Are Lori Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell still married? Details explored ahead of Dateline on NBC
Lori Vallow Daybell and her husband, Chad Daybell, were convicted of the murders of Lori's two children, Tylee and Joshua "JJ," in 2023 and 2024, respectively. The remains of Lori's children were found in Chad's backyard in Rexburg, Idaho, in 2020.
The discovery of the remains led authorities to the death of another individual, Chad's ex-wife, Tammy Daybell. Investigation into the case saw both Lori Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell get linked to the three murders. After their convictions in 2023 and 2024, while Lori was sent to prison, Chad was put on death row.
Chad Daybell is Lori Vallow Daybell's fifth husband, and they continue to remain married despite being incarcerated, as per Forbes. The two tied the knot in 2019, weeks after the death of Chad’s ex-wife, Tammy.
The case of Lori Vallow Daybell and her husband, Chad Daybell, was featured on Dateline's latest episode, which aired on Friday, March 7, 2025. on NBC. The episode also had an exclusive interview with Lori, who was dubbed the "Doomsday mom" by the media.
Titled Lori Vallow Daybell: The Jailhouse Interview, the episode marks her first televised interview and is expected to feature her side of the case. The official synopsis of the episode reads:
"In her first TV interview ever, convicted murderer Lori Vallow Daybell speaks to Dateline correspondent Keith Morrison in an all-new special Dateline this Friday at 9 p.m. ET/8 p.m. CT."
Lori Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell got married right after Tammy Daybell’s death
WDSU reported that authorities discovered that Lori Vallow Daybell and Chad met in 2018 and were involved in an affair as they were both married at the time. However, soon after they began their relationship, both their spouses died suddenly.
While Lori's husband, Charles Vallow, was shot dead by her brother, Alex Cox, in 2019, he got away, claiming that he had fired the gun in self-defense. A few months after Charles' death, Lori moved to eastern Idaho with her three children, Tylee, JJ, Colby, and Alex, to be closer to Chad.
Meanwhile, in October 2019, Chad's ex-wife, Tammy Daybell, was also found dead. Initially, it was believed that she died of natural causes, but it was later revealed that she had died from asphyxiation.
The couple, Lori and Chad, got married in November 2019 in Hawaii, shocking their family and friends, as the announcement came soon after Tammy's death. At the same time, it was unclear where Tylee and JJ were.
WDSU reported that JJ's grandmother, Kay Woodcock, was the first person to inform the police of her suspicions about the children's welfare. The children were last seen in September 2019, according to Forbes. A welfare check showed that no one had seen or heard from the children in a while, and soon after that, Lori and Chad reportedly fled to Hawaii to avoid the police.
Authorities reached out to Lori Vallow Daybell, but she refused to answer questions and missed court dates where she was supposed to present her children in front of a judge. Lori was arrested in Hawaii in February 2020, charged with abandonment of her children, and extradited to Idaho.
In June 2020, Tylee and JJ’s remains were discovered by the police in a shallow grave on Chad’s property. They also came across incriminating evidence linking Chad and Lori Vallow Daybell to the homicides.
After being exhumed, JJ's remains were found buried under a tree, bundled up in multiple plastic bags with his face and hands bound with duct tape. Strands of Lori’s hair were also found stuck to the duct tape.
Tylee's remains, on the other hand, were burnt, and her remains were severely disfigured. Authorities also believed that Lori and Chad Daybell attempted to dismember her before burying her. Other evidence, including a storage locker full of the children’s belongings and a video footage of Lori handling those belongings, aided the prosecution’s case.
As per USA Today, in 2023, Lori was convicted of two counts of first-degree murder for killing her children and one count of conspiracy to murder, linked to the death of Tammy Daybell. She was given multiple life sentences without the possibility of parole.
In separate cases in Arizona, Lori Vallow Daybell is currently awaiting trial in relation to the death of Charles Vallow and the attempted shooting of her nephew Brandon Boudreaux by Alex Cox.
In 2024, a jury found Chad Daybell guilty of murdering Tammy Daybell and Lori’s two children. He is currently on death row, as reported by NBC.
Although they remain incarcerated in separate prisons, Chad and Lori are still legally married. As per NBC, Lori Vallow Daybell asserts that they are innocent and will be exonerated. In the preview for the upcoming Dateline episode, she stated:
“I have seen things in the future that Jesus showed me when I was in heaven. And we were not in jail, and we were not in prison, and they were still in the future, from now.”
Why are Lori Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell called the "Doomsday Couple"?
As per WDSU, Lori Vallow Daybell was raised by Mormon parents, and Chad Daybell was a doomsday fiction writer, based on Mormon teachings. Although initially Lori and Chad were members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, their belief significantly shifted from traditional Mormonism.
The couple shared the idea that the world was going to end in 2020, and they had a pivotal role to play in it. As per USA Today, when Charles Vallow filed for divorce from Lori in 2019, he claimed in the paperwork that she has a “God-complex."
“A goddess, an exalted being whom God had placed on Earth to begin preparation for the end times,” the document read.
Lori Vallow Daybell’s friends also claimed that the couple believed that Lori’s children were possessed and were “zombies,” and the only way to rid them of evil was to kill them.
Right before her sentencing in 2023, Lori Vallow Daybell addressed the public for the first time and justified her actions.
"Jesus Christ knows that no one was murdered in this case. Accidental deaths happen, suicides happen, fatal side effects from medications happen," she said.
However, according to the prosecution, the couple, known as the "Doomsday Couple," killed their children not because of their religious beliefs but to remove them from the path of their relationship and to gain monetary benefits from their death.
To learn more about the Vallow-Daybell case, catch the latest episode of Dateline on NBC.
