‘Don’t flatter yourself’: Accused killer Lori Vallow aggressively cross-examines woman who dated husband the night before he was murdered
Prosecutors say Lori Vallow Daybell conspired to carry out the killing of her fourth husband Charles Vallow in 2019 so that she could move forward with marrying Chad Daybell
Notorious mom Lori Vallow Daybell, who is representing herself at her Arizona trial in the murder of her fourth husband, ripped into a witness who testified about going on a date with him the night before he was killed.
The confrontation grew tense as Vallow Daybell aggressively cross-examined Nancy Jo Hancock Wednesday in court about the date and what they talked about.
“So, you spent your whole date getting to know each other talking about me?” Vallow Daybell pressed.
“Don’t flatter yourself,” Hancock snapped back. “No, we did not spend the whole time talking about you.”
Vallow Daybell, 51, known as the “Doomsday Mom” for her religious beliefs, was convicted in 2023 in Idaho for her role in the killing of her two youngest children — 16-year-old daughter Tylee Ryan and 7-year-old adopted son JJ Vallow — and a romantic rival.
She is now on trial for conspiracy to kill her fourth husband, Charles Vallow, in 2019 so that she could marry Chad Daybell, prosecutors charge. They accuse Vallow Daybell of conspiring with her brother Alex Cox to kill Charles to cash in on a life insurance policy, while insisting that he was possessed by an evil spirit. Cox died before he could be tried for the crime.
On Wednesday, Hancock told the court that she had met Charles on a dating site for members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in early July 2019.
They exchanged “hundreds of texts,” and had hour-long phone calls before meeting in person on July 10, 2019, the night before he was fatally shot by Vallow Daybell’s brother.
“I just remember thinking that he was strangely calm and still kind toward Lori,” Hancock said. “His hope was that she would be a great mom JJ,” their adopted son.
Hancock’s voice cracked with emotion as she recounted that Charles was “like a kid on Christmas morning” whenever he was about to see JJ.”
Charles revealed to her the night before his death that he had changed the beneficiary of his assets in the event of his death to his sister Kay Woodcock, Hancock testified. She said she suggested that he share that news with Vallow Daybell.
“Charles was a texter and a talker,” Hancock noted, adding that their conversations were filled with banter.
Hancock and Charles continued to text after dinner the night before he was murdered, but when she texted him the next day, she didn’t receive a response.
“I was puzzled how I had misread what I had thought was a good date that he would not even take the courtesy to reply,” she said. “I wondered why, but just figured that was what his decision was.”
It wasn’t until December of that year – months after their date – that Hancock found out on the news that Charles had been killed.
“Oh my gosh, that’s right when I went out with him,” Hancock testified she thought at the time. She wasn't interviewed by police in Chandler, Arizona until April 2020, she said.
In court on Wednesday, Vallow Daybell asked Hancock if she was surprised to learn later that Charles was not in the process of a divorce, as he had claimed, and asked if she would have gone on a date with Charles had she realized he wasn’t dissolving his marriage.
“He was not in the process of a divorce,” Vallow Daybell angrily noted.
Hancock responded that they had only shared a dinner, adding: “I wasn’t sleeping with him or anything.”
“Do you go on dates with married men?” Vallow Daybell asked, which prompted an objection from prosecutors.
“You’re trying to tell me and this jury that you went on one date with my husband and he told you all the details of our lives?” Vallow Daybell asked.
“I’m telling you the truth,” Hancock said. “That’s what I know.”
On Monday, Vallow Daybell broke down in tears while giving her opening statements as she painted Charles as the aggressor in the incident that led to his death. She said her brother fatally shot Charles as he threatened her daughter with a bat.
Charles’ death was allegedly the first step in a wider plot by Vallow Daybell and Chad Daybell to rid their lives of “obstacles,” meaning their spouses and her children, according to text message presented as evidence at her 2023 trial for the murders of her children.
Four months before he died, Charles filed for divorce from his wife saying she had become infatuated with near-death experiences, and had claimed to have lived numerous lives on other planets.
He alleged she had threatened to ruin him financially and kill him and sought a voluntary mental health evaluation for his wife.
Vallow Daybell has pleaded not guilty to charges in Charles’ death. If convicted, she would receive another life sentence in addition to the three she is serving for the murders of her two youngest children and Daybell’s first wife, Tammy Daybell.
The Arizona trial is expected to last until mid-May and is the first of two trials for Vallow Daybell.
She will also face trial for conspiracy to murder her niece’s estranged husband Brandon Boudreaux after he narrowly escaped a drive-by shooting. He was not harmed. The two cases will be tried separately and then she will be returned to Idaho to finish out her life sentences.