Devil in the Family: The Fall of Ruby Franke

It absolutely blows my mind that there are people like these operating in our world. They are so completely consumed by delusions and magical fantasies that they actually act in their insane and inane beliefs. In truth, they use their false deities and revelations to advance their own agendas, prejudices, and desires for more money and more power. Then they lord or over their children and their families through punishment, denial of love and affection, and outright abuse. If any of them actually attempted to live the words ascribed to their mythical savior, they would share all of their wealth and resources with the poor and needy. Yet they never do. Grow up, you ridiculous fools and con artists.

"Devil in the Family" (2/27/25, 3eps, 50-min, Hulu) This documentary charts the rise and fall of Ruby Franke's "8 Passengers" Youtube channel. Hulu did a really good presentation with this, but the visual and audio redactions were annoying and apparently unnecessary since you can find a short 20/20 presentation of this on YT which has no such restrictions. When you watch you'll wonder how it took so very long for her abuse to be identified and stopped, especially regarding the Utah state agency whose JOB it is to investigate such matters! And husband/father, Kevin, is a sorry, pathetic character. He should've been prosecuted for criminal negligence, so much disgrace to spread around. And we find at the very end that she is eligible for parole in Dec 2026! That's horrifying, this monster should've been sentenced MUCH more harshly to 25 yrs hard time w/o the chance of parole. Finally, I hope people don't miss the incredible religious irony that in her effort to battle the evil in her children, she and Jodi exhibited the most heinous evil we dared imagine.

The fact that a mother can do all of this to her family and not have remorse,(I don't think she meant her apology). But KEVIN WHAT ARE YOU DOING. I'm not saying he should have got the same sentence but dude you were there before you got kicked out of the house. Both of these women are despicable and the hurt you see on Chad and Shari on the archived footage is haunting, Ruby just treating them like trash, screaming at them because she is recording. I don't ever want to see something like this happen to children, the pain they all have to live with now is beyond comprehension. I'm just glad they were put in jail before anyone was killed. Series was good, some stuff with Kevin needed to be addressed more.

Ruby Franke is where she belongs - in jail. Why isn't Kevin? This doc wants to make him the victims too. I understand he seems very weak, and he was completely infatuated with Ruby and would have done anything to make her love him. How he allowed Jodi Hildebrandt to move in with them is a mystery. He also let his wife sleep in Jodi's bed, under the auspices of protecting Jodi from the demons that she possessed. He gets kicked out of his own home by these two nut jobs; here a man would put his foot down and fight for the kids. Not Kevin. He left. His daughter Shari tries to reach out to him, she also shunned by the mad women. What does Kevin do? Blocks her from calling him again.

Honestly this doc should have been called: "Why is this guy not in jail with the other two".

Watching the show it is blatantly obvious that Jodi and Ruby abused those kids; if you've followed the case even remotely you know that. Apparently the only person that does not know that is Kevin. The last interview of the whole show is Kevin saying that he still loves Ruby and throughout he posits that he would always pick Ruby over the children. I don't care how great your memories are with someone if you learn that they are abusive: let alone to children, YOUR children, and to such a degree that those children were abused; your perspective changes. If your perspective doesn't change that's because you knew or at least don't care. I hope none of those kids have any contact with Kevin ever again and that they finally get the support and love that their parents were supposed to provide.

Oh and Ruby and Jodi were definitely hooking up. Nothing like faking demon possession to get into your girlfriend's house and kick her husband out.