Sinead Butler
Apr 02, 2024
Washington County Attorney’s Office
Ruby Franke's estranged husband described himself as the "resident exorcist" for Ruby's business partner Jodi Hildebrandt in a newly released interview from the Washington County Attorney's Office.
Kevin Franke has since filed for divorce from Ruby, a family vlogger from Utah who was convicted alongside business partner and mental health counsellor Jodi Hildebrandt for abusing Ruby's 12-year-old son and nine-year-old daughter in a "concentration camp-like setting."
Both women were sentenced to four one- to 15-year terms in prison (to be served consecutively which is up to 30 years in the state of Utah).
Now, in the recently released interview with Kevin - who hasn't been charged for anything - he described how the "weirdest crap started happening" back in 2021 when Hildebrandt moved in with the family and claimed she was possessed.
“I became the resident exorcist,” Kevin said. “It was my job, go and give her blessings — whenever she started going in a trance and going into possession, which started to be a lot.”
"I’m a smart guy. I’m an engineer — designed and helped build some really big stuff. I’m a college professor. I can’t explain some of the stuff that happened while we were there, like crashes in the basement while we were talking upstairs, and plates in the kitchen just flying off by themselves, like, full-speed smashing off the wall and falling to the floor by themselves."
"I can’t explain it, but I saw it with my own eyes," he recalled as said the moment Hildebrandt turned up at his house, he saw "lights turning on and off, sounds of people walking in walls," as well as "footprints going up walls and across the ceiling" and "stuff floating around.
He also noted how the women became close as Ruby would check up on Hildebrandt during her episodes which led Ruby to stay in the same room as her where she then started having trances.
“[Hildebrandt and Ruby] started sleeping in the same bed,” Kevin explained. “Then [Ruby] started having, like, trances and stuff. I would say it was probably around September where she believed that she was going to heaven and seeing God and Jesus and talking with them.”
Kevin also claimed as the pair grew closer, it prompted Ruby to ask him for a separation in July 2022 and he moved out. He then later filed for divorce in November last year following her and Hildebrandt's arrest in August.
The pair were arrested after Franke's son escaped Hildebrandt's home to a neighbour’s house where he was found to be “emaciated and malnourished, with open wounds and duct tape around the extremities," according to Santa Clara-Ivins Public Safety Department.
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