In January 2015, Kevin Franke and his divorced wife, Ruby Franke, started posting videos on their YouTube channel, 8 Passengers, chronicling their daily activities as parents to six kids. Prior to being shut down, the channel had 2.5 million followers at its height. By 2020, many Mormon followers begged for child protective agencies to look into the family’s rigid household due to growing concern.
Despite appearing in numerous YouTube videos, Kevin was not prosecuted upon his wife’s arrest on the 30th of August 2023.
Attorney Randy Kester for Kevin has said that his client is a kind individual who was not involved in the assaults that occurred against his children. The father of six children says that before her incarceration, they were not together, but he filed for divorce and is now trying to get his kids back. Additionally, he has declared his desire for his ex-wife to serve the longest sentence possible in prison.
“These children were subjected to horrifying and inhumane treatment, both physically and psychologically, by those they had a right to trust,” his attorney continued.
Ruby Franke
The channel was hosted by Ruby Franke, the former host of 8 Passengers, until it was abruptly shut down in 2022. Compulsion to look into Franke emerged from the records of her strict discipline practices. One of the Franke kids disclosed in 2020 that their father ended up resting on a beanbag for a few months.
It was later revealed that Franke used coercive tactics to maintain control, including depriving her children of food, threatening to behead stuffed animals, and eventually transferring one of her kids to a camp for problematic teenagers.
Ruby and Kevin Franke divorced in 2022, and Kevin left the property.
Soon after the divorce, Ruby Franke and her business partner Jodi Hildebrandt founded Connections, a parent counseling service.
Kevin and Ruby Franke Have Six Children Together
Kevin and Ruby are parents to six children together: Eve, Russell, Julie, Chad, Abby, and Shari. Their now-defunct 8Passengers YouTube channel featured their children, who are between the ages of 10 and 20.
After Ruby’s arrest in August 2023, four of their children were placed under the custody of child protective services. Shari, her oldest and estranged daughter, rejoiced when the police showed up at the family’s house.
Shari posted a picture of the cops at the residence on the platform along with the words, “Finally.”
“It’s been an exciting day,” Shari posted to Instagram. “My family and I am really happy that justice is being done. We’re happy that the police and CPS finally took action after years of our attempts to inform them of this.”
Kevin has posted life documents on YouTube with Ruby Franke
In 2015, Ruby and Kevin started posting vlogs on their now-deleted 8Passengers YouTube channel, chronicling their life as parents to six kids. Before it was taken down, Insider claims that it accumulated roughly 2.5 million followers.
Eventually, in 2020, passengers came under investigation as followers started to worry about the rigid household of the Mormon family. An internet petition asking child protective services to look into the Franke family was signed by a large number of people.
Kevin appeared in numerous YouTube videos, one of which claimed that he “supported the decision to send their son, then 14 years old, to the Anasazi Foundation Wilderness Therapy Program.”
When Ruby Franke was arrested, Kevin and Ruby Were Not Together
In September 2023, Randy Kester, Kevin’s attorney, stated to Today that his client and his spouse had been apart “at Ruby’s directive” for about a year and a half. Additionally, he said, “Kevin did not want to be separated.”
“He wanted to work through concerns as a family,” Kester clarified. There was never a formal, documented separation agreement or decree of separate maintenance. Ruby and Jodi Hildebrandt prescribed the terms for the separation.”
Hildebrandt started providing marriage counseling to Ruby and Kevin in 2021. In 2012, Hildebrandt—who was divorced and alienated from her own two children—founded the therapy group ConneXions.
Hildebrandt offered parenting and marriage counseling with the goal of helping people “dispose of distortion’s ugly lies in order to live in Truth, connection, and freedom.” Her website made the promise to “help you flourish in your relationships.”
Hildebrandt recommended that the couple split up in order to preserve their marriage throughout therapy, as Kester had previously told PEOPLE. At Hildebrandt’s request, Kevin moved out, filed for divorce, and ceased to communicate with his family.
When Ruby was detained, Kevin was not charged with any offenses
When the two of Franke’s kids were reportedly discovered “emaciated and malnourished” in Hildebrandt’s home in Ivins, Utah, on August 30, 2023, Ruby & Hildebrandt were taken into custody and charged with many counts of child abuse, according to authorities at the time. Ruby and Kevin have six children together, yet Kevin has never been accused of a crime.
In the month of September 2023, Kevin’s attorney Kester spoke with the morning show Good Morning America and characterized the man he represented as a “very gentle” individual who was not involved in the mistreatment of his children. “There’s no one’s ever filed any kind of claim that he’s never physically assaulted those children or anybody else,” Kester stated. The following month, Kester told Today that Kevin was presently attempting to rebuild his ties with his kids.
In November 2023, Kevin filed for divorce
Despite reports that they had been apart for more than a year due to “Ruby’s directive,” Kevin filed for separation from his spouse in November 2023. The application was made weeks after Ruby was initially accused of criminal child abuse.
Kevin filed a sealed divorce suit in Utah, according to court documents examined by PEOPLE. According to the court filing, an interpersonal relations injunction was also filed, directing Ruby and Kevin not to criticize or harass one another in the presence of their children.
Conclusion
Ruby Franke’s spouse, Kevin Franke, is no longer with her. Their visible online presence has brought attention to their relationship. Ruby frequently mentions Kevin Franke, who seems to have had a big influence on their family’s channel on YouTube and internet activities. The details of their romance and its breakup, however, are still mostly unknown. Both are still pursuing their own courses in spite of their separation. The specifics of Kevin Franke’s relationship with Ruby are still unknown because they haven’t talked about it in great depth in the public. Their experience serves as an example of the difficulties in maintaining private-public boundaries and the intricacies of interpersonal interactions in the digital age.
