ELDORADO, Texas, April 5, 2008
Tensions Escalate At Polygamist Compound
Authorities Prepare For "The Worst" After Sect Leaders Refuse Search Warrant
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This aerial view shows the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints compound under construction near Eldorado, Texas, in this March 2, 2005 file photo. (AP Photo/Donna McWilliam, file)
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Officials escort two buses, April 4, 2008 from the retreat built by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, located near El Dorado, Texas. Child welfare officials and state troopers removed at least one busload of children from the secretive West Texas religious retreat built by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs following a complaint to state authorities. (AP Photo/Harry Cabluck)
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Officers stand at the entrance to the El Dorado Civic Center, April 4, 2008, in El Dorado, Texas, after children were removed in the buses in the background from a nearby polygamist retreat. (AP Photo/Harry Cabluck)
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Warren Jeffs looks at one of his attorneys during his sentencing on Nov. 20, 2007, in St. George, Utah. (AP)
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If no agreement is reached with sect leaders, authorities will forcibly remove the sect's followers "as peaceably as possible," Allison Palmer, a prosecutor in Tom Green County, told the San Angelo Standard-Times.
Medical workers are being sent "in case this were to a go in a way that no one wants," Palmer said. Law enforcers are "preparing for the worst," she said.
"Within the religion that we have encountered, their place of worship is very special to them," Palmer said. "It appears to be of great concern to them if a person from outside their congregation even attempts to step inside their place of worship."
A search warrant authorized troopers to enter the retreat, run by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. They are looking for evidence of a marriage between the girl and a 50-year-old man.
Court documents say the girl had a baby eight months ago, when she was 15.
State welfare officials on Friday removed 52 girls from the compound. Marleigh Meisner, a spokeswoman for Child Protective Services, said another 131 residents were removed overnight. By Saturday afternoon, 137 children and 46 women were being housed and interviewed at local community centers.
"They seem to be doing fine," Meisner told The Associated Press.
The whereabouts of the 16-year-old mother who sparked the investigation are unknown, Meisner said. State troopers who raided the religious retreat were looking for the girl, her baby girl and 50-year-old Dale Barlow.
Under Texas law, girls younger than 16 cannot marry, even with parental approval.
Officials in Texas declined to comment Saturday on whether they had found Barlow, citing a gag order, but the man's probation officer told The Salt Lake Tribune that he was in Arizona.
"He said the authorities had called him (in Colorado City, Arizona) and some girl had accused him of assaulting her and he didn't even know who she was," said Bill Loader, a probation officer in Arizona.
Barlow was sentenced to jail time last year after pleading no contest to conspiracy to commit sexual conduct with a minor. He was also ordered to register as a sex offender for three years while he is on probation.
His lawyer in that case, Bruce Griffen, said he had not spoken to Barlow in a year.
The search warrant instructed officers to look for marriage records or other evidence linking her to the man and the baby. The warrant authorized the seizure of computer drives, CDs, DVDs or photos.
Those inside the retreat did not respond to requests for comment.
The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints broke away from the Mormon church after it disavowed polygamy more than a century ago.
The compound sits down a narrow paved road and behind a hill that shields it almost entirely from view in town. Only the 80-foot-high, gleaming white temple can be seen on the horizon. Authorities blocked access to the gate, keeping onlookers miles away.
The 1,700-acre property had been an exotic game ranch. It is surrounded by dusty, wind-swept land where sheep are raised and mohair produced.
Eldorado is a two-stoplight town of fewer than 2,000 people and located nearly 200 miles northwest of San Antonio. It consists of a cluster of government buildings, a couple churches and a few blocks of houses.
State officials said they did not know how many people lived at the retreat, although local officials estimated about 150 two years ago.
The FLDS has been led by Warren Jeffs since his father died in 2002. In November, Jeffs was sentenced to two consecutive sentences of five years to life in prison in Utah for being an accomplice to the rape of a 14-year-old girl who wed her cousin in an arranged marriage in 2001.
In Arizona, Jeffs is charged as an accomplice with four counts each of incest and sexual conduct with a minor stemming from two arranged marriages between teenage girls and their older male relatives. He is jailed in Kingman, Arizona, awaiting trial.
© MMVIII The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
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Best-selling author Mitch Albom on his first nonfiction work since "Tuesdays with Morrie."
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See all 136 CommentsI believe you probably mean the Constitution, not the NRA. They have been instrumental in the preservation of constitutional rights. They do not create them.
(Let the hysteria begin.)
What about out of the hands of government? You may recall at Waco that government guns led to the deaths of 80+ people at the Branch Davidian compound.
Governments around the world KILLED 170 MILLION of their own people in the 20th Century alone - NOT including war casualties (Death By Government). The worst individual serial killers in history did not kill more than 50 or so people.
I''ll take guns in the hands of responsible private citizens over guns in the hands of unaccountable government agents any day.
You''re *** tootin'' - so why didn''t the local sheriff do this, decades ago? We''ve all read in the recent past that many local law enforcements turned a blind eye because they were sympathetic to what was going on.
Posted by bgwinnett
The Mormons are dumb but, these are FLDS not Mormons, most of whom having never been Mormon.
yeah
The nuns were brutal to my dad in 30''s.I wouldn''t mind perv nuns if they were good looking.
Posted by bgwinnett
if you''re catholic, it will be the perv priests or nuns. why not round them up with all the mormans? and round up the perv politicians who molest the pages and interns on capitol hill.
Posted by cpaide at 02:58 PM : Apr 06, 2008
IF ANYONE EVER GETS ME IT''LL BE THE KKK CUS I''M CATHOLIC.
After WACO, Janet Reno defined a "cult" as a group which preaches Jesus and in which there is "excessive reading of the Bible". Basically, a real Christian!
The prophet Daniel Rodes warned before hand: If the Christian church does not intercede, there will be a definition made by the government which is INTENDED to include Christians.
The Satanist-humanist-atheists are manipulating events to justify their goals: the death of Christians. (atheists and humanists don''t really realize what they are working for... but they don''t care, either.)
Posted by bgwinnett
you are more stupid than any mormans if you think it''s ok for the feds to kidnap and jail a whole little town of people because of some anonymous tip from someone who doesn''t even exist.
so where''s the aclu and jessie jackson now? what, they aren''t black mormans? stinks like waco and ''lil bush.
you might be next.
well here again see another frindge group like,
the branch davidians, and the bunch that took poison down in mexico whent he end of the world didn''t come.
it is difficult for goverment to enforce the protection of the innocent from the other extreme to infrindging on religous freedom.
Fuzzy what can be done with frindge groups ?
well thats a good question , take for example the Baptist Soldiers in Colorado to the Moonies of Chicago, and Harichrishnas,
I think as long as no established law is broken such as rape of a minor, you can''t infrindge on what people want to belive, but when those beliefs transform into unlawful behavior, the Law must be upheld.
I was trying to think of that other crazy california group that was devil worshippers or pegans.
anyway word space is up
sincerely Fuzzy Bear
Man, what a deal. hahaha
part of that 18% that still supports GW bush and the
McBushCain repibliCONs
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See all 136 Comments