'Cult mom' Lori Vallow hid 3rd husband Joseph Ryan's death from family, cremation held without their knowledge
The death of Lori Vallow’s third husband Joseph Ryan is still a mystery. Ryan reportedly died on April 3, 2018, and his death was ruled as a heart attack. But recently, a recording -- whose metadata stated that it was recorded on October 19, 2018 -- came to light and hinted that Vallow was behind the 58-year-old’s death. Ryan’s sister Annie Cushing shared the recording, which has now prompted the Phoenix Police Department to announce a review of Ryan’s death.
In the recording taped at a Preparing A People gathering, Vallow was heard saying: “When people hear my story, they’re like, ‘I can’t believe you did that. I can’t believe you lived through that. I can’t believe that you’re still here.’” Reports stated that she was speaking about Ryan whom she divorced in 2005. “I had been married to someone who was very awful, who raped my children, and I had divorced him and gotten away from him,” she mentioned in the recording, before adding: “I was going to murder him. I was going to kill him. Like the scriptures say. Like Nephi killed. Just to stop the pain and to stop him coming after me and to stop him coming after my children. I just thought I couldn’t take it anymore. And I would go through the scriptures and find all the things. Like: ‘If he comes against you once, if he comes against you twice, if he comes against you three times then you can kill him.’ It says it in the scriptures in the Book of Mormon. I was like there it is. There’s my answer.”
According to Crime Online, Nancy Grace had a discussion over the two-year-old recording and other issues with a panel of guests this week on Fox Nation’s ‘Crime Stories with Nancy Grace.’ During the discussion it was found that Ryan was cremated even before his closest family members, including his sister, knew he had died. Grace said, “She told the bishop there at the Latter Day Saints, the Mormons, that either she needs to turn her life around or she was going to murder her husband. But as she’s telling this story, she’s speaking about what happened back when. For all I know, she had a, quote, murderous heart at the same time Ryan was killed.”
Though police have confirmed that they are investigating the case, it has been said it’s not going to be easy to find the answers. “One of the problems here is that because he died and he was cremated so quickly, I mean, within a matter of days,” EastIdahoNews.com reporter Nate Eaton stated. But Cushing told Grace, “My understanding is that the state made the call because they couldn’t get a hold of anyone, because — Lori and I maintained contact over the years, but she never told me that Joe had died. I had found out through a relative being forwarded one of these letters where they were seeking family members.” Also, when Ryan’s sister got to know about her brother’s death, his body had already been cremated “because he was an unclaimed body.”