Israel Keyes was born in Richmond, Utah, on January 7, 1978, to Heidi and Jeff Keyes. He was the second of ten children in his family. His family belonged to the LDS Church from Torrance, California, and prior to that, his father had been an LDS missionary in Germany.
Israel, along with his siblings were homeschooled until 1983, when his family left the LDS church and moved to a remote spot of land in Stevens County, Washington. The property was so far away from society it had no rumming water, nor electricity; all 12 of the family members lived in a 1 room cabin. (Israel was only 5 years old at this point).
In the nearby township of Colville, the family attended services at a church called the Ark, (instilled white supremacy Christian Identity ideology). Israel Keyes would later describe the Ark as an Amish-like environment.
***Interesting fact...During this period of attending the Ark, the Keyes family befriended the neighboring family of Chevie Kehoe, who was later convicted for a 1996 triple murder.***
The family attended another church in Colville called the Christian Israel Covenant Church that taught British Israelism as doctrine, also teaching that Anglo-Saxons were to rule over the perceived inferior races. Israel would later akin it to be militia-like. For years, some of the Keyes children were forced to sleep in a tent due to their cabin's small size and made to hunt their food, chop firewood, and work on local farms to support the family.
(This is where Israel Keyes started showing signs of being "unhinged")
Just for the fun of it, Israel would hunt "anything with a heartbeat"; openly admitting to skinning a deer ALIVE. After revealing his hobby, Israel was ridiculed and ostracized by the other kids who when to the same church.
Even from a young age, Israel Keyes—(who stood 6 ft 2) displayed signs of how dangerous he was; even if people would view him as just a misfit. He admitted to shooting at neighbors' houses, starting fires in the woods, etc. He also broke into houses with friend, (the teen cut their friendship off once he saw Israel shoot an animal).
On another occasion, Keyes stole several guns from his neighbor's place. He was forced to apologize when his parents discovered what he did. Israel Keyes was also known to sell guns to the locals.
The Keyes brought in friends to stay in times of trouble. Israel Keyes, one day, was our with their children and one of his sistersl he tied a cat to a tree with a cord from a parachute and gored it with a .22 revolver. The cat circled the tree until it crashed into it.It was after this incident that Israel Keyes realized that hs was different from his other peers, and kept his troubling behaviour to himself. His mother, Heidi Keyes, noticed some subtle changes in her son at this point as well.
Israel Keyes DID prove to be handy with his hands. When he was merely 16, he built a wooden cabin for his family. He worked for a local contractor, but also kept a very detailed journal, especially detailing his sins, like lusting after his girlfriend, at the time.
Once again, the Keyes family moved, this time to Smyma, Maine. They worked at collecting sap for a maple syrup company, in a prominent Amish community. Their mother, Heidi, who maintained her higly religious ways, forced her children to hide any of their actions, like watching movies or playing instruments. It was around this time, that Israel Keyes would renounce himself from Christianity; declaring that he was Atheist.
This confession resulted in his parents kicking him out and his siblings being forced to not speak to him. Not long after, Israel Keyes became extremely interested in Satanism and was planning to commit a ritualist murder.
To be continued...