5 men allege Ruby Franke's business partner Jodi Hildebrandt forced them into porn and sex addiction therapy when they didn't actually need it, NBC reports
- Five men alleged to NBC News that Jodi Hildebrandt misdiagnosed them with porn or sex addictions.
- The men alleged they were then forced into counseling for issues they did not have.
Five men have accused Jodi Hildebrandt — the business partner of family YouTube vlogger Ruby Franke — of diagnosing them with porn or sex addictions and then forcing them into therapy even though they all said that they did not have a problem with porn, according to an NBC News report on Hildebrandt's business practices as a therapist.
Hildebrandt's lawyer did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment.
Hildebrandt, alongside Franke, was arrested in August and they were both charged with child abuse. In a probable cause affidavit reviewed by Insider, authorities said Franke's son had climbed out of a window at Hildebrandt's home and asked a neighbor for food and water. Authorities said the son appeared malnourished and had "severe" wounds, and that they also found Franke's daughter malnourished in Hildebrandt's house.
Prior to her arrest, Hildebrandt counseled Mormon couples and families in Utah through her life coaching service, ConneXions, NBC News reported. According to Hildebrandt's LinkedIn page, ConneXions started in 2007.
NBC News reported that ConneXions was not registered as an LLC until April 2018, citing Utah Department of Commerce records.
Hildebrandt's family and couple counseling services pulled from the principles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints — also known as LDS or the Mormon church, NBC News reported, citing former clients.
Some former clients told NBC News that Hildebrandt took LDS teaching to an extreme in their sessions. They told NBC News that they, too, were members of the church at the time.
In some cases, the clients alleged Hildebrandt diagnosed them with porn or sex addictions — largely frowned upon activities for LDS members — and then forced them into counseling for their addictions, even though they all said they did not struggle with either, NBC News reported.
Porn addiction is not classified as a disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-5), which is the guide used by mental health counselors in the US. But, NBC News reported, the LDS does encourage its members to get help from LDS-sponsored addiction recovery programs if they consume pornography.
NBC News reported that the group therapy meetings were focused on porn, sex, and lust and included hourlong meetings and daily "support calls" between group members. Hildebrandt's former clients told NBC News that the group would discuss their punishments for watching porn, such as being kicked out of their own homes or abstaining from sex for months with their spouses.
One man, who told NBC News that he was misdiagnosed and mistreated by Hildebrandt when he was 16, told the publication that he was initially sent to her for two months because he got in trouble for keeping a secret phone to play video games. He described his life as "extremely sheltered" to NBC News.
"I had a secret phone, but I didn't even know what porn was," Spencer Tibbets, now 21, told NBC News.
He told NBC News that Hildebrandt took him out of the children's group when he was a teen to move him to the adult men's therapy group so he could more deeply discuss his therapy goals.
But the men in that group were being seen for porn addictions, Tibbets told NBC News, adding that in their calls, the men would talk about being separated from their wives as they struggled with porn consumption. Tibbets told NBC that one man talked about his incest fantasies with him.
Tibbets told NBC News that in counseling, Hildebrandt told him that if he "didn't accept the Mormon God, [he] would never be able to get help from therapy."