Charles Vallow’s sister, Kay Woodcock, is on the witness stand. She was one of the first people to flag that Lori’s kids, JJ and Tylee, were missing in late 2019.
PHOENIX — Day four of testimony in Lori Vallow Daybell’s first murder conspiracy trial in Arizona is set to start Thursday morning.
She’s accused of conspiring with her brother to kill her former husband, Charles Vallow. She pleaded not guilty and is representing herself at trial.
Day three of testimony had some bombshell witnesses, with references to dark spirits and accounts of Vallow Daybell saying she tried drugging her former husband with her child’s medicine. There was also a contentious cross-examination between Vallow Daybell and a woman who went on a date with Charles Vallow the night before he was killed.
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4:14 PM – Court is in recess for the day and week. The trial will resume Monday morning at 10 a.m. local time.
4:10 PM – Vallow Daybell asks if Kay was aware of the events on the morning of July 11, 2019, the day Charles died.
“‘Cause you didn’t tell me,” she added
Vallow Daybell then asks the same question she’s asked of two other witnesses today: whether Kay saw her conspire with Alex to kill Charles.
Kay said she hadn’t, but she saw a lot of evidence that showed they did.
Lori ends her questioning of Kay and the state does a brief redirect.
4:08 PM – Lori Vallow Daybell gets up to cross examine Kay Woodcock. She asks whether Kay knew about Charles and Tylee’s relationship. Kay said she thought it was contentious and seemed like there was drama going on in Tylee’s life.
4:05 PM – Woodcock shares that Charles switched his life insurance to her and that she was contacted by the insurance company after he died. She said Lori texted her confronting her about the switch.
4:02 PM – Kay Woodcock says she had to get JJ because he was “not safe with her,” referring to Lori. The prosecutor stops her from saying anything further.
3:59 PM – Woodcock gets emotional talking about how she found out about Charles’s death. She said she was at a nail salon in her home state and one of Charles’ adult sons called her. She had to tell her other siblings and she said that when she tried to reach Lori, she was too busy.
3:36 PM – Kay said Charles told her that Lori didn’t want him, Tylee or JJ anymore. This is during a time when Kay said Lori disappeared for nearly 60 days after some struggles in early 2019.
3:34 PM – The prosecutor asks Kay if she believed Charles was ever concerned for his safety.
“Charles was absolutely concerned for his safety,” she testified.
She goes on to describe challenges in Lori and Charles’s relationship in early 2019.
3 PM – Kay Woodcock starts by talking about their family dynamics growing up and eventually talks about Charles’s relationship with Lori and her own relationship with Lori.
She said Lori was outgoing and that she loved her.
3:17 PM – Charles Vallow’s sister, Kay Woodcock, is on the stand. She is also JJ Vallow’s biological grandmother. She testified in Lori Vallow’s murder case in Idaho and was one of the first people to flag that JJ and Tylee were missing in late 2019.
2:57 PM – Court is in afternoon recess.
2:36 PM – Francisco is talking about processes for things like collecting DNA evidence and fingerprints.
Later, the prosecutor brought her the bat that Lori Vallow Daybell said Charles Vallow was using the morning he was shot.
Francisco said they found two latent prints on the bat but could not match them to anybody. She was asked if she could exclude Charles Vallow. Francisco said the results were inconclusive, meaning she could not match to Charles Vallow or exclude him.
Vallow Daybell asks a few questions on cross-examination, mostly asking whether DNA collected had been tested. Francisco said that collected DNA goes to the state lab.
2:26 PM – The state’s next witness is Marrisa Francisco, a forensic analyst with the City of Chandler.
2:04 PM – The prosecution’s next witness is William McDonald, a now-retired officer with Chandler PD. It sounds like his specialty is data extractions from cell phones.
His testimony is brief, walking the court through the process of extracting data from cell phones.
Vallow Daybell doesn’t have any cross-examination, but the jury has a question.
The jury asked if it’s possible to retrieve browser data once it’s been deleted.
McDonald said it is possible. If something was deleted more recently, like within a year, it can possibly be retrieved. It’s harder to retrieve something deleted further back.
1:57 PM – Vallow Daybell’s final question is the same she gave her brother: whether Sharp saw or heard her personally conspire with her brother to kill her husband Sharp said she didn’t.
The prosecutor goes up on redirect and asks whether Sharp takes her oath seriously. Sharp said she did. She also testified that she didn’t make it up that Lori said her husband was possessed.
1:49 PM – Vallow Daybell tells the judge she can ask questions about people in the Bible being translated because she’s being accused of being “outside the scope of the LDS” faith when she very much was.
1:37 PM – Lori Vallow Daybell starts to cross-examine sharp. She asks if her testimony is accountable to God. The prosecution objects.
Vallow Daybell repeatedly asks Sharp when the word “zombies” came out of her mouth and if she could say the sentence verbatim. A lot of objections from the prosecution, the judge overrules some.
1:30 PM – Court is back from recess. Sarena Sharp is still on the stand. She testified that she saw Lori Vallow Daybell after Charles Vallow died and said she was not mourning.
12:10 PM – Court is in recess for lunch and will resume at 1:30 PM local time.
12:06 PM – Sharp is asked if Lori used the term “zombie.” Sharp said yes, it stood out to her. She said Lori correlated the term “zombie” to an evil spirit inside of someone, like her husband.
Sharp said she was asked to be part of a group to cast the evil spirit out of Lori’s husband during a March 2019 girls weekend.
12:03 PM – Sharp said it was unusual that Lori talked about casting evil spirits out of her husband. She said Lori said her husband was possessed by an evil spirit. She named the evil spirit “Ned.”
11:44 AM – The state calls Sarena Sharp as their next witness. Sharp said she met Lori through a Preparing A People Conference, a group focused on the second coming of the Lord.
11:46 AM – Vallow Daybell asks if he saw with his own eyes or heard with his own ears whether she and their brother Alex Cox conspired to kill Charles. He said no. She ends her cross-examination.
On re-direct, the state asks him about this. He said there was “no doubt” in his mind that Alex and Lori killed Charles.
11:44 AM – Vallow Daybell asks her brother about their communication over the years. They establish they weren’t that close over the past 20 years or so.
11:31 AM – The state wraps and Lori starts to cross-examine her brother. She calls him “Mr. Cox.”
11:30 AM – Adam Cox said this created a divide in his family. He continued to stick up for Charles.
11:23 AM – Adam Cox said neither Lori nor Alex nor anyone in his family told him that Charles was killed on July 11. He said he learned two days later after a friend googled it.
“Probably one of the worst feelings I’ve ever felt in my life,” Adam Cox testified.
10:56 AM – Adam Cox said Charles talked to him about having an intervention on Lori in July 2019. Charles bought him a ticket to fly in to Phoenix. He said he was supposed to stay with his brother Alex on July 10, 2019, but Alex “ghosted him.” He later learned Alex was staying at Lori’s and said it was “off.”
Charles and Adam were texting the morning of July 11, before Charles was killed.
“They’re planning something,” Adam texted to Charles.
“Absolutely,” Charles texted to Adam.
10:43 AM – Adam Cox said in the past year and a half before this all happened, Alex and Lori were “oddly close.” He also said he knew that Lori and Charles were having marital problems.
The prosecutor asks him if she had beliefs outside the LDS faith. Adam said Lori told him she was in the process of “translating from a mortal human being to a immortal being – a celestial state.”
He said when he tried to flag Lori’s beliefs with the family, they cut him off. He said he was told she was in “delusion” and she’d come out of it.
10:36 AM – Jury is brought in and the state calls the first witness of the morning. She calls Adam Cox, Lori’s other brother.
10:30 AM – The judge goes on the record. He said the going forward the plan is to start trial on Mondays and Tuesdays at 10AM. It sounds like they’re waiting on jurors to get things started this morning.
10:28 AM – Lori Vallow Daybell comes into the courtroom with a black blazer and what appears to be a black and gray shirt.
9:52 AM – Vallow Daybell’s adult son Colby Ryan just arrived outside the courtroom. He’s on the prosecution’s witness list.
9:47 AM – Members of the public and media are waiting in line to get into the courtroom. One of the people who has been showing up daily is Tom Evans, a juror in Lori Vallow Daybell’s 2023 murder trial in Idaho.
CASE BACKGROUND:
Vallow Daybell was already convicted in Idaho for murdering her children, Tylee and JJ. She was also convicted for her role in the death of Tammy Daybell, her current husband Chad Daybell’s first wife.
Chad Daybell was also convicted in Idaho for murdering Lori’s children and his first wife, Tammy. He was sentenced to death in that state.
Vallow Daybell was extradited to Arizona after her convictions in Idaho in 2023.
Her brother, Alex Cox, can’t be charged in this case because he died in December 2019 before charges were brought in court.
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