Human remains have been recovered from the property of Lori Vallow’s husband Chad Daybell, police confirmed after he was taken into custody while they raided his home for the second time in a seven-month hunt for the ‘cult mom’s missing kids.
Rexburg Assistant Police Chief Gary Hagen announced the heartbreaking discovery at a brief press conference near the property in Salem, Idaho, on Tuesday afternoon.
Hagen said it was too soon to say whether the remains belonged to Lori’s missing children, Joshua ‘JJ’ Vallow and Tylee Ryan, who were last seen in September.
Authorities had arrived at the home hours earlier to execute a search warrant. Aerial footage from the East Idaho News showed investigators digging up soil around what appeared to be a well in the back yard.
At about 11.30am Rexburg officers were seen handcuffing Chad and placing him in a police vehicle after stopping him on the road near his home.
Hagen said Chad had been taken in for questioning but was not officially arrested or facing charges.
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Human remains have been recovered from the property of Lori Vallow’s husband Chad Daybell, police confirmed after he was taken into custody on Tuesday while they raided his home for the second time in a seven-month hunt for the ‘cult’ mom’s missing kids
Police said Chad has not yet been officially arrested or charged. Lori is already currently behind bars on charges of neglect and desertion in the case
Aerial footage from the East Idaho News showed officers digging up soil around what appears to be a well in the backyard
Police said it was too soon to say whether the remains belonged to Lori’s missing children, Joshua ‘JJ’ Vallow and Tylee Ryan, who were last seen in September
Lori has spent the past four months behind bars on charges of abandonment and desertion in connection with the children’s disappearance.
She and Chad – the prolific Doomsday author, alleged cut leader and former grave digger whom she married less than two months after her kids vanished – have repeatedly refused to say where the children are but insisted that they were safe.
The last known sighting of 17-year-old Tylee was on September 8, when she visited Yellowstone National Park with her family. JJ, who would have turned eight last month, was last seen two weeks later on September 23.
While some relatives believed that Lori would never hurt her kids, others feared that they could be dead.
Fremont County Sheriff’s deputies, Rexburg Police officers and FBI agents arrived at Chad’s home on 200 block of 1900 East at about 7am Tuesday with a search warrant.
Video showed them using a backhoe to dig up dirt near a barn in the yard.
FBI spokeswoman Sandra Barker confirmed that the agency’s Evidence Response Team is assisting local authorities with the execution of the warrant.
Police told media outlets on the scene that they planned to be there for several hours or days.
This is the second major raid performed at the Daybell home since police began searching for the children in late November.
During the previous raid on January 3, authorities removed 43 items from the home and combed over several sections of the yard with metal detectors and rakes.
Lori and Chad are also being investigated for conspiracy, attempted murder and murder in the death of Chad’s first wife Tammy Daybell, who mysteriously died at the Salem home in October.
Rexburg Assistant Police Chief Gary Hagen said Chad (above in gray) had been taken in for questioning but did not disclose whether he is facing any charges
Law enforcement vehicles are seen lined up on the street outside Chad’s property on Tuesday. The structure on the left appears to be a barn, while the home is seen on the right
Video showed investigators using a backhoe to dig up a patch of grass in the yard
Chad’s home in Salem is seen in January, when police executed an earlier search warrant
FBI agents removed 43 items from Chad’s home during their initial raid in January. Officers were also seen combing sections of the yard with rakes and metal detectors
Chad married Lori less than two months after her children vanished. The couple are seen during their wedding on the beach in Kauai
Tylee was last seen on September 8 when she visited Yellowstone National Park with her family (pictured). JJ was last seen two weeks later on September 23
Authorities began searching for the children in late November after performing a welfare check ordered by concerned relatives who said they hadn’t spoken to seven-year-old JJ, who is autistic, in months.
When officers first went to Lori’s home in Idaho on November 26, she told them that JJ was visiting relatives in Arizona – which investigators say was a lie.
Chad Daybell worked as a grave digger in college and wrote an entire book about the ‘rewarding’ experience
Years before he was linked to the disappearance of Lori Vallow’s missing children, Chad Daybell worked as a ‘cemetery sexton’ – or grave digger – while studying at Brigham Young University in Utah in the mid-1990s.
Chad described the job in an interview with the Deseret News in 2001.
‘Taking care of the graves is rewarding, as well as helping widows and grieving family members deal with the trauma,’ he said.
‘Sad times are always when you have to bury babies. That’s always a poignant moment.’
Chad published an entire nonfiction book about his experiences that same year, entitled: One Foot in the Grave: Secrets of a Cemetery Sexton.
He left that job soon after the book was finished and went on to publish more than 25 other titles, many of them about near-death experiences and the end of the world.
Chad briefly reprised his sexton role years later in 2008 by working part time at a cemetery in Springville.
Officers returned the following day and found that Lori and the man she married weeks earlier, Chad Daybell, had fled from the home.
Authorities say the couple have repeatedly lied about where JJ and Tylee are and refused to cooperate with the investigation.
Lori and Chad were named persons of interest in the children’s disappearance after investigators said they believe the mother knew where her children were or what happened to them.
The case captured nationwide attention with the revelations that police are also investigating three mysterious deaths linked to Lori and Chad, as well as family members’ claims that the couple are members of a dangerous doomsday cult.
The first death is that of Lori’s estranged husband Charles Vallow, who was shot dead by her brother Alex Cox in Arizona on July 10.
Charles and Lori had gotten into an argument when the father came to pick up JJ at the mother’s home in Chandler.
Lori’s brother intervened and fatally shot Charles.
Police initially determined that he acted in self defense – but the case was reopened amid the multi-state search for JJ and Tylee, who had moved to Idaho, where Chad lived, with their mother in August.
The second mysterious death was Tammy Daybell, who was found dead at the home she shared with Chad on October 19.
An obituary stated that Tammy passed away in her sleep and her cause of death was ruled as natural after Chad reportedly declined an autopsy.
Investigators reopened the case after learning that JJ and Tylee were missing, as their mother had married Chad just two weeks after Tammy died. They believe the two cases could be linked.
Tammy’s body was exhumed on December 11 and the autopsy results have not yet been released.
On December 12, Lori’s brother, Alex Cox, was found dead in Gilbert, Arizona.
An autopsy determined that the 51-year-old’s died of natural causes but noted that he had the overdose drug Narcan in his system at the time.
Police tracked Lori and Chad down in Princeville, Hawaii, in late January and served the mother with a court order requiring her to physically produce the children to authorities in Idaho by January 30.
Lori failed to meet the deadline, prompting her arrest and extradition to Idaho, where she is currently being held at Madison County Jail in lieu of $1million bond.
Chad’s wife Tammy Daybell (pictured together) was found dead under suspicious circumstances at their home in Idaho in October
Lori’s fourth husband Charles Vallow (pictured together) was shot dead by her brother, Alex Cox, in July 2019
Lori’s brother Alex Cox died under mysterious circumstances on December 12
Last month Lori’s former best friend Melanie Gibb made the dire prediction that the children are dead during an exclusive interview with East Idaho News.
‘They’re not on this planet anymore,’ Gibb said. ‘I don’t think they are. That’s my personal opinion.’
She went on to reveal her suspicions that Alex Cox, Lori’s brother, may have done something to the children for Lori or for a ‘higher reason’ related to the family’s extreme religious belief that the end of the world is approaching.
‘If he really truly believed these things, maybe he felt he was doing something good for not only them, but God,’ she said.
Gibb, who has known the Vallow family for years, offered a brief explanation for why she doesn’t think it’s possible that the children are alive.
‘Tylee is a very strong-willed individual, and she’s capable of making a phone call if she needs to call, and she hasn’t reached out to anybody and let anybody know she’s alive,’ she said. ‘I can’t imagine she would be quiet the whole time.’
Last month Lori’s former best friend Melanie Gibb (pictured) made the dire prediction that the children are no longer alive during an interview with East Idaho News
Addressing the possibility that Tylee is hiding out with JJ, Gibb noted that it would be difficult for the teen to take care of the boy alone because he’s autistic.
‘JJ’s a handful. He wouldn’t have his medication with him, so how could she take care of him?’ Gibb said. ‘It doesn’t add up.’
She also questioned the fact that Lori and her new husband Chad Daybell fled Idaho for Hawaii soon after police discovered the children were missing.
‘If they’re in a safe place, why is [Lori] in Hawaii having a great time on her honeymoon when her children are hiding for safety?’ she asked.
‘That doesn’t even make sense. I think most people understand that.’
Gibb also described how Lori and Chad allegedly asked her to lie to police and say she was with JJ when the kids were first reported missing.
She refused to comply with their requests and has been cooperating with investigators from the start, she said.
Gibb went into great detail about Chad and Lori’s extreme religious beliefs, which centered around the idea that the end of the world is coming this summer.
She recounted how Lori told her she believed JJ was a zombie just days before the boy disappeared, and how Chad had convinced her that the kids were ‘dark’ spirits.
Several relatives of Lori, including her mother Janis Cox, sister Summer Shiflet and niece Melani Pawlowski have defended her in recent weeks.
Gibb met Lori (above together) in October 2018 through the Church of Latter-day Saints. She last spoke to Lori back in November, days after the children were reported missing
Janice Cox and Shiflet broke their silence for the first time in an interview with CBS News aired on May 16.
The women failed to explain why Lori has so far refused to cooperate with investigators trying to find out what happened to her children.
When asked about the matter, they replied in unison: ‘Well, that’s a great question,’ laughing towards one another as they spoke.
However, they insisted that Lori would never hurt either of her kids.
‘She’s invested her whole life in those children,’ Janice Cox said. ‘So we know there’s another whole side to this. We don’t know what it is. But we know her.’
When asked why, as a ‘loving grandmother’ and ‘loving aunt’, they hadn’t approached Lori to reveal to them where the children are, Shiflet replied: ‘She can’t tell us.
‘She’s in jail. She’s not — everything’s recorded. So she’s not gonna tell us, she can’t discuss anything about the case.’
Janice Cox added: ‘I’m positive beyond any doubt that they hasn’t harmed those kids.’
Reporter Jonathan Vigliotti pressed by asking: ‘Do you think they’re in a bunker somewhere?’
‘I think that’s possible,’ the mother said, but she did not elaborate on where she believed the children were.
Lori Vallow’s mother Janice Cox and sister Summer Shiflet broke their silence for the first time to defend her in an interview with CBS News aired on May 16. The women failed to explain why Lori has refused to cooperate with investigators trying to find out what happened to her kids