West
Child-abusing mommy blogger Ruby Franke's daughter warns parents about posting kids' pictures online
The eldest daughter of Ruby Franke, the Utah parenting blogger convicted of child abuse in February, is sounding a warning to parents who post photos and videos of their children on blogs.
Franke, a 41-year-old mother of six, and her friend Jodi Hildebrandt, a 54-year-old mother of two, ran a joint parenting and lifestyle YouTube channel called ConneXions Classrooms. In December, both pleaded guilty in a St. George courtroom to four of six counts of second-degree aggravated child abuse inflicted upon two of the Frankes’ children.
“When children become stars in their family’s online content, they become child influencers,” Franke said in a statement before the Utah House of Representatives on Oct. 16. “It is more than just filming your family life and putting it online. It is a full-time job, with employees, business credit cards, managers, and marketing strategies. The difference between family vlogging and a normal business, however, is that the employees are all children. Children, from before they are born to the day they turn 18, have become the stars of family businesses on YouTube, Instagram, and most other social media platforms.”
Prior to ConneXions Classrooms, Franke ran her own parenting vlog, or video blog, on social media called 8Passengers, representing herself, her husband and their eight children.
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Blogger Ruby Franke pleaded guilty to child abuse in Utah. (Instagram/moms_of_truth)
Shari noted that Utah is a “hotspot for family content” due to the state’s culture surrounding the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (LDS), noting that the goal of the church is to “share” that culture “with the world.”
“[T]here is NEVER, never a good reason for posting your children online for money or fame.”
“We also have large families, which makes family content more lucrative,” Shari noted. “Specifically, many parents film their regular family life as an online video blog, called vlogging. But I want to be clear that there is NEVER, never a good reason for posting your children online for money or fame.”
UTAH POLICE DISCOVER ‘PANIC ROOM’ INSIDE ABUSIVE MOMMY BLOGGER ACCOMPLICE’S $5.3M DESERT HOME
Ruby Franke ran a joint YouTube page called ConneXions with Jodi Hildebrandt that aimed to teach some 4,650 followers how to “successfully navigate life.” (Instagram/moms_of_truth)
Franke teamed up with Hildebrandt, a formerly licensed therapist, in 2022, and the pair decided to start their own parenting vlog on YouTube, often staying together in Hildebrandt’s multi-million dollar home in St. George with Franke’s children. They also hosted conferences throughout the country aimed at giving parenting advice to those having trouble disciplining their children.
“There is no such thing as a moral or ethical family vlogger.”
Shari said her mother’s blog became the primary source of income for her household, but sometimes the money that her mother’s vlogging work brought to the table was used as a “bribe.”
YOUTUBE MOMMY BLOGGER RUBY FRANKE, CO-HOST JODI HILDEBRANDT SENTENCED FOR CHILD ABUSE: ‘DARK DELUSION’
Parenting blogger Jodi Hildebrandt pleaded guilty to four of six counts of aggravated child abuse in connection with the physical and emotional harm of two of her co-host’s children. (Sheldon Demke/ St. George News/ Pool)
“For example, we’d be rewarded $100 or a shopping trip if we filmed a particularly embarrassing moment, or an exciting event,” Shari explained. “Or other times, simply going on vacation was expected to be payment enough—because most kids don’t get to go on regular and expensive vacations or trips. Never mind the fact that the child’s labor is actually what paid for the vacation or trip. There is no law in place to guarantee child influencers get any money from their work.”
She has since been calling on Utah lawmakers to consider implementing certain protections for child influencers.
YOUTUBE MOMMY BLOGGERS ARRESTED ON ALLEGATIONS OF CHILD ABUSE: ‘FINALLY’
Most families in the area were aware that Franke had a YouTube channel called 8Passengers, her neighbor told Fox News Digital. When she started another vlog called “Moms of Truth”/ ConneXions on Facebook with Hildebrandt, “a few” neighbors became “very concerned” with the content, the neighbor said. (Moms of Truth/Instagram)
In 2023, the two pals and business partners were arrested for abusing Franke’s two youngest children, a 9-year-old girl and 12-year-old boy. Some of the abuse occurred in Hildebrandt’s home.
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The allegations against Franke and Hildebrandt only came to light after Franke’s son fled Hildebrandt’s Ivins home and ran to a neighbor, who called 911 after seeing the malnourished boy with duct tape on his wrists and ankles.
HEAR THE 911 CALL:
“For the past four years, I’ve chosen to follow counsel and guidance that has led me into a dark delusion,” a teary Franke said in a statement during her February sentencing hearing. “My distorted version of reality went largely unchecked as I would isolate from anyone who challenged me. I was led to believe this world was an evil place, filled with cops who control, hospitals that injure, government agencies that brainwash, church leaders who lie and lust, husbands who refuse to protect, children who need abuse.
CLICK HERE FOR MORE TRUE CRIME FROM FOX NEWS
“Kevin, my husband of more than 23 years, you are the love of my life. I’m so sorry to leave to you what we both started together,” Franke continued through sobs. “The ending of our marriage is a tragedy, and you are wrapped around my heart in a knot I’ll never be able to undo. To my babies, my six little chicks, you are part of me. I was the momma duck who was consistently waddling you to safety. . . . In the past four years, I was consistently leading you to danger. . . . I was so disoriented that I believed dark was light and right was wrong.”
Ruby Franke and her business partner Jodi Hildebrandt were arrested and charged after Santa Clara police received a dispatch call asking for help. (Instagram/moms_of_truth)
Franke and Hildebrandt were both sentenced to serve four consecutive terms between one and 15 years each for each charge.
Shari’s comments before the Utah legislature on October 16 came 10 days ahead of the premiere of a Lifetime movie about her mother titled, “Mormon Mom Gone Wrong.”
Shari said on her Instagram story posted on October 4 that she and her siblings had never been contacted about the film and will not receive any proceeds.
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“This movie is trash, and only hurts my siblings more. Please do not support this movie,” she wrote at the time.
Simon and Schuster is set to publish Shari’s upcoming book, “The House of My Mother,” on January 7.
Read the full article from Here
San Francisco, CA
San Mateo supervisor urges CDC to step up protections amid hantavirus outbreak
(KRON)– San Mateo County Supervisor David Canepa is asking the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to step up protections at ports and Airports across the country, including San Francisco International Airport (SFO), after the recent hantavirus outbreak.
The outbreak began aboard a cruise ship in May 2026.
The ship outbreak has reached 12 cases, nine of which have been confirmed. So far, three people have died.
In California, five people, including one Santa Clara County resident, are being monitored for possible exposure. Another Bay Area resident is being monitored separately in Nebraska.
In the U.S., the CDC is monitoring 41 people for Hantavirus. That includes an additional 16 who were not aboard the cruise ship where the outbreak began, but were exposed on an April flight from Johannesburg with a woman who was infected on the ship and later died.
Canepa is fighting for concrete policies that would protect Californians, specifically calling out the CDC to create a clear process when outbreaks, similar to the recent hantavirus outbreak, begin.
Along with the CDC, the World Health Organization is emphasizing that the overall risk to the public remains low. So far, there’s been no evidence of ongoing transmission.
Denver, CO
Nuggets’ Nikola Jokic finishes 2nd in MVP voting; Shai Gilgeous-Alexander repeats
Two of the top three players in the NBA will face each other Monday. The other, according to MVP voters, will be watching from the couch.
Nuggets center Nikola Jokic finished in second place in the 2025-26 MVP vote, the league announced Sunday night. In what was widely regarded as a three-horse race, Jokic was a distant runner-up but extended his streak of top-two finishes to six consecutive years, joining Bill Russell and Larry Bird as the only players to do so.
Oklahoma City Thunder point guard Shai Gilgeous-Alexander was crowned MVP for the second straight season. San Antonio Spurs phenom Victor Wembanyama, just 22 years old, placed third. He was also named Defensive Player of the Year last month. The Spurs and Thunder are set to compete in the Western Conference Finals starting Monday night.
The award is decided by a panel of 100 voters who cover the NBA and its teams for various local, national and international media outlets. Jokic appeared on all 100 ballots, earning 10 first-place votes and 48 second-place nods. He was third on 37 ballots, fourth on four, fifth on one.
Gilgeous-Alexander received the lion’s share of the first-place votes with 83. Wembanyama got five votes for first. Ballots are submitted before the playoffs begin, ensuring that only the regular season is taken into account — meaning that Denver’s first-round exit had no bearing on the tally this year.
Jokic averaged 27.7 points, 12.9 rebounds and 10.7 assists per game, marking the seventh time in NBA history that a player has averaged a triple-double. Jokic, Russell Westbrook and Oscar Robertson are the only players to accomplish the feat. Jokic has done it two seasons in a row.
He shot 56.9% from the field, 38% from 3-point range and 83.1% from the foul line, good for a 67% true shooting clip that ranked fifth in the league. At 66.5%, Gilgeous-Alexander was the only non-center to rank in the top eight. He averaged 31.1 points, 4.3 rebounds and 6.6 assists for the defending champion and first-place Thunder.
Jokic’s season was split in two parts by a knee injury he suffered on Dec. 29, 2025, in Miami. Before he limped off the court with a bone bruise, he was averaging 29.6 points on 67% shooting inside the arc and 43.5% shooting outside it. After he returned a month later, his scoring dropped to 25.8 points per game at a 60.3% clip from 2-point range and an inefficient 31.9% mark from deep.
His shooting splits were even worse in the playoffs — 55.3% from two, 19.4% from three as the Timberwolves eliminated Denver in six games. The Serbian big man struggled to contend with four-time Defensive Player of the Year Rudy Gobert for most of the series. The Nuggets failed to advance to the second round for the first time since 2022.
Jokic has won three regular-season MVPs in his career, in addition to NBA Finals MVP in 2023 when he led Denver to its first championship. He’s eligible to sign a contract extension this summer.
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Seattle, WA
Caitlin Clark’s stats today in Indiana Fever vs Seattle Storm
Brian Ray describes the process of photographing Caitlin Clark
Iowa director of photography Brian Ray describes how he captured Caitlin Clark’s deep 3-pointer during the Indiana Fever’s game at Carver-Hawkeye in 2025.
Caitlin Clark and the Indiana Fever continued their 2026 WNBA regular season with an 89-78 victory against the Seattle Storm on Sunday, May 17.
Clark, a former Iowa women’s basketball star, and the Fever are 2-2 after the first four games of the regular season.
Here’s a look at how Clark fared in Sunday’s game in Indianapolis:
Caitlin Clark stats today in Indiana Fever vs Seattle Storm
- Minutes: 23
- Points: 21
- Rebounds: 7
- Assists: 10
- Blocks: 2
- Steals: 0
- Turnovers: 5
- FG shooting: 5-10
- 3-point shooting: 2-4
- Free throws: 9-9
Caitlin Clark, Indiana Fever upcoming games
- May 20: vs. Portland Fire, 6 p.m. CT, USA Network
- May 22: vs. Golden State Valkyries, 6:30 p.m. CT, ION
- May 28: at Golden State Valkyries, 9 p.m. CT, Prime
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