For numerous years, under everyone’s radar, was Ruby Franke and the dark scenes unfolding behind the eyes of all viewers. A family vlog channel that showed the daily lives of all the Franke family in Utah. The channel gained millions of viewers/subscribers. The viewers tuned in to watch Ruby and her Christian household. Ruby Franke was arrested in 2023 on charges of child abuse. 

Ruby and her husband Kevin launched the channel 8 Passengers in 2015. Ruby openly stated how she would punish her children by withholding meals. An example of her enforcing this extreme discipline was in one of her videos where her at the time 6-year-old son forgot to pack his own lunch for school. The school called Ruby, to which she replied that he forgot to pack it himself and she wasn’t going to bring lunch for him. 

As the channel 8 Passengers was rising in popularity, Ruby began to become involved with a life coaching-group called Connexions, ran by therapist Jodi Hildebrandt. In 2022, Ruby began to stop posting on 8 Passengers and primarily focused only on Connexions. Ruby and Jodi would give “advice” where they would promote harsh disciplinary methods. 

In August 2023, viewers who had noticed a shift with Ruby’s discipline, had their suspicions become true. One of Ruby’s childrens had escaped from the Hildebrandt home and begged a nearby neighbor for a favor. The favor was to take the 12-year-old boy to the police station. Ruby and Jodi were arrested after this incident. 

Ruby Franke and Jodi Hidebrandt were both charged with multiple counts of aggravated child abuse. In the beginning of 2024, Ruby Franke pleaded guilty to four counts of child abuse, to which she was sentenced to a long prison sentence. Jodi Hidebrandt, who was seen as the pushing factor to the harsh abuse, was convicted and sentenced as well.

The children of Ruby are now in State custody, and to us on the outside perspective we all hope they’re healing from this trauma. This case shows us that we never know what’s going on behind the scenes.