Dark Secrets of the Duttons: Why Every Yellowstone Family Member Belongs Behind Bars

One of the most controversial elements of Taylor Sheridan’s Yellowstone series is that its main characters have some lawless tendencies. Most, if not all, of Yellowstone’s main characters should be in prison. For characters like Rip Wheeler (Cole Hauser) and John Dutton (Kevin Costner), committing felonies like murder is synonymous with protecting the Yellowstone Dutton Ranch. Defending the largest contiguous ranch in the United States is no laughing matter, and we learn that quickly, with Rip’s intention to send Walker (Ryan Bingham) to the Train Station in Yellowstone season 1.

With only a few exceptions, Yellowstone makes murderers out of its main characters. Monica (Kelsey Asbille), Kayce Dutton’s (Luke Grimes) wife, vehemently opposed his family’s track record of violence, and she wanted no part of it. Still, due to Yellowstone’s grave themes, even Monica has blood on her hands. Monica helps Thomas Rainwater (Gil Birmingham) catch a killer on the Broken Rock Reservation, luring him to his kill site, where Mo Brings Plenty takes a fatal shot at him. Even Tate (Brecken Merrill) is a killer, forced to shoot an intruder in Yellowstone season 4.

It’s more compelling for television to witness the Dutton family tree get away with their crimes, and Yellowstone‘s message helps us somewhat subscribe to their necessity. Still, if Yellowstone played out realistically, all of the paramount members of John Dutton’s clan would be in prison for the crimes they committed. Will prison time be on the table for some of Yellowstone‘s central figures as their stories continue in respective Yellowstone spinoffs?

5John Dutton III

Governor Dutton Was Responsible For Countless Murders

Perhaps more than anyone, John Dutton deserves to be in prison. Even Kevin Costner is thinking about the family’s violent tendencies, candidly saying, “We should all be in prison,” regarding Yellowstone’s main characters. As we learn in Yellowstone season 1, John Dutton has carried out or sanctioned dozens or hundreds of murders while protecting his family’s ranch. John’s track record builds on a legacy of violence within the Dutton family. We know this begins in the 19th century with John Dutton’s ancestor, James Dutton (Tim McGraw), who killed and hanged thieves on his ranch.

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Still, John’s ancestors lived in a different time with more moral ambiguity. John has committed countless crimes protecting his ranch, though, in spirit, it has always been about protecting the land from greed, the same duty his ancestors were tasked with. While John isn’t the one tasked with dumping bodies at the train station by the time Yellowstone begins, we know that John was the one who trained his cowboys to do his dirty work from flashbacks that show John going to the train station with younger Lloyd (Forrest Smith) and Rip (Kyle Red Silverstein).

4Beth Dutton

Beth Dutton Could Go To Prison For Murdering Jamie Dutton In The Finale

Making good on her threats throughout Yellowstone, Beth Dutton murders her brother, Jamie Dutton (Wes Bentley), in Yellowstone season 5’s finale. And with Beth’s story ongoing in Beth and Rip’s Yellowstone spinoff, John’s daughter could still go to prison for the crime she committed. She fools the detectives into thinking that Jamie attacked her during a fight and then flees the scene of the crime. In reality, Beth killed her brother.

Beth attacked her brother in his own home after Jamie, the attorney general of Montana, played a role in their father’s murder. While he didn’t sign off on the deal, Jamie had discussed going after Montana’s governor with Sarah Atwood (Dawn Olivieri), who was operating as a Trojan horse for Market Equities by sleeping with John’s son. After John Dutton’s death in Yellowstone season 5, Beth immediately sniffs out her brother and Sarah’s involvement, vowing to wage war on her brother and, later, to kill him. Beth follows through on her threat in Yellowstone season 5’s finale, warranting prison time.

3Jamie Dutton

Jamie Was An Accessory To The Governor’s Murder While Impeaching Him As Attorney General

While Jamie can’t go to prison after Beth stabbed him to death in Yellowstone season 5, episode 14, he is perhaps the most deserving of hard time. On top of murdering a reporter in Yellowstone season 2, episode 6, to cover up the John Dutton hit piece he gave an interview for, Jamie is guilty of the heinous crimes he committed in Yellowstone season 5. While Jamie’s legal claims about John Dutton as Montana’s attorney general that justified the governor’s impeachment may have been warranted, helping Sarah kill him while vying for his office was the farthest thing from legal.

Wes Bentley’s Jamie Dutton won’t go to prison because Beth took his trial into her own hands, deciding that her brother should die for betraying their father. That said, the investigation into John Dutton and Sarah Atwood’s murders is ongoing, and either investigation could tie Jamie to his crimes, forever tainting his legacy as Montana’s attorney general. More than the rest of them, Jamie Dutton was morally bankrupt. Let’s not forget that he killed his biological father, Garrett Randall (Will Patton), at the end of Yellowstone season 4, shooting him as he looked on at the creek.

2Kayce Dutton

Kayce Dutton Murdered Tate’s Kidnappers Without A Fair Trial

Kayce Dutton is more morally sound than the rest of his clan, but the former Navy SEAL still has blood on his hands. After his son is kidnapped, Kayce goes after the responsible party. However, rather than the off-the-books killing his family usually does, Kayce uses his livestock agent badge to apprehend his son’s abductors under the guise of authority. However, Dutton abandons due process, arresting the abductors and allowing them to stand trial. Instead, Kayce kills Tate’s kidnappers in cold blood, coming after them with other law enforcement agencies, like the sheriff’s department, with the intent to kill them.

Kayce’s handling of his son’s perpetrators is perhaps his most unforgivable crime. While Kayce is responsible for other murders throughout Yellowstone, many are morally sound. For instance, in Yellowstone season 1, Dutton kills the men who kidnapped a girl from the Broken Rock Reservation, preventing an active abduction with his quick action. Though they trace the crime to him, Thomas Rainwater and Broken Rock Tribal Police Chief Ben Waters (Atticus Todd) help Kayce cover up his crimes, seeing the heroic actions behind the violence. Kayce’s crimes against Tate’s kidnappers are more complex to look past in a moral sense.

1Rip Wheeler

Rip Wheeler Murders A Fellow Cowboy For Making A Crude Comment About Beth

While Rip Wheeler has committed countless murders in his promise to defend the Yellowstone Ranch for John Dutton, Rip’s first crime on the ranch is perhaps the one that could have landed him in prison. In a flashback in Yellowstone season 5, a younger version of Rip, portrayed by Silverstein, is protecting the herd from a pack of wolves in the mountains with fellow Yellowstone Ranch cowboy Rowdy (Kai Caster). However, in a fit of boredom, Rowdy tells Rip that he detests their task, saying he could otherwise “be holding that girl’s ass in each hand,” referring to Beth.

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Rip brawls with Rowdy over his comment, hitting him in the head with a rock when Rowdy pulls a knife during their fist fight. While Wheeler did not intend to kill Rowdy, the hostility is hardly warranted, as John Dutton notes when he learns why Rip committed the crime. When Rip goes for help as Rowdy’s condition deteriorates, Rowdy dies, and Rip and John Dutton discover the ranch hand’s death when they return. While he was defending Beth, Rip’s actions weren’t essential to protecting the ranch and warranted his first-ever visit to Yellowstone’s Train Station, where he dumps Rowdy’s body.