Former family vlogger Ruby Franke and her business partner Jodi Hildebrandt were handed a sentence of four to 60 years in prison on Tuesday, as per the prosecution’s description of their actions as “concentration camp-like” child abuse.
According to Eric Clarke, Franke’s children were “regularly denied food, water, beds to sleep in, and virtually all forms of entertainment.”
“Had the older of the children not had the courage to run away and ask a neighbor to call the police, heaven only knows how much longer he could have survived in that situation,” he added.
Franke informed Judge Walton that she was under the sway of Hildebrandt, her co-defendant in the child abuse case. Both women will serve their sentences consecutively.
Once a YouTube sensation, Franke, a mother-of-six, garnered millions of subscribers with parenting advice. However, her reputation crumbled following her arrest alongside Hildebrandt in August 2023 for the abuse of her own children.
Following an escape by one of Franke’s sons from Hildebrandt’s residence to a neighbor’s house, authorities were alerted through a 911 call.
The malnourished boy revealed that Hildebrandt had applied cayenne pepper and honey to their wounds, inflicted by being tied with a rope, as stated in the arrest warrants.
