TikTok personality and mommy influencer Hannah Hiatt is under investigation after a video of her 2-year-old son appearing to flinch when his father walked towards him sparked a “slew of reports” to authorities. Utah’s Ogden Police Department confirmed to PEOPLE on Dec. 10 that “there is an open, active investigation into” Hiatt, who first rose to fame in October when she shared a video showing the 17 dirty diapers she had lying around her house.
Further information, including what the investigation will entail and if there will be public updates, was not provided. According to authorities, there is already a detective “assigned to the case.”
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The Ogden Police Department said they opened the investigation due to “numerous reports through Child Protective Service and police” sparked by a since-deleted TikTok video Hiatt shared last month that sparked concern among viewers. In the video, Hiatt, who goes by @hannah_bhiatt on the platform and previously went by @nursehannahbh, could be seen grocery shopping with her husband and their 2-year-old son, James, who was seated in the child seat of a cart. Followers expressed concern, though, over one moment in the video in which the toddler lifted his hands up to his face as his father walked towards him in what many suggested was a move of self-defense.
“In the video that you guys are all freaking out about, they’re just playing. They’re always playing where they scare each other… that’s what they’re always doing,” Hiatt addressed the concern in a Nov. 29 follow-up video, in which she described her husband as the “sweetest, nicest, kindest, most loving, most nurturing father in the entire world.”
She continued: “Nothing’s going on. From the moment that my husband wakes up in the morning, to the second he goes to bed, he is only thinking about our children and our family and what’s best for us.”
In a second video on Nov. 30, Hiatt slammed those comparing her to YouTuber Ruby Franke, who in February was sentenced to up to 60 years in prison after she pleaded guilty to four counts of aggravated child abuse.
“To be compared, right now, to Ruby Franke is absolutely comical. It’s hilarious, really. We live in a world nowadays where people will turn nothing into something,” she said before accusing her critics of being “so desperate to become TikTok famous.” She added that her two children – James and a 2-month-old baby – are very “happy… They’re healthy, well-nourished. They’re running around playing. That should be a pretty good indicator that everything’s just fine.”
Hiatt has not addressed the Odgen Police Department’s open investigation at this time.
