Polygamist To Stand Trial On Rape Charges

Church Leader Warren Jeffs Could Face Life In Prison For Forcing 14-Year-Old To Marry Cousin

(AP)  A polygamist church leader accused of forcing a 14-year-old girl to marry an older cousin in 2001 was ordered Thursday to stand trial on charges of rape by accomplice.

Warren Jeffs, 51, pleaded not guilty Thursday in state district court. The leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints could face up to life in prison if convicted. A trial was set for April 23.

Prosecutors said the girl had no choice but to obey Jeffs, whose influence over his followers has been described as extraordinary, dictating everything from where they live to whom they should marry.

The girl “expressed her disdain, reluctance, opposition and total dislike of sexual relations,” Judge James Shumate said.

The woman, now 20, was not in the courtroom to hear Shumate's decision. She testified last month that she felt “completely trapped and defeated” during a ceremony at a Nevada motel — the “darkest time of my entire life.”

The woman, identified as Jane Doe No. 4, left the sect after 3 1/2 years, remarried and had a baby last week.

Outside court, her attorney Roger Hoole said she was pleased with and relieved by the ruling.

Jeffs' defense team contends he is being pursued for his religious beliefs.

In his closing argument, defense attorney Wally Bugden told Shumate he would be making a “factual leap” to find probable cause for a trial.

“Saying I don't want to get married is not the same as saying I don't want to have intercourse,” Bugden said.

Prosecutors said Jeffs, who performed the wedding ceremony, was responsible for any trauma because he counseled her to submit to her husband, “mind, body and soul.”

The girl and her cousin united in an FLDS religious ceremony but never held a valid marriage license. The cousin has not been charged.

Jeffs also faces felony charges in Arizona, accused there of arranging a marriage between a 16-year-old-girl and a 28-year-old man, who was already married.

Jeffs, at the time one of the FBI's Ten Most Wanted fugitives, was arrested Aug. 28 in a traffic stop north of Las Vegas. He is being held without bail.

Jeffs' sect traces its roots to early Mormon theology, which promoted plural marriage. The modern Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints disavows polygamy and renounced the practice in 1890 as a condition of Utah statehood.

FLDS members, however, consider themselves “fundamentalist Mormons” who continue to believe polygamy will bring glory in heaven. They also consider Jeffs a prophet of God with dominion over their salvation.

The church has 10,000 members mostly living in Colorado City, Ariz., and Hildale, Utah, on the Utah-Arizona border.

[markbrookhar]

Worldwide, stranger things happen than this. For example, Muhammad the founder of Islam had at least 11 wives, several of them concurrently at the time of his death. When he was 52 he married a child who was 8 years old at time of betrothal, and no more than 15 when they consumated their relationship. Current Moslim law allows up to 4 wives in many mid-eastern countrys where it is legal. Why should we be so shocked at fundemental Mormanism and be so politically accepting of Islam?

howzilla, I have a really strange neighbor, he tells all his friends that he has been married for 22 years, however I know that the woman he is living with is not his wife, but her sister, he got his wifes sister pregnant 6 years ago, and she had a daughter from a previous marriage that lives with them. He also has a son now 22 from his wife. So he has a 6 year old kid that can call him uncle as well as daddy, and get this his wife, her sister, all the kids go on vacation together in Wilmington NC every year.

Genuine Rednecks......
Oh did I forget to mention he sleeps with one of his cousins from time to time?

Look at the photo above, Warren Jeffs is checking out his attorney, he is thinking "she wouldn't be a bad wife"

[freezulu]

If you're born into this or any other extreme religious clan, it's very difficult to escape. I salute the brave young FLDS women who risk everything to escape, and even fight back via our judicial system to try and prevent further abuses from happening to others.

-Ron / Nebraska