Day 15: Vallow Daybell’s children ‘thrown away like garbage,’ sister said in recording

The 18-person jury continued to listen to testimony Tuesday about cellphone records in the trial of Lori Vallow Daybell, who is accused of killing her two children, and Daybell’s sister also took the stand.

FBI Special Agent Nick Ballance, who works for the agency’s Cellular Analysis Survey Team, continued testifying Tuesday.

He presented cellphone records that placed Vallow Daybell’s brother Alex Cox at Chad Daybell’s Salem, Idaho, property — where 7-year-old Joshua Jaxon “JJ” Vallow and 16-year-old Tylee Ryan’s remains were found.

The Daybells — who had a months-long affair before getting married — are being tried separately. Lori Daybell’s trial began in early April and could last another four weeks.

The 49-year-old Rexburg mother also faces a felony charge in Arizona for allegedly conspiring to kill her fourth husband, Charles Vallow, with Cox.

In Idaho, the Daybells are charged with first-degree murder in the deaths of JJ and Tylee, along with three counts of conspiracy to commit murder. Vallow Daybell is accused of conspiring to kill Chad Daybell’s then-wife, Tammy Daybell.

Chad Daybell — whose trial date has yet to be set — also faces a first-degree murder charge in Tammy Daybell’s death. Chad and Lori got married on a Hawaii beach two weeks after Tammy Daybell’s body was buried in a Utah cemetery, according to witnesses throughout the trial.

Authorities said they believe Cox — who died from natural causes — also conspired to kill JJ, Tylee and Tammy Daybell, according to the indictment filed by prosecution teams from Madison and Fremont counties.

Check this story for live updates on Vallow Daybell’s trial.

READ MORE: Lori Vallow Daybell’s case spans 3 states, 4 deaths. Here are all the key people involved

1:30 p.m. —

FBI Special Agent Steve Daniels during his testimony Tuesday said authorities used aerial imagery along with other pieces of evidence — like text messages and location data — to map out any potential areas where JJ and Tylee’s bodies would be buried on Chad Daybell’s 3- to 4-acre property.

Daniels said that a text Chad Daybell had sent Tammy Daybell about burning wood in the fire pit and shooting a raccoon and then burying it in the pet cemetery flagged both of those areas as potential burial sites. He also mentioned that location data — like Cox’s Google services location, which placed him near a pond on the property — pinpointed another area where law enforcement looked.

“We had some ideas about where we could look,” Daniels said.

As a part of the investigations, authorities took somewhere between 500 to 700 images of the property. Daniels said investigators document the process so that they can show how someone was buried, but he said that “it wasn’t a standard excavation,” primarily because of the way Tylee’s body was buried. Her remains were found burnt and in pieces in the property’s fire pit and buried in a green plastic bucket in the pet cemetery.

Daniels’ statements echoed similar testimony from Rexburg Police Det. Ray Hermosillo, who told the court in-depth about locating the children’s remains on Chad Daybell’s property. Daniels said they used a tractor to excavate the area until they located a bone fragment. Authorities initially weren’t sure whether it was human or animal, Daniels added.

A “bigger bone” indicated that excavators were in the right spot to find the children’s remains, Daniels said, and that an anthropologist on the scene helped to confirm that the remains were human.

Daniels added that law enforcement took several tools into evidence from Chad Daybell’s shed, including shovels, a pickax and a hacksaw. He noted that the shovels were dirty and looked like they’d been used in a fire.

The court was adjourned at 3:30 p.m., and Daniels is expected to continue testifying Wednesday.

11:30 a.m. — Vallow Daybell’s sister says Lori changed after meeting Chad Daybell

When Summer Shiflet was asked by Vallow Daybell’s defense attorney Jim Archibald if she was ever concerned about Tylee’s safety with her mother, Vallow Daybell’s younger sister said no.

Shiflet told the courtroom during her testimony Tuesday that Vallow Daybell was a “loving mother,” and she couldn’t imagine Vallow Daybell hurting her children. But she said she felt like Vallow Daybell changed after she met Chad Daybell and pointed to her religious beliefs, which, she said, began to shift in late 2018. The Daybells met in October 2018.

When asked by the prosecution whether Vallow Daybell lied to Shiflet about the children’s whereabouts, Shiflet said she felt like she did. Shiflet grew emotional after finding out the children were dead, which could be heard in a 10-minute jail recording between the sisters that was played in court Tuesday.

“I don’t have one piece of scripture that says it’s OK for children to be thrown away like garbage in the ground,” Shiflet told Vallow Daybell in the recording on June 24, 2020.

Shiflet also noted during her testimony that Cox suffered a traumatic brain injury from a car accident and that his decision-making, she said, was stuck at a teenage level.

“I’m glad he’s gone — if he was a part of this,” Shiflet said during the jail recording about Cox.

11 a.m. — ‘My trust in my sister was broken.’ Daybell’s sister takes the stand

Summer Shiflet, in a June 2020 jail recording, told Lori Daybell that she was “dancing on the beach with a smile on her face” while her children were buried in shallow graves on Chad Daybell’s property.

“That was later,” Lori Daybell responded to her sister in a calm voice.

The Daybells got married on a beach in Hawaii in November 2019 — less than two months after police said they believe the kids were killed.

In a roughly 10-minute jail recording played in court Tuesday, Shiflet questioned her sister through sobs — which were sometimes inaudible — and asked whether Lori Daybell knew what happened to her children.

“You were in Hawaii dancing on the beach while your kids were in the ground,” Shiflet told her.

Vallow Daybell remained calm throughout the majority of the phone call and told Shiflet that “nobody knows” what she’s been through and that she took care of the kids their whole lives, slightly raising her voice and adding, “ME. ME.”

During her testimony Tuesday, Shiflet said Lori Daybell told her in February 2020 that she knew where Tylee and JJ were and that “they were safe.”

“I felt lied to and my trust in my sister was broken,” Shiflet said about finding out that JJ and Tylee were dead.

9 a.m. — No GPS data for the Daybells, Ballance says

Cellphone data placed Cox’s cellphone on Chad Daybell’s property — where Tylee and JJ’s remains were found — on Sept. 9 and Sept. 23 of 2019, Ballance said during his testimony.

Tylee was last seen on Sept. 8 and JJ was last seen on Sept. 22.

Cox’s cellphone had Google’s location services turned on, which showed his estimated GPS location. Those location services are different than cellphone tower records, which can only show a range of someone’s location — not an exact location.

From 9:55 p.m. to 10:12 p.m. on Sept 23., 2019, Cox’s phone was on Chad Daybell’s property, and the Google data showed him in the backyard near a pond — where JJ’s body was buried. Cell tower records also showed dozens of calls between the Daybells and Cox on Sept. 9 and Sept. 23 in 2019.

But there was no GPS location data from Chad or Lori Daybell.

When asked by Vallow Daybell’s defense attorney, John Thomas, whether Ballance used any GPS data to locate Chad or Lori Vallow Daybell’s cellphone, Ballance said he didn’t.

“I didn’t have it to use,” Ballance said, referencing their location data. He added that people can opt out of Google’s location services and can turn it off.

Ballance added that typically to establish a “pattern of life,” which would give law enforcement an idea of an individual’s daily routine, he’d like to have at least 30 days of cellphone records. But Vallow Daybell and Cox had only moved to Rexburg in early September 2019.