A judge in Utah decided to seal hearings and documents related to the welfare and placement of Ruby Franke’s children. This is one of two court cases involving the mother, who ran a popular YouTube channel about her large family before her arrest in August on suspicion of child abuse.
Fourth District Juvenile Court Judge Suchada P. Bazzelle issued the decision Oct. 10 to close the case in juvenile court before a preliminary hearing Tuesday in Provo, where Bazzelle presided over the case’s final public hearing on Sept. 18.
Bazzelle said in her order that while she “recognizes the media and public’s interest in this case and values transparency,” the court cannot guarantee a “fair, impartial and private trial” for the Frankes and their children without “appropriate “To take protective measures to protect children from the intrusive effects of media coverage related to this case.”
According to the order, the media and the public are prohibited from watching any future court hearings in the case.
Extended family members will be allowed to attend after the court reviews their relationship with the children, the order says, but will not be allowed to discuss information they learn at hearings with “any media outlet, person or entity not connected to the case.” connected is”. cannot post about the hearings on social media.
“Sensitive information from children… published worldwide”
Ruby and Kevin Franke’s four minor children were taken into custody of the Department of Children and Family Services (DCFS) following Ruby Franke’s arrest on August 30. She and her business partner Jodi Hildebrandt, a licensed mental health counselor, were each later charged with six counts of aggravated child abuse.
Neighbors called police when Franke’s 12-year-old son escaped from Hildebrandt’s home in Ivins, about 260 miles from the Franke family home in Utah County, to ask neighbors for food and water. Neighbors said the child had duct tape on his wrists and ankles, and police said Franke’s 10-year-old daughter was later found malnourished in the home.
The arrest and trial drew widespread interest from followers online, where Franke and her family appeared on a parenting advice YouTube channel called “8 Passengers.” At her peak, she had more than 2 million followers, but sparked controversy over videos showing various punishments for the Franke children, such as banning the eldest son from his bedroom for months for pranking his brother had played.
The channel was deleted last year and Franke has since worked with Hildebrandt on ConneXions, a self-improvement program that offers DVDs, workshops, workbooks and other materials.
[Read more: Utah’s ‘free-range parenting’ law supposedly kept child services from helping Ruby Franke’s kids, neighbor says]
Kevin Franke, who lives separately from his wife, has been applying for custody of their four children since Franke’s arrest. The family’s two other children are both older than 18 and are not part of this case, although 20-year-old Shari Franke regularly attends court hearings.
At a Sept. 18 hearing, DCFS attorney Virginia Blanchard, who represented the four younger children in state custody, made brief statements about keeping the case secret from the public. Ruby Franke appeared virtually from jail, while Kevin Franke, Shari Franke and their attorneys all attended the hearing in person.
Blanchard’s request came after Ruby Franke, who also appeared virtually at an earlier hearing on September 7, accused two of her children of molesting other children, The Daily Mail reported.
“We’re talking about children. We’re not talking about adults here,” Blanchard said during the Sept. 18 hearing. “Sensitive Children’s Information Released Worldwide.”
“Intense, extraordinary and intrusive” reporting
In deciding to seal the case, Bazzelle referenced events from previous hearings, including coverage of the Sept. 7 and Sept. 18 hearings.
Bazzelle wrote that a reporter “gained access to the proceedings by sneaking into the courtroom unannounced” on Sept. 7, a day when the discussion involved “highly sensitive information about the children.”
Media outlets later wrote about the hearing, disseminating “this confidential and highly private information about the children to a worldwide audience,” she wrote.
Bazzelle wrote that she learned that reporters violated court rules by taking photos of people involved in the case in the hallway outside the courtroom on Sept. 18, and that those media outlets later published the photos.
“The news media and social media coverage of this matter has been intense, extraordinary and intrusive into the legal process and is expected to remain so indefinitely,” Bazzelle wrote. “The presence of members of the public and/or news media in this proceeding has been, is and will be detrimental to the welfare of the minor parties in this matter.”
(Francisco Kjolseth | The Salt Lake Tribune) Shari Franke, 20, the eldest daughter of Kevin and Ruby Franke, attends a child welfare hearing on Sept. 18, 2023, at Fourth, where her four siblings are in custody of the Department of Children’s Services. and family services involved are District Court in Provo.
Complicated relationships and upcoming court dates
On September 18, before her ruling, Bazzelle asked all parties – including Shari Franke – to file briefs on whether the custody case should proceed, adding that doing so could result in the 20-year-old oldest sibling being excluded from court becomes. Mediation on the matter was scheduled for October 11.
The order did not directly refer to the material contained in those pleadings.
Attorney Jared Hales, who represents Shari Franke, confirmed Monday that she would be allowed into the courtroom under Bazzelle’s order. When asked if Shari had any further comment, he replied: “No comment.”
Outside the courthouse on Sept. 18, Kevin Franke’s attorney, Randy Kester, told reporters that Shari Franke had “a right” to be in the courtroom, but added that Bazzelle would make the final decision.
[Read more: Ruby Franke case: A timeline of events]
Police records indicate that Kevin Franke attempted to have Shari Franke arrested after her mother was arrested.
Kevin Franke called police to report a burglary when he saw the door to the family’s Springville home had been broken down and some of his electronic devices removed. “Kevin stated that Shari is not allowed to enter the home and that he believes she entered unlawfully and that he wants her charged with burglary,” an officer wrote in police documents.
But an officer told him that police forced open the door to execute a search warrant and that officers went to the home with Shari Franke on Aug. 31 to retrieve personal items for two of her siblings.
Shari Franke said in a podcast in April that she became estranged from her family in 2022 after her mother began working at ConneXions. Police files also show that she had previously called the police to check on her siblings and make sure they had enough to eat after their mother left them home alone.
Court dates in the child abuse case against Franke and Hildebrandt are not planned (as of Monday morning).
A status review hearing in the criminal case was scheduled for later on September 18, but that morning a spokesman for a Utah court announced that the hearing had been postponed, saying attorneys had filed a mandatory motion for a continuance because they “additional” time required to review large-scale discoveries.”
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