Closing arguments begin in Lori Vallow Daybell’s trial on charge she conspired to kill husband

PHOENIX (AP) — Closing arguments began Monday afternoon at the Arizona trial for Lori Vallow Daybell, the Idaho woman with doomsday religious beliefs who’s charged with conspiring to murder her estranged husband in suburban Phoenix.

Vallow Daybell, who isn't a lawyer but has chosen to defend herself, didn't call any witnesses or put on any evidence in her defense. Jurors heard testimony from prosecution witnesses for seven days.

She is accused of conspiring with her brother, Alex Cox, to kill Charles Vallow at her home in Chandler in 2019 so she could collect money from his life insurance policy and marry her then-boyfriend Chad Daybell, an Idaho author who wrote several religious novels about prophecies and the end of the world.

Prosecutor Treena Kay told the jury in her closing argument that was the motive behind the crime: “Chad and money."

“What we see is a very planned out, premeditated murder,” Kay said.

Cox, who claimed he acted in self-defense when he fatally shot Vallow, died five months later from what medical examiners said was a blood clot in his lungs. Cox’s account was later called into question.

Kay said Cox waited 47 minutes before calling 911 after the shooting “to stage the scene." The jury on Monday also listened to a recorded conversation between Vallow Daybell and the life insurance company.

Vallow Daybell believed she was the beneficiary of Vallow's $1 million policy, Kay said. In the recording, she is heard saying that Vallow had been shot and that “it was an accident.”

She has pleaded not guilty. If convicted, she would face a life sentence without the possibility of release until serving at least 25 years.

In her opening statement, Vallow Daybell had said during the encounter inside the house, Vallow chased her with a bat, and Alex shot Vallow in self-defense after she left the house.

Kay reminded the jury Monday that “anything the defendant said in her opening statement was not presented at trial through a witness.”

As Kay addressed the jury, Vallow Daybell kept glancing at the jurors. She is expected to deliver her closing argument later Monday.

She has already been convicted in Idaho of killing her two youngest children and conspiring to murder a romantic rival, for which she was sentenced to life in prison.

Last week at the Arizona trial, Adam Cox, another brother of Vallow Daybell, testified on behalf of the prosecution, telling jurors that he had no doubt that her siblings were behind Vallow's death.

Adam Cox said Vallow’s killing occurred just before he and Vallow were planning an intervention to bring Vallow Daybell back into the mainstream of their shared faith in the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. He testified that before Vallow’s death, his sister had told people her husband was no longer living and that a zombie was living inside his body.

Four months before he died, Charles Vallow filed for divorce from Vallow Daybell, saying she had become infatuated with near-death experiences and had claimed to have lived numerous lives on other planets. He alleged she threatened to ruin him financially and kill him. He sought a voluntary mental health evaluation of his wife.

The trial over Vallow's death will mark the first of two criminal trials in Arizona for Vallow Daybell. She's scheduled to go on trial again in early June on a charge of conspiring to murder Brandon Boudreaux, the ex-husband of Vallow Daybell's niece, Melani Pawlowski.