Lori Vallow's Attorney Asks For Reduced Bail — Prosecutor Says She Should Produce Missing Kids First

Lori Vallow’s attorneys have requested her bail be lowered, but prosecutors have argued she needs to produce her missing children first.

Vallow, sometimes referred to as Lori Daybell, requested her $1 million bond be reduced to $10,000 or $50,000 just shortly after the original judge in the case was dismissed in March, according to local station KUTV.

Vallow’s attorney Mark Means filed another motion last week for a bail reduction hearing, after arguing that his March 24 request had been ignored, the East Idaho News reports.

As part of the motion, Means said that during a March 30 visit with his client he was forced to meet with her in a “public visitor” room that separated the two with a wall of glass.

“I was told that the ONLY way that my client could review documents was to pass possibly sensitive documents/records by and through a Detention Center Officer from the public (my side) room... round and about…through multiple security doors to the inmate (client side). All of which would be out of sight of the Attorney and Client,” he wrote.

Means said his conversation with Vallow was also recorded on a telephone line.

He called the visit “unreasonable and in direct violation” of the Idaho and United States constitutions and said the current policies at the jail were impairing his ability to properly prepare for a preliminary hearing in the case.

Vallow was initially arrested in Kauai. She was held on a $5 million bond and extradited to Idaho, where she had been living when her children, 17-year-old Tylee Ryan and 7-year-old Joshua “J.J.” Vallow, disappeared in September.

She is facing two counts of felony child abandonment, misdemeanor resisting and obstructing an officer, solicitation of a crime and contempt of court after she failed to produce her missing children by a deadline set by authorities.

Her bond was later reduced to $1 million.

Madison County Prosecuting Attorney Rob Wood has filed an objection to Vallow’s latest attempt to get her bond further reduced.

“It has been less than one month since the Court reduced the defendant’s bail to $1,000,000.00 and it appears to be an abuse of the Court Rules for the Defendant to disqualify the judge on the case and then to request the same or similar relief so soon thereafter,” he wrote in the objection, according to East Idaho News.

He also noted that Vallow has still not given authorities any information about her missing children.

“This court should make obedience to said order or show a good cause for why the defendant cannot obey said order, a condition for any further bail reduction,” he said in the court documents.

Wood agreed that the conversation between Means and Vallow had been recorded, but said it was done accidentally and was “promptly deleted” by jail staff.

He said the new visitation practices are in place due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

“What was the public visitation center is now being used for attorneys to visit their clients in a safe manner, which does not allow for the spread of the COVID-19 virus into jail,” he said.

No ruling has been made on the request from Vallow’s attorney.

Means also requested the prosecution turn over toxicology and autopsy reports for two of Vallow’s former husbands, Charles Vallow and Joe Ryan, who both died before she married her fifth and current husband Chad Daybell.

Charles Vallow was killed by Lori’s brother Alex Cox, who claimed he shot Charles in self-defense. Charles died just months after he had filed for divorce from Vallow, after citing his growing concern about her extreme religious beliefs.

“Mother [Lori Vallow] has recently become infatuated at times obsessive about near death experiences and spiritual visions,” the documents filed on behalf of Charles said, according to local station KSTU.

The documents also claimed that Vallow believed she was a “translated being who cannot taste death sent by God to lead the 144,000 into the Millennium.”

Cox later died in December under circumstances that are still under investigation.

Vallow’s attorney has also requested the toxicology and autopsy report in Cox's death, along with the same reports in the death of Tammy Daybell.

Tammy Daybell had been married to Chad Daybell when she died in October under what authorities now believe was suspicious circumstances.

Chad Daybell and Lori Vallow got married just weeks later.