Cult Dehumanization: How the Daybell Doctrine Made Children "Zombies" | Spiritual Abuse
Hidden Killers With Tony Brueski | True Crime News & Commentary
True Crime Today
3.3 • 910 Ratings
🗓️ 11 March 2026
⏱️ 16 minutes
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Summary
The last photograph of Tylee Ryan was taken at Yellowstone. September 8, 2019. She's sixteen. She's smiling.
Within a day, investigators believe she was dead. Her remains were found nine months later — burned and dismembered in Chad Daybell's backyard.
Her mother's explanation, according to friends who testified? Tylee had "gone dark."
This is Part 3 of "The Chosen Ones," Hidden Killers' 5-part psychological examination of spiritual abuse and religious trauma through the Vallow-Daybell case. Today we examine the moment a child becomes "other" in a parent's mind — and the spiritual language that made it possible.
According to testimony, Chad Daybell's labeling started with Charles Vallow. Chad Daybell told Lori her husband was possessed by a demon named "Ned." She stopped using his name. Seven days after he was killed, she texted about the life insurance: "Ned probably changed it before we got rid of him."
Then came the children. Tylee questioned her mother's beliefs — and was declared "dark." JJ needed more care than Lori wanted to give — and became a "zombie."
Both buried in Chad Daybell's backyard. Both killed by people who believed they weren't really killing children — just destroying the demons that had taken them over.
This is how dehumanization works in high control religion. You create a category. You assign people to it. And then the rules that protect humans don't apply anymore.
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#ChadDaybell #LoriVallow #TyleeRyan #JJVallow #HiddenKillers #ZombieDoctrine #Dehumanization #SpiritualAbuse #ReligiousTrauma #HighControlReligion
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | This is Hidden Killers with Tony Brewski. Here now, Tony Brucey. |
| 0:06.8 | There's a photograph of Tiley Ryan that you've probably seen. It was taken into Yellowstone |
| 0:13.3 | National Park on September 8th of 2019. She's standing with her little brother JJ and her |
| 0:18.4 | uncle Alex Cox. The sky is kind of overcast. |
| 0:21.0 | They're in front of some kind of trail marker or overlooked. |
| 0:23.7 | Tiley is 16 years old. |
| 0:25.1 | She's smiling. |
| 0:26.2 | According to investigators, within 24 hours of that photograph, |
| 0:31.9 | she'd be dead. |
| 0:34.8 | When a remains, her finally discovered nine months later buried in Chad daybill's backyard the investigators found evidence of burning and dismemberment the damage was so extensive so extensive that identification required DNA analysis somebody did that |
| 0:53.3 | that and the disturbing thing is Somebody did that. |
| 1:01.5 | And the disturbing thing is it was probably the man in that very photo smiling alongside her as having a hand in it, Alex Cox. |
| 1:09.0 | Her mother's explanation for what happened, according to testimony from those close to her |
| 1:13.8 | was tyly had gone dark little girl lorry valo had raised for 16 years was no longer |
| 1:22.5 | tyly according to the belief system witnesses described she was now a zombie. |
| 1:28.8 | She'd been possessed by a dark spirit. |
| 1:30.7 | The danger was, the daughter was gone. |
| 1:33.6 | Only the shell remained. |
| 1:36.4 | So deep in, Lori got into this way of thinking, this religiosity. |
| 1:45.6 | So here's a question that haunts this case. |
| 1:48.3 | What has to happen inside a mother's mind for her to look at her own child and see a demon? |
| 1:55.6 | The answer isn't madness, not exactly. |
... |
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