Chad Daybell trial live: Medical examiner testifies about bruises on body of ex-wife Tammy

Dr Lily Marsden attended the exhumation of Tammy Daybell and assisted Dr Erik Christensen, Utah’s chief medical examiner at the time, with the autopsy.

They concluded that Tammy died from asphyxia, and the manner of death was homicide.

But in their initial examination, Dr Marsden said she and Dr Christensen were not able to see anything that would have caused Tammy’s death.

On the stand Tuesday, Dr Marsden said that smothering, a bag over her head or weight on her chest would not have left any obvious signs of asphyxiation on the body.

Chad Daybell’s adult children have mostly stayed out of the spotlight in the wake of their father’s arrest in the death of their mother Tammy Daybell and Lori Vallow’s two children.

But almost all of them will testify in his death penalty case in his defence.

Daybell’s attorney John Prior says they will detail their mother’s “health struggle” before her sudden death in 2019.

Daybell had told police his wife had died suddenly in her sleep after battling an illness, but an autopsy later revealed she died of asphyxiation.

“They’re going to talk about their mother’s use of various medical treatments she would use—oils she would put on her leg, medicine, and different herbs she would take, and that their mother was suffering from a number of maladies, and she would refuse to see a doctor,”Mr Prior said during opening statements.

Chad Daybell’s trial is now on break for lunch.

Court will resume at 2pm.

On Friday, Samantha Gwilliam testified about the conversation she had with Chad Daybell after the “shocking” death of her sister Tammy Daybell.

She asked him in a phone call about his quick marriage to Lori Vallow just two weeks after Tammy’s death and said he responded to her in a “spiritual-like tone.”

“Samantha, I am telling you now that when I was at the cemetery, Tammy showed herself to me and said that I should move on,” he said.

Ms Gwilliam said she responded with: “When most women say that to their husband, it’s in two years from now, not two weeks after I’m dead.”

Tylee Ryan’s best friend Ashlyn Rynd testified on Monday in court that Tylee’s relationship with her younger brother JJ Vallow, seven, was “almost maternal.”

“She was there for him. … he was going for anybody who was going to provide for him, and Tylee would always be the one to show up,” Ashlyn said.

Ashlyn temporarily moved to Texas in 2017, but the two friends remained close, and she moved back to Arizona.

However, when Tylee moved to Idaho in 2019, they “tried for two weeks” but fell out of contact.

Dr Lily Marsden, the Deputy Chief Medical Examiner at the Utah Medical Examiner’s Office, who attended the exhumation of Tammy Daybell’s body, took the stand on Tuesday.

She said the bruises on Tammy are consistent with someone being restrained and could mean more than one person was there when she was killed. She said the bruises indicate someone was kneeling on her chest while another person was holding her down.

Dr Marsden also testified that she had information that Tammy may have been experiencing seizures or shaking.

“It is extremely unusual for a 49-year-old woman to just spontaneously develop seizures without a reason like a tumor,” she said.

Prosecutor Lindsey Blake ends her questioning by asking Dr Marsden, “In your experience, do dead bodies roll out of bed?”

Chad Daybell was arrested on 9 June 2020 and booked into the Fremont County Jail after the remains of Lori Vallow’s children were found in his Rexburg, Idaho backyard.

He had left the house during the search as Rexburg Police, Fremont County Sheriff deputies and the FBI swarmed the property and began a dig that lasted for hours. But he was arrested a short time later.

Daybell has shown little to no emotion at his court appearances over the past four years.

On 21 March, he was transferred from Fremont County Jail to the Ada County Jail in Boise in preparation for his trial.

Daybell is charged with first-degree murder and conspiracy to commit murder in the deaths of the two children and the death of his former wife Tammy. He’s also charged with insurance fraud.

Prosecutors say that the couple conspired with Vallow’s brother Alex Cox to kill the children and Daybell’s wife both as part of their doomsday beliefs – but also to collect life insurance money, the kids’ social security and survivor benefits.

On Monday, jurors listened to gruesome testimony and viewed graphic photos as Douglas Halepaska, FBI Toolmark Analyst, described tools used to chop and shattered Tylee Ryan’s remains.

The 16-year-old’s remains were found buried and burned on Chad Daybell’s property.

Her hip bone and spine were shattered.

“The force you can kind of see at the top left, you can see that the bone has actually shattered in separate places and fractured,” the analyst said.

“Based on my training experience, it appears that the tool that was used actually cut through the bone and into that soft tissue and may have actually carried into it.”

Mr Halepaska testified that many of Tylee’s injuries came from tools like a machete, a hatchet, a cleaver and a pick.

A pickaxe and shovel were among the numerous tools found on Daybell’s property that tested positive for human remains.

The defence argued that the tools analyst could not specifically identify the tools that were used on Tylee.

Family and friends honoured the short lives of Tylee Ryan and Joshua “JJ” Vallow at a  celebration of life service on 27 April.

The service was hosted by JJ Vallow’s grandparents Larry and Kay Woodcock on Saturday.

“We’re not sad today,” Mr Woodcock told the attendees. “We’re honouring those who lost their lives in this.”

Mr Woodcock, who attended every day of Vallow’s trial last year and has been a regular at Mr Daybell’s trial, was one of many who shared his favourite memories of the children at the service.

The grandparents decided to have the service after the children’s remains were returned to the family in 2023 – more than four years after they were killed.

Andrea Cavallier reports: