A Coffee County woman remains in jail in Croatia after she was arrested last month in connection with the “Doomsday Mom” case from Salt Lake City, Utah.
Lovie McVeigh, 49, of Douglas, was taken into custody when Elleshia Anne Seymour, 35, of Salt Lake City, was apprehended with her four children in Dubrovnik, Croatia, on January 26, 2026. Seymour had fled Salt Lake City with her four children because she believed the world was going to end and Salt Lake City wasn’t safe, according to reports. Allegedly using forged documents, she and her children boarded a plane at the Salt Lake City International Airport in late November bound for Europe. She did not tell anyone where she was going.
Her disappearance sparked an international manhunt. As it turned out, Seymour and her children went to Dubrovnik and moved into a small home with McVeigh and her 13-year-old son. McVeigh shared the same apocalyptic beliefs as Seymour and believed that when the end times began, Croatia was the safest place to be.
When authorities discovered Seymour, she was arrested and charged with four counts of custodial interference and removing a child from the state.
McVeigh, who has had at least one run-in with Croatian authorities since moving to the country about 18 months ago, was arrested on child endangerment charges. Her visa was also expired. McVeigh remains incarcerated in Croatia. Her son, along with the four Seymour children, were placed in a state-operated orphanage. The Seymour children have been released to the custody of their families and are on their way back home to Utah. McVeigh’s son remains in the orphanage while family in Coffee County work through the process of getting him back home.
The investigation into Seymour’s disappearance and the level of McVeigh’s involvement in the plot is active and ongoing.
