“I Will not feed a Demon”: Ruby Franke journal details explored as authorities release records detailing “horrific abuse” of children

In a slew of records released on Friday, March 22, 2024, the Washington County prosecutors revealed family vlogger Ruby Franke detailed abuse of her kids in a journal.

The journal entries written by Ruby Franke, found in the home, detailed how she believed her children were possessed by demons. The journal revealed Franke starved and beat her children as she believed they needed physical punishment to “repent” for imagined sins.

In the earliest journal dated back to June 11, 2023, Franke details the abuse she and her business partner, Jodi Hildebrant, inflicted on her two youngest children. In an entry from June 13, 2023, Franke recounts screaming at her 12-year-old son, who was referred to as R in the document. In the same, Ruby Franke wrote she yelled at R to rid himself of the demon possessing him.

The next day, Franke wrote she told her son that she would not “feed a demon.”

“I will feed R, I will not feed a demon. So I will check on you a bit and if you want food then be prepared to tell the truth about your behavior."

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A journal entry revealed Ruby Franke cut off her daughter's hair as a punishment

Ruby Franke and Jodi Hildebrandt pleaded guilty to child abuse on December 18, 2023, and both were sentenced to four consecutive terms of one-to-15 years each on February 20, 2024. Franke and Hildebrandt were arrested on August 30, 2023, after Ruby’s son, referred to as R, ran away for a second time from Hildebrandt’s Utah home where he was being held, and asked a neighbor for food and water.

When police arrived at the scene, R told them that he believed two of his sisters were also in Hildebrandt’s home, but he wasn’t certain as he hadn’t seen them “in over a month as they were kept separately in the home.”

When police searched the home, they reportedly found his emaciated sister, referred to as E, sitting in a walk-in closet. Bodycam footage released by Washington County prosecutors on Friday showed E refusing to leave the closet or allow people to touch her for medical treatment as she feared Jodi did not want her to go to the hospital where she was told staff forcefully inject a vaccine that could potentially kill her.

The journal entries found at the home further detailed the “horrific abuse” suffered by the children, including starvation referred to as ‘fasting.” In the journal, Franke referred to her 9-year-old daughter E as “evil” before adding she cut off her hair for “manipulating” her.

In a journal entry on June 11, 2023, Ruby Franke wrote:

“Big day for evil. HE manipulates me. She won’t scream when Jodi is around but with me, she wails (sic). All night, E screamed, cried and would hit her head on the tile floor.” She added, “E is better behaved with Jodi. She likes to think she can still manipulate me. I gave her a pixie haircut. All her long hair is gone. No more distracting with hair.”

In a journal entry dated June 12, 2023, Franke wrote about how E became enraged after she refused her daughter to break her "fast."

“All day E makes rhymes: ‘My mom starves me and calls it fasting,’ ‘My mom won’t lift a finger and bring me food because all she does is lie on the bed and eat brownies.”

In another entry, Ruby Franke wrote on Hildebrandt’s direction, that the children were subjected to extreme punishment as “Allowing lies to be spewed gives the devil a platform. Articulating lies reinforces possession.”

In an entry on June 14, 2023, Franke wrote she forced her daughter to carry a heavy box up and down the stairs and shaved her head as punishment for slipping. The entry read:

“Because she didn’t listen the night before, she would do 2 sets of boxes/stairs with a 5 min break. She did the first set easily and agreeably. After 5 minutes of rest, she began whimpering. When she got to the bottom stair she ‘slipped’ and dropped the box. I put her in the dog wash and shaved her head. Then back to the boxes.”

The journal entry revealed at the time, Ruby Franke’s son was sleeping on the patio outside her sliding glass window and his sister was sleeping on the floor beside her bed.

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In the journal Ruby Franke referred to her children as “Spawns of Satan"

In the journal, Ruby Franke, who referred to her children as “Spawns of Satan" wrote about how she starved her children as a form of discipline. She once wrote she would not feed her “demon” son as he would often talk back to her amid the escalating abuse.

“I bring him dinner of brown rice, beans, lentils and water. He takes the bowl and begins eating. I say, ‘No thank you. Are you going to acknowledge the woman you’ve been abusing just bought you dinner?'” the entry on June 14 reads. “Well I would say thank you but I wouldn’t really mean it,” Franke’s son allegedly replied.

In response, Ruby Franke wrote she grabbed his dinner and said:

“Wow! … I will not talk with a demon. Your soul is damned and I will not hear your damnable words.'”

Authorities revealed that the next day Franke's son tried to run away. Shortly after, Franke found her son walking on the side of the road and brought him home before writing in her diary, “Devil wants me in prison. My children are dead.”

Ruby Franke wrote she put her son in sedation after he ran away from home. She wrote:

“The demon is still here and I purposefully put R back into a slumber. Hibernate (sic). To watch R go into an awful state of compliance, knowing the demon he harbors in his heart, is so sick like stitching up a patient knowing you didn’t get all cancer out.”

The journal revealed as her son became more “aggressive and destructive,” the punishments escalated to “poking, pouring cold water, towel whip.” In the last entry, Franke wrote she struck both her children with belts.

During her sentencing hearing, Ruby Franke apologized for abusing her children and thanked the ale enforcement services for saving her children from her at a time she claimed she was under the influence of Hildebrandt.