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A Utah woman who ran a popular YouTube parenting advice channel has been sentenced to prison for child abuse.
Ruby Franke She was arrested last year with her friend Jodi Nan Hildebrandt after the former’s malnourished son ran away to ask neighbors for help.
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To the authorities also found another daughter of Franke10 years old, malnourished at her partner’s house.
The two women, who pleaded guilty, were sentenced to serve four sentences of 1 to 15 years in prison each.
The sentences will run consecutively and are the maximum for each charge under Utah law. The state parole board will determine how long each person will serve.
In court, Utah prosecutor Eric Clarke said two of Franke’s children lived in an “environment similar to the a concentration camp“and called it a significant threat to the community.
“Children were regularly deprived of food, water, beds to sleep in and virtually all forms of entertainment,” Clarke said.
In court, Franke apologized to her children and said, “I was so disoriented that I believed darkness was light and right was wrong.”
“I was led to believe that this world was an evil place, full of police officers who control, hospitals that hurt, government agencies that brainwash, religious leaders who lie and are lecherous, husbands who refuse to protect, and children who need to be abused. ”, he assured.
The women were arrested in August 2023 after Franke’s 12-year-old son jumped out a window and ran to a neighbor’s house to ask for food and water.
“The person who called [el vecino] I declare this the youngest appeared emaciated and malnourishedwith open wounds and tape on the extremities”, explained a statement from the Santa-Clara Ivins Department of Public Safety.
“Upon arrival, authorities observed that the injuries and malnutrition of the [el chico] were serious,” the statement said.
The child had to be taken to the hospital “due to the deep lacerations he suffered from being tied with a rope and his malnutrition.” Franke’s 10-year-old daughter also needed medical attention.
Authorities later obtained a search warrant in connection with the incident, and in total, four children were placed in the care of Children and Family Services, according to the release.
Strict Parenting
Franke, 42, became famous on YouTube in 2015 for her channel “8 Pasajeros”, in which she talked about raising her six children.
The channel had more than 2 million subscribers before being deactivated in 2022, the year Franke separated from her husband.
In the past, the blogger faced criticism for the strict parental measures she described on the channelsuch as his son’s claim that he slept on a beanbag chair for several months as punishment and Franke’s description of meal deprivation as another disciplinary measure.
The beanbag incident prompted some bystanders to call local child protective servicesalthough Franke stated that the incident was taken out of context.
It has also appeared in YouTube videos posted by Hildebrandt, a life coach and consultant, on her website ConneXions Classroom.
In one such video, posted on May 10, 2022, Franke described herself as Hildebrandt’s “helper” and wondered why so many children suffered from depression.
“I never expected my second grader to come home and say so-and-so has anxiety and so-and-so has depression,” she said. “Something isn’t right. This isn’t right.”
Away from the cameras, Franke’s children were being subjected to severe abuse.
These included tying them up, hitting and kicking them, failing to feed them and forcing them to work outdoors in the summer without sunscreen, resulting in severe sunburns, according to police records.
In a plea agreement, Hildebrandt claimed that he tortured the children or was aware of the abuse and that he forced one of Franke’s daughters to “jump into a cactus several times.”
Through his lawyer, Franke’s ex-husband, Kevin Franke, asked before the hearing that the maximum sentence be imposed and described the abuse suffered by his children as “horrible and inhumane”.
Source: Elcomercio
I am Jack Morton and I work in 24 News Recorder. I mostly cover world news and I have also authored 24 news recorder. I find this work highly interesting and it allows me to keep up with current events happening around the world.
