Utah mom who believed in 'end of times' is arrested over taking kids to Croatia

A Utah woman who said the end times were near and who is accused of taking her four young children overseas in violation of a custody order has been arrested in Croatia, authorities said Tuesday.

Elleshia Seymour, 35, was charged in December in Salt Lake County with four counts of custodial interference by removing the kids from the state despite not being entitled to custody. Croatia’s foreign ministry confirmed via email Tuesday that she was arrested earlier this month and was being held on suspicion of violating children’s rights.

The kids are being held in foster custody in Croatia while her ex-husband, Kendall Seymour, works to bring them home. He told The Associated Press he's currently in the Southern European country and has been visiting the children while completing paperwork. He is the father of the three oldest children, and said he has power of attorney for the child who is not his.

The Salt Lake County district attorney, Sam Gill, said his office is exploring options with federal partners to extradite Elleshia Seymour. She was unavailable for comment while in Croatian custody, and Utah court records did not list an attorney who could speak on her behalf.

Elleshia Seymour posted videos of herself on TikTok last year describing apocalyptic dreams and urging people to prepare, according to her ex-husband, who identified her in videos viewed by the AP.

The end times is a Christian view with various interpretations of apocalyptic biblical passages, but many believe it involves a series of cataclysmic events before Jesus returns to Earth.

In one video, she said she dreamed about an electromagnetic pulse attack that caused aircraft to crash, computers to stop working and people to lose access to food, water and heating. “The Lord is trying to tell people that it's going to be a cold winter."

Elleshia Seymour and her children were last seen in the U.S. in late November. They were staying with an American family in Croatia who apparently didn't know at first that she and her children were being sought, according to her ex-husband.

One of the children tipped off a son of the hosting family, leading to her arrest Jan. 16, Kendall Seymour said by phone from Croatia. “One of my kids told him, ‘Hey, search my name, Google my name, you’ll find it.’”

The host family either turned her in or convinced her to do so, he said.

The FBI had been getting tips that Elleshia Seymour and the children — ages 11, 8, 7 and 3 — were in Croatia after allegedly leaving their home in a Salt Lake City suburb in late November, said Kendall Seymour.

A former boyfriend told police Elleshia Seymour had “recently discussed obtaining passports and leaving the country, expressing concerns about biblical events and the ‘end of times,’” according to Utah court documents.

Court documents said police went to Seymour’s home in West Jordan on Dec. 2 after friends and co-workers reported being unable to reach her. Officers found the apartment unlocked with nobody home, along with a notebook listing plans to shred documents, discard phones and take passports.

Police later found her car parked at Salt Lake City International Airport and reviewed video showing the family entering the airport Nov. 29 and boarding a one-way flight to Europe, according to court documents.

Elleshia Seymour divorced the father of her youngest child in 2024 and Kendall Seymour in 2021, according to court documents.

Associated Press writer Jovana Gec in Belgrade, Serbia, contributed to this report.

FILE - Salt Lake City, where Elleshia Seymour lived with her children before allegedly taking them to Croatia, is seen on April 10, 2024. (AP Photo/Rick Bowmer, File)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Trump administration has notified Congress that it is taking the first steps to possibly reopen the shuttered U.S. Embassy in Venezuela as it explores restoring relations with the South American country following the U.S. military raid that ousted then-President Nicolás Maduro.

In a notice to lawmakers dated Monday and obtained by The Associated Press on Tuesday, the State Department said it was sending in a regular and growing contingent of temporary staffers to conduct “select” diplomatic functions.

“We are writing to notify the committee of the Department of State’s intent to implement a phased approach to potentially resume Embassy Caracas operations,” the department said in separate but identical letters to 10 House and Senate committees.

The notification, sent to Capitol Hill just two days before Secretary of State Marco Rubio i s due to testify on Venezuela before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said the staffers would live and work in a temporary facility while the existing embassy compound is brought up to standard.

It is the first formal notice of the administration’s intent to re-open the embassy in Caracas. Such a move would be key to the restoration of diplomatic relations between the two countries, which have been broken since March 2019 when the embassy was shuttered.

The Trump administration has moved slowly but surely to try to normalize ties with Maduro's successor and current acting President Delcy Rodríguez. However, doing so would require the U.S. to revoke its decision to recognize the Venezuelan parliament elected in 2015 as the legitimate government.

Shortly after the military operation that deposed Maduro on Jan. 3, a small team from the Venezuela Affairs Unit at the U.S. Embassy in Bogota, Colombia, traveled to Caracas to do an initial survey and appraise the prospects for re-opening the embassy.

Last week, the department named a Bogota-based career U.S. diplomat to serve as the charge d’affaires for Venezuela. In its notification, the department said the first phase would be the expanded deployment of temporary staff to Caracas.

“To support increased temporary duty personnel and the potential resumption of embassy operations, the Department of State may also need to open an interim or temporary facility in Caracas, Venezuela, to accommodate temporary duty personnel or operations while the existing facilities are brought to serviceable condition,” it said.

These diplomats would perform limited “select duties,” including security and management in the first phase, but gradually expand their work “to include consular, political, economic, management, security, and public diplomacy.” In addition, the Venezuela Affairs Unit now located in Bogota would move to Caracas.

Asked about the notice, the State Department replied that it is "is taking steps to prepare for the potential reopening of the embassy in Caracas should that decision be made. The congressional notification is part of that process to allow for those preparations to take place.”

United States Secretary of State Marco Rubio speaks after the signing of a Board of Peace charter during the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Thursday, Jan. 22, 2026. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)