Prosecutor responds to Lori Vallow Daybell’s request for a new trial
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PHOENIX — A Maricopa County prosecutor says Lori Vallow Daybell’s request for a new trial should be denied because “there was no juror misconduct, no prosecutorial misconduct, no improper exclusion of hearsay testimony and no lack of impartiality by the court.”
Maricopa County Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Treena Kay filed a 16-page response Tuesday to Daybell’s motion for a new trial.
A jury found Daybell guilty of conspiracy to commit the murder of her fourth husband, Charles Vallow, on April 22. She represented herself and it took the jury less than three hours to reach a guilty verdict.
In her filing last week, Daybell asked Maricopa County Superior Court Judge Justin Beresky to grant her another trial for a number of reasons, including a statement made by a juror on live television after the verdict was announced.
“You know, I feel sorry for her, driving home yesterday, I was like, God, she’s spending the next three lives in prison, in a cell,” the juror said.
The Idaho crimes were not discussed in the Arizona trial. Jurors were not supposed to know Daybell was convicted in 2023 of murdering her two children, Joshua JJ Vallow and Tylee Ryan, along with conspiracy to commit the murder of Tammy Daybell, her husband’s first wife.
Kay responded to Daybell’s argument by pointing out the juror was “mobbed” by the media after walking out of the courthouse and made multiple statements while answering questions.
“In the initial media contact, one of the media asked Juror Fifteen and another juror, ‘Were any of you folks aware that this woman had already been convicted of three homicides?’ Juror Fifteen responds, ‘No, no. I did not,’” Kay wrote.
Kay also pointed out an interview the juror did with Hidden True Crime in which he “repeatedly stated that after the verdict was read and they were released from the admonition, he started ‘Googling’ Lori Vallow while still in the Jury Room.”
Daybell also raised concerns that statements made by Tylee and her brother, Alex Cox, after Charles Vallow was shot were not allowed into the trial. The statements were considered hearsay because Tylee and Cox are dead and could not be called as witnesses.
“There is no exception that permits their admission,” Kay wrote. “The defendant never established a foundation that any statements made by Alex Cox or Tylee Ryan hours after the shooting were admissible under any of the Arizona Rules of Evidence. The testimony of Alex Cox and Tylee Ryan were appropriately precluded as hearsay.”
Content retrieved from: https://www.eastidahonews.com/2025/05/prosecutor-responds-to-lori-vallow-daybells-request-for-a-new-trial/.
