The Shifting Bond Between the Brothers

This thread traces Dan and Ron’s movement from a distant sibling relationship to a shared religious mission, joint violence, and prison-era suspicion.

increasingBearing stren­gth in each eventdecreasing

An Uneven Childhood Closeness

An Uneven Childhood Closeness Ron as the older figure Ron was six years older than Dan and often acted more like a father figure than a sibling. The younger children looked to him for counsel, while Dan later said that he had wanted to be close to Ron but had not had many chances to know him well as a child. Divergent roles Dan remembered being especially close to Mark in childhood, while Ron occupied a more authoritative place in the family. Their difference in age and role meant that the brothers’ later intimacy was not simply a continuation of childhood companionship. That distinction gives the road trip of 1984 particular significance. Dan described it as a chance to know Ron for the first time, just as Ron’s family losses and religious transformation were drawing the brothers into an unusually intense alliance.

A Sudden Religious Alliance

A Sudden Religious Alliance Dan’s arguments take hold When Ron attended a discussion with his brothers to challenge Dan’s fundamentalist teachings, he instead became persuaded by them. The change converted the brothers from opponents into allies. Dan’s ideas found a new force in Ron’s standing as an older brother whom the younger men had long respected. Shared purpose Ron joined the brothers’ meetings, abandoned ordinary markers of civic life, and later entered Onias’s School of the Prophets with Dan and several siblings. Their bond became organized around a common conviction that the established church and government had betrayed sacred principles. The conversion also carried an emotional charge: Dan offered Ron a way to interpret the loss of his wife, children, home, and church standing as a sign of divine calling. Religious agreement thus supplied both a mission and a substitute family at a moment when Ron felt abandoned.

Brotherhood Under Strain

Brotherhood Under Strain Promotion and revelations Onias appointed Ron bishop of the school, reinforcing the authority Ron already held among his brothers. When Ron began receiving revelations, Dan was fascinated. He had not received such messages himself in the school, but he listened closely as Ron described feeling the Lord’s thoughts and writing them down. Unequal roles in a shared belief Ron’s revelations elevated him as the mouth of God and assigned Dan the role of the arm of God. Dan accepted that division as a basis for action. When other members of the school rejected the removal revelation, Ron and Dan left together rather than submit to the group’s judgment. The bond was now both fraternal and hierarchical. Ron supplied the revelation and direction; Dan believed he was entrusted with its physical execution. Their trust in one another reinforced a plan that those around them had recognized as dangerous.

The Road Trip and the Killings

The Road Trip and the Killings Intimacy on the road Ron and Dan traveled across the West together, seeking support from fundamentalist communities and discussing the removal revelation. Dan said the journey brought him closer to Ron than he had been before. As the weeks passed, he also noticed Ron becoming more agitated and focused on a date for the killings. A shared crime On July 24, Ron and Dan went to Allen’s apartment, where they killed Brenda and Erica. Their accounts differed about who wielded the knife, but Dan acknowledged that Ron beat Brenda and was present throughout the attack. Afterward, the brothers left together and continued toward the other people named in the revelation. Their partnership reached its most terrible expression in the killings. Whatever their private differences, both brothers acted as part of a shared effort, each treating the other’s presence as confirmation that the commandment was real and must be fulfilled.

From Complicity to Suspicion

From Complicity to Suspicion A near-fatal rupture In jail, Ron attacked Dan and later gave him a revelation saying Dan should allow Ron to kill him. Dan agreed once, then refused a second time. Shortly afterward Ron attempted suicide by hanging. The brothers’ shared religious identity had become entangled with physical danger and radically different understandings of what God required. A new account of the past By 1995, Dan believed that Ron was a child of the devil and feared that he still intended to kill him. In prison Dan developed a new theology in which he identified himself as Elijah, the forerunner of Christ. He reinterpreted Ron’s violence as an attempt by Satan to prevent his mission. The brotherhood that once made Dan feel part of a divine undertaking had become a story of betrayal and supernatural opposition. Dan continued to explain their shared history through faith, but no longer trusted Ron as an ally or even recognized him as a fellow child of God.

Before Dan and Ron joined the School of the Prophets

Late summer 1982

Late 1983 through spring 1984

May through July 24, 1984

December 1984 through the later prison years