True Crime YouTube star Jonathan Lee Riches, aka JLR Investigates, is accused of brutally beating, strangling and threatening to kill a former girlfriend, she claims in courtroom paperwork.
In a sworn petition filed in Arkansas, Jaime Tennille Phillips claims Riches, 49, carried out a violent assault on Christmas Eve 2025, capping what she describes as a years-long sample of abuse that included him repeatedly strangling her.
The submitting, obtained by The Submit, alleges Riches — a convicted felon who spent 10 years in federal jail over a bank card fraud scheme — was in a relationship with Phillips starting early 2023 that spiraled into “a persistent and escalating sample of home abuse, coercive management, intimidation, monetary exploitation, and bodily violence.”
Based on the handwritten affidavit, the alleged Dec. 24 assault left Phillips with “excessive accidents, together with damaged nostril + septum, important trauma to my head and ribs,” requiring emergency medical care, CT scans and X-rays — and that she’s going to want reconstructive surgical procedure.
Phillips claims Riches assaulted her on a number of events, beat her with a closed fist in a separate alleged Aug. 2025 assault, strangled her roughly two dozen instances, and threatened to kill her if she reported him, the submitting alleges.
She additionally alleges ongoing harassment after the Christmas incident, which happened in Washington state, together with threats, intimidation, and monetary abuse.
On Jan. 21, 2026, the courtroom issued an order of safety, discovering there was ample proof Phillips confronted an “fast and current hazard of home abuse.”
Riches has not responded to the allegations and he and his lawyer didn’t return The Submit’s requests for remark.
Chelan County Sheriff’s Workplace in Washington despatched The Submit an incident report, which says that they had possible trigger to arrest Riches, however he had left the state. He has not formally been charged in relation to the incident and no warrant seems to have been issued for his arrest.
Phillips herself has a colourful previous, having been accused in 2017 of fabricating a narrative about being impregnated by Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore as an adolescent, which she tried to get the Washington Submit to run. She couldn’t be reached by The Submit for remark.
In an e-mail to The Submit, she claimed: “He’s a harmful man and sadly I discovered the laborious method to not underestimate what he’s able to doing.”
Riches reinvented himself as “JLR Investigates” — a YouTube channel which has grown to greater than half 1,000,000 subscribers — round three years in the past after a lifetime of frauds, fakeries and manipulation.
He describes himself as a “fearless investigator” and inserts himself into high-profile investigations to dwell stream.
Most lately he has been broadcasting from Tucson, Arizona, outdoors the home of lacking Nancy Guthrie.
“He’s mainly a giant movie star within the true-crime neighborhood,” fellow True Crime streamer Alina Smith advised The Submit.
Riches has gained a popularity for being one of the crucial persistent streamers, filming for as much as 15 hours a day, responding to questions in actual time and accepting cash from viewers to finish duties comparable to zooming in on sure components of a criminal offense scene.
The extra subscribers he will get, the extra worthwhile his YouTube movies develop into, no matter whether or not the data he reviews is truth or fiction.
Different streamers have estimated to The Submit he makes as much as $30,000 per week along with his persistent “boots on the bottom” strategy.
However his viewers are seemingly unaware of simply how sinister Riches’ previous is.
In 2019 he brazenly admitted being a troll and fabricating extremely delicate data, after he was known as out for pretending to be Jewish and giving a faux backstory at a Trump rally.
“I don’t take into consideration the long-term penalties so far as disinformation or offending anybody,” Riches advised The Huffington Submit in 2019.
“The disinformation that I would like, I can put on the market. The following mass capturing, earlier than they determine the shooter, I can arrange 10 Twitter accounts wanting like information websites after which create whoever I would like because the shooter … Weak, gullible individuals will see that, they assume it’s from a information website after which they may copy it and tweet it out.”
Riches’ operation has drawn criticism from authorities and journalists alike as he’s a part of a rising ecosystem of YouTube crime-scene streamers who monetize tragedy by broadcasting from lively investigations.
Nonetheless, Riches’ notoriety lengthy predates the livestream period.
Fraud ring and federal jail
Based on federal courtroom information, Riches was indicted in 2003 within the Southern District of Texas alongside a number of co-defendants for a bank card fraud scheme.
The indictment claimed the conspirators used stolen monetary knowledge to acquire cash and property by way of fraudulent transactions. Riches was arrested in Florida in February 2003 and dropped at Texas to face the costs, coming into a responsible plea to conspiracy and wire-fraud counts in September that 12 months.
A federal decide sentenced him to 125 months in jail for wire fraud and 60 months for conspiracy — to run concurrently — together with $92,680 in restitution to victims, in line with the felony docket.
‘Most litigious inmate’
Whereas incarcerated, Riches flooded federal courts with hundreds of weird, frivolous, lawsuits concentrating on politicians, firms, public figures and celebrities — together with one towards the Kardashian household for allegedly taking part in al-Qaida coaching.
The instances have been rapidly dismissed.
The sheer quantity of Riches’ lawsuits — estimated at over 4,000 — in the end compelled federal prosecutors to hunt an unprecedented nationwide injunction towards him, to forestall him from suing. He was additionally banned from having paper in his cell.
In response, Riches went on a starvation strike for 22 days, and a warden had him force-fed by way of a tube.
Sandy Hook hoax
After being launched in 2012, Riches returned to Pennsylvania on supervised launch — however nearly instantly discovered himself again in authorized hassle.
He traveled to Newtown, Connecticut, three days after the Sandy Hook Elementary College bloodbath – that left 20 first graders and 6 employees members lifeless. He attended a memorial the place he falsely claimed to be the uncle of gunman Adam Lanza, in line with native authorities and courtroom filings.
He stated he was “Jonathan Lanza”, and made unsubstantiated claims in regards to the shooter’s psychological well being, which have been rapidly debunked.
Three days later, Riches posted a YouTube video of the journey by which he tried to strategy Lanza’s house earlier than being stopped by a police blockade.
“We’re reality seekers, and we’re going to discover out why Adam was mind-controlled and manipulated to go in and allegedly shoot little children in Sandy Hook Elementary College, and why this occurred,” Riches stated within the clip, as reported by the New Haven Register.
A couple of weeks later, Riches discovered himself again behind bars for violating the phrases of his probation by crossing state traces. From there, his phoney lawsuits saved coming.
In March 2016, he filed a civil motion towards consultant Gabrielle Giffords, posing as the person who shot her and killed six individuals a number of years earlier.
Based on a felony grievance, he posed as Jared Loughner, the gunman who tried to assassinate Giffords. The grievance sought $25 million. Riches pleaded responsible to a cost of constructing false statements, in line with courtroom information, and was sentenced to 5 years’ probation.
He later advised the Arizona Republic that he filed the faux lawsuit as a joke to entertain himself in jail.
Riches was launched from federal jail in Could 2016, in line with the Bureau of Prisons inmate locator.
Nonetheless, his headline-grabbing stunts and questionable antics continued to evolve.
Throughout Invoice Cosby’s trial in September 2016, he confirmed up in courtroom repeatedly, providing the disgraced rapist Jell-O every time he entered. Weeks later, he surfaced in Florida alongside then–gubernatorial hopeful Andrew Gillum, posing as a Black Lives Matter protester.
A few of his most audacious acts got here from disguising himself as each a Muslim and Jewish attendee at political occasions — together with rallies for now-President Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. He confirmed to the Huffington Submit he was “an atheist from a Christian household,” and confirmed at the moment he didn’t “observe any faith.”
Reside stream ‘Investigator‘
In recent times Riches has tried to reinvent himself on-line below the model “JLR Investigates.”
Whereas he markets himself as a crime-scene investigator chasing the reality behind high-profile instances — critics say his appearances usually quantity to nothing however exploitation, interference, and the spreading disinformation.
In a single such incident, a enterprise card was left on Nancy Guthrie’s entrance door. Riches advised his viewers she may need been on the middle of an lively elder abuse case previous to her disappearance.
The cardboard was from a case supervisor for Arizona’s Grownup Protecting Companies division who later confirmed it had dropped by after she was reported lacking, so she may contact the company if she returned house safely.
“A lack of know-how results in hypothesis,” Riches advised The Republic whereas livestreaming outdoors Guthrie’s house in February.
The observe mirrors a rising development highlighted in latest reporting by The Submit about YouTubers who earn hundreds of {dollars} from livestreams outdoors lively investigations, broadcasting theories and commentary to viewers.
Legislation-enforcement officers and victims’ advocates have warned the observe can complicate investigations and implicate harmless individuals and victims, wreaking havoc on their lives.
But, for some top-earning dwell streamers like Riches, it seems notoriety and infamy can really work of their favor.
Crime Seen Collective co-founder Alina Smith advised The Submit she had seen followers of Riches fly in from interstate and present up at crime scenes merely for a meet and greet with him. A lot of them got here bearing presents, she stated. Others merely donate money to him on-line. “They’re obsessive about him,” she stated.
