She then elaborately put “her hands in his face” and asked him if he had ever “heard someone talk underwater.”
“I know [R] is there somewhere. I know deep down beneath all this rage that you can hear me,” she wrote. “It may sound like I’m underwater with you, but hear me, ‘I love you.’ ”
Ruby Franke’s former parenting YouTuber and ex-business partner sentenced to prison for child abuse
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YouTuber Ruby Franke.
mame_istine/Instagram
Among many other unredacted pieces of information, Franke wrote that her daughter was “manipulative” and was trying to break her “two-day fast.”
A press release from the attorney general’s office after Franka’s arrest in 2023 accused her of “inflicting serious bodily harm on the victims in three different ways: (1) by a combination of multiple physical injuries or torture, (2) by life-threatening starvation or malnutrition, and (3 ) inflicting serious emotional injuries.”
Franke wrote that her daughter “became unglued and started screaming” after Franke insisted she would not be allowed to eat for another day. “Whole day, [E] makes rhymes about ‘Mama starves me and calls it fasting’. ‘My mom won’t lift two fingers and bring me food because all she does is lie on the bed and eat cookies.’ ‘My mom says she’s the most loving mom in the world — blah blah blah.’ ”
After writing about a physical “intervention” for her daughter, Franke wrote that she cut her daughter’s hair and doused her with “dog wash” water.
“I cut more [E’s] the head. We doused her with water in the dog wash. [E] said she wanted to run away. Jodi said [E] she has no idea what awaits her.”
The rest of the magazine offers a disturbing look at Franke accusing her children of “stealing water”, threatening to “comb” her daughter’s hair and more.
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The public release of the redacted journals comes weeks after the sentencing of Franke, in which she received four separate prison terms ranging from one to 15 years, TODAY, KSL 5 and KUTV reported.
Utah’s Deseret News also reported at the time that the Utah Board of Pardons and Paroles would decide the length of each sentence, while Business Insider noted that she would serve no more than 30 years due to Utah’s consecutive sentencing laws.
Franke’s former business partner and therapist Hildebrandt — who she claimed orchestrated the abuse — also received the same sentence. In December, they both signed a plea agreement to four second-degree felonies, with both counts of aggravated child abuse dismissed.
Winward Law, the firm representing Franke, shared in a previous statement to CBS News after their client’s plea that she was led to believe that Hildebrandt “had the insight to offer a path to continuous improvement.”
Franke was finally arrested on Aug. 30 after her 12-year-old son, Russell, ran away from the home she and Hildebrandt shared and asked a neighbor to call the police. In a 10-page plea agreement, she admitted to abusing her two youngest children.
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Source: HIS Education