The lives of Chad Daybell's children were changed forever on October 19, 2019, when their 49-year-old mother, Tammy, was found dead in their parents' bedroom in their home outside of Rexburg, Idaho.
In a recent interview, Chad Daybell’s children say their father was “framed” and had nothing to do with the deaths of Joshua “JJ” Vallow and Tylee Ryan. Garth Daybell, Emma Murray, Seth Daybell, Leah Murphy and Mark Daybell spoke with ’48 Hours’ in their first interview since their dad’s case made national news.
The Secrets of Chad Daybell's Backyard | Sneak peek
CBS News correspondent Jonathan Vigliotti spoke to the Daybell children and in a preview released Monday, Leah Murphy says, “The time has come that we need to share our story.”
“My father needs someone to be a voice for him. To let people know what’s real - what we know,” Emma Murray tells Vigliotti.
Garth Daybell, Emma Murray and Seth Daybell attend their father’s arraignment on June 9, 2021.
Read also: The Life of Chad Everett Harris
Daybell was arrested in June 2020 after the remains of Joshua “JJ” Vallow and Tylee Ryan were found buried on his property. Investigators discovered the remains of 16-year-old Tylee Ryan and 7-year-old Joshua “JJ” Vallow buried in shallow graves at Daybell’s Idaho home in June of 2020-ending a months-long search for the missing children.
The children have remained relatively quiet over the past 18 months but Murray, Garth and Seth attended their father’s arraignment June 9. They wore masks and sat behind Daybell as he pleaded not guilty to multiple felony charges including first degree murder. Prosecutors are seeking the death penalty in his case.
The Children's Perspective
After months of silence, Chad Daybell’s children are speaking out to proclaim his innocence, insisting he's too smart to have buried the bodies of Lori Vallow’s children on his own property.
“I don’t know why [the bodies] would be there,” Chad’s daughter Emma Murray told CBS’s “48 Hours” in a new episode airing Wednesday. “But I do know that if he were to commit a crime, he wouldn’t be foolish enough to put the evidence in his own backyard.”
She insisted that her father had been framed by someone who secretly snuck onto the property to bury the children, telling reporter Jonathan Vigliotti that her father rarely went outside and said the location where the bodies were found could not been seen from his house. “This is his property,” she said of the possibility of him being set up. “If there’s bodies buried here, it would be attributed to him.”
Read also: "Married to Evil": Chad Graves
She said there are other more remote areas nearby if Chad had been trying to conceal a body and didn’t believe her father would have left such damning evidence so close to home, if he had been the one to carry out the acts.
Doubts and Explanations
Vigliotti questioned the children about their father’s unusual behavior-including the text message, evidence that Chad had lied to police, and the fact that the children were found on his property.
“A lot of people are gonna say there’s a lot of convenient excuses here,” Vigliotti said. “What do you say to those people who are still very skeptical with all this?”
“It might seem like a convenient excuse,” Murray replied. “But if it’s the truth, we have to hold to it.”
Chad’s other children pointed out that the Tylee and JJ were found buried in shallow graves-yet their father had once worked as a gravedigger. “This is … a man who buries pets at, like, as deep as he can,” Seth Daybell said. “He knew how to dig graves and that just doesn’t sound believable to me.”
Read also: Vallow-Daybell Trial: Key Evidence
Chad’s other children, Leah Murphy, Garth Daybell and Mark Daybell, also appeared in the interview to defend their father.
“Everything that’s happening - it eats at the soul a bit,” Garth says in the ’48 Hours’ preview. “I think about it every day.”
When Vigliotti asks the kids if their father played any role in the deaths of JJ and Tylee, they all immediately respond, “No.”
“How is it possible two children are found buried in your father’s backyard and he had nothing to do with it?” the reporter asks Murray.
She replies, “He was framed.”
The Death of Tammy Daybell
The lives of Chad Daybell's children were changed forever on October 19, 2019, when their 49-year-old mother, Tammy, was found dead in their parents' bedroom in their home outside of Rexburg, Idaho.
"My room was down the hall. And I heard a thump," said Garth Daybell. "And heard my dad yell, 'Garth, Garth, come quick,' with the most panic I'd ever heard in his voice."
Garth Daybell said his mother was already dead and they called 911.
"My dad was just pacing back and forth," Garth recalled. "Just saying, 'Why? How could this happen?' Pointing at pictures on the wall, 'She can't be dead. Like, how could this be? What do we do?'"
Chad, a religious author who often wrote about the end of days, is also facing murder charges for allegedly killing his wife, Tammy, in October of 2019, just weeks before he and Lori tied the knot in Hawaii. Tammy’s death was initially believed to be the result of natural causes but after an investigation was launched to find Lori’s missing children, authorities exhumed the body and conducted an autopsy.
According to Garth, he had been at home on Oct. 19, 2019 when his 49-year-old mother was found dead in her bedroom. “My room was down the hall. And I heard a thump,” Garth Daybell told “48 Hours,” according to CBS News. “And I heard my dad yell, ‘Garth, Garth, come quick,’ with the most panic I’d ever heard in his voice.”
He said his mother was dead before he and his father could place the call to 911.
“My dad was just pacing back and forth,” he said. “Just saying, ‘Why? How could this happen?’ Pointing at pictures on the wall, ‘She can’t be dead. Like how could this be? What do we do?’”
The Daybell children say when the coroner arrived that day, she told them it appeared their mother had died of natural causes. The children, who say their mother was in failing health, accepted that explanation. And they say it was they, not their father, who declined to have an autopsy performed.
"The narrative is that he was going, 'No, no, no autopsy.' But he was standing there - in complete shock, traumatized, letting us make the decision," says Chad Daybell's daughter, Emma Murray. "If he was trying to hide something, you - I wouldn't leave something like that up to my kids if I was trying to hide something."
Based on the family's wishes, no autopsy was performed.
Autopsy Results
Although the results of that autopsy have never been publicly revealed, Garth Daybell said authorities told him that his mother had been asphyxiated. “They told me that she’d been asphyxiated … but we never saw an autopsy,” he said.
Mark Daybell said even if his mother was asphyxiated, it doesn’t necessarily indicate what caused her death.
“Asphyxiation doesn’t necessarily mean smothered,” he said. “According to my understanding, it just means the breath was interrupted. And in the end, she wasn’t able to breathe. And according to that, there’s more facts that we need.”
His children said their mother’s health had been failing before she was found dead in the couple’s home outside of Rexburg, Idaho and insisted that they had made the decision initially not to perform the autopsy-not their father.
“The narrative is that he was going, ‘No, no, no autopsy.’ But he was standing there-in complete shock, traumatized, letting us make the decision,” Murray said. “If he was trying to hide something, you-I wouldn’t leave something like that up to my kids if I was trying to hide something.”
The Daybell children say authorities have been less than forthcoming with them. "They've told us things before that turned out to not be true," said Garth Daybell.
Chad Daybell's Trial and Lori Vallow's Involvement
Chad Daybell has pleaded not guilty to all three murder charges. His children continue to insist he is innocent of the allegations against him and hope that he can get a fair trial in light of all the publicity the case has received.
“We presume innocence in this country,” Murray said. “Just because things look funny, we don’t send people to jail.”
Chad Daybell has waived his right to a speedy trial and a hearing is also scheduled Monday in his case. It has been sealed by Judge Steven Boyce and is not open to the public. Daybell’s next court appearance is a change of venue hearing on Oct. 5 and 6. EastIdahoNews.com will livestream the proceedings.
Lori Vallow Daybell also faces multiple charges including first degree murder, but her case remains on hold until she is found competent for trial.
Lori has also been charged with murdering her two children, but the case against her has been put on hold after a judge ruled that she was mentally unfit to stand trial earlier this year, according to court documents obtained by Oxygen.com. Lori is also facing separate conspiracy to commit murder charges in Arizona in connection with the death of her fourth husband, Charles Vallow.
Charles was shot to death by Lori’s brother, Alex Cox, in July of 2019 in what he claimed at the time had been self-defense. However, in June the Maricopa County Attorney’s office announced the conspiracy charges against Lori in connection with Charles’ death. According to an indictment in that case, authorities believe that Lori “agreed” with Cox to carry out the first-degree murder of her late husband.
Investigators believe Cox likely played a role in the other slayings as well, but he died himself in December of 2019 from what authorities later determined were natural causes.
Lori Vallow, married Daybell in November 2019 - weeks after his first wife, Tammy Daybell, was found dead at their Salem home.
Chad Daybell is charged with first-degree murder in the death of Tammy Daybell. In May 2021, investigators charged Chad Daybell with first-degree murder of Tammy Daybell.
Chad is also charged, along with his new wife Lori Vallow, of murdering her two children, JJ, 7, and Tylee Ryan, 16. The case against Vallow was suspended but she was found competent to stand trial in April 2022.
Chad Daybell pleaded not guilty to the charges and is in jail awaiting trial. Meanwhile, his five children remain steadfast in their belief that their father had nothing to do with the death of their mother or the murders of JJ and Tylee, feeling there has been a rush to judgement.
"We presume innocence in this country. Deaths of Tylee Ryan and J. J.
Yet investigators have said that Chad texted his wife Tammy Daybell-who would die herself the next month-on Sept. 9, 2019, the day after Tylee was last seen alive, to report he had been out on the property burying a raccoon in the same area where the bodies were later discovered.
“Well, I’ve had an interesting morning!,” he wrote in the next message, according to a probable cause statement obtained by Oxygen.com. “[F]elt should burn all of the limb debris by the fire pit before it got too soaked by the coming storms. While did so, spotted a big racoon [sic] along the fence. hurried and got my gun, and he was still walking along. got close enough that one shot did the trick. He is now in our pet cemetery. Fun times!”
Popular articles:
tags: #Chad
