Dateline: A complete timeline of Lori Vallow Daybell's murder conviction, revisited

Dateline has followed many chilling cases, but the Lori Vallow Daybell saga stands out for its sheer horror. Once a smiling mother in family photos, she became the face of a murder trial that gripped the country.

Her story stretched across years of deception, sudden deaths, missing children, and courtroom drama. So how did it all unfold, and how did Dateline capture every twist? Here's a complete timeline revisiting the shocking conviction.

Dateline: A complete timeline of Lori Vallow Daybell's murder conviction

Early years before the storm:

According to Dateline, back in 2006, Lori seemed to be living an ordinary life. She had married Charles Vallow, a businessman, and together they were raising Lori's daughter, Tylee Ryan. Friends at the time remembered a family that looked happy.

In 2014, when Lori and Charles adopted 7-year-old Joshua "JJ" Vallow, the picture looked even more complete. JJ, who had autism, was the grandson of Charles' sister. According to Lori's friend April Raymond, Lori was patient and;

"An ideal mother for him."

JJ and Tylee had a close bond. Family acquaintance Vaisia Itaaehau remembered Tylee proudly taking on the role of big sister, even joking that JJ felt like "her own child." But as the years went on, the warmth inside the Vallow household began to be a thing of the past.

A dangerous new connection:

Dateline says that by 2017, those close to Lori noticed changes. Her interests had turned toward the books of doomsday writer Chad Daybell, whose stories about preparing for the end of the world fascinated her.

The following year, Lori met Chad in person, and they quickly clicked. The two began recording religious podcasts together. Chad was married to Tammy Daybell and was raising five kids.

Friends started hearing disturbing talk. Melanie Gibb, once close to Lori, recalled hearing both Chad and Lori discuss "zombies," which they described as people overtaken by dark spirits.

According to Dateline, Lori even told her friend April Raymond that Charles was a "demon." Charles himself went to the police in 2019, saying Lori thought she was a God preparing for the end times and that she had threatened to kill him.

Deaths, disappearances, and a marriage in secret:

According to Dateline, 2019 marked the point of no return. In February, Charles filed for divorce, citing fear for his life and his children's safety.

Just months later, in July, he was shot and killed by Lori's brother, Alex Cox, during what Cox insisted was self-defense. Lori and her daughter Tylee backed that story, telling police they had witnessed the fight.

By September, Lori had moved with her kids to Rexburg, Idaho, closer to Chad. That month, everything unraveled. On September 8, Tylee was last seen during a family trip to Yellowstone.

The next day, Alex's phone pinged in Chad's backyard. Shortly after, Chad texted his wife about killing a raccoon and burying it in their pet cemetery.

As Dateline puts it, just two weeks later, JJ vanished as well. Melanie Gibb, who was visiting that weekend, remembered Lori brushing off questions by saying JJ had been acting like "a zombie" and that Alex had taken him away.

In October, Chad's wife Tammy died suddenly. The Daybell children later told "48 Hours" they believed it was natural causes and declined an autopsy. But just two weeks after Tammy's funeral, Lori and Chad married in Hawaii, smiling on the beach while Lori's children were missing.

Investigations and grim discoveries:

By November 2019, police were searching for JJ and Tylee. Lori lied to investigators, claiming JJ was with her friend Melanie Gibb in Arizona. Gibb eventually told police that it wasn't true.

According to Dateline, the hunt for the children intensified, even as Lori and Chad went back to Hawaii. Meanwhile, suspicions grew around Tammy Daybell's death, leading to her body being exhumed.

In February 2020, Lori was arrested in Hawaii after refusing to produce her children.

Authorities kept digging for answers. On June 9, 2020, investigators searched Chad Daybell's backyard, focusing on spots where Alex Cox's phone had been. What they found was heartbreaking - JJ's and Tylee's remains were buried in shallow graves. The discovery ended the search but started a murder case that Dateline and other outlets covered step by step.

Court battles and shocking convictions

The legal path was long and complicated. In 2021, both Chad and Lori were charged with murder. At first, Lori was deemed incompetent to stand trial and sent for treatment. By April 2022, she was ruled fit and arraigned.

Judge Steven Boyce even had to enter a not guilty plea on her behalf when she refused.

Her trial finally began in April 2023. The jury heard disturbing evidence, from Lori's bizarre spiritual claims to the financial motives behind the murders. On May 12, 2023, the verdict came down: guilty on all charges, including the murders of Tylee, JJ, and conspiracy in Tammy's death.

Judge Boyce delivered a harsh sentence in July, telling Lori;

"You justified all of this by going down a bizarre religious rabbit hole, and clearly you are still down there."

She was sentenced to life without parole.

The case refuses to end:

Even after Idaho's trial, Lori faced more charges in Arizona. In April 2025, a Phoenix jury convicted her of plotting to murder Charles Vallow. Regardless of representing herself in court, she was eventually found guilty.

In July 2025, she got an additional life sentence for having a hand in plotting Charles' death and in the attempted killing of her niece's ex-husband, Brandon Boudreaux. On the other hand, Chad Daybell was sentenced to death in 2024 for his part in the kilings.

The Dateline timeline of Lori Vallow Daybell's case tells a disturbing fall from mother and wife to now being a convicted killer. What started off with religious fantasies soon spiraled into multiple deaths, kids going missing, and trials that shocked everyone.

The case may have reached its end in the legal field, but the haunting details keep drawing people back to Dateline, reminding us how obsession and delusion can destroy lives in the most devastating way.