SAN ANGELO, Texas, April 7, 2008
400 Children Taken From Polygamist Sect
Authorities Investigating Abuse At Compound Put Children In Texas Custody
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Law enforcement officials escort members of The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Later Day Saints onto a school bus in Eldorado, Texas, Sunday, April 6, 2008. Authorities took 220 women and children from the compound. The group was relocated to San Angelo, Texas. (AP Photo/Tony Gutierrez)
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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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Play CBS Video Video Texas' Child Abuse Case Authorities say more than 400 children have been taken from a polygamist compound and placed in state custody as they investigate if one of them had been an underage bride. Hari Sreenivasan reports.
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Video Former Polygamist Speaks Out A former polygamist himself, John Llewellyn speaks with Katie Couric about the latest scandal involving the alleged child abuse of 401 Texas children under the supervision of a breakaway Mormon sect.
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Video Polygamist Compound Raided A 16-year-old girl's call for help sparked a raid on a polygamist sect in Texas. Women and children were removed from the compound, but the girl has not been located. Hari Sreenivasan reports.
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Interactive Eye on Religion Find out more about the beliefs, practices and history of some of the world's major religions.
The dayslong raid on the sprawling compound built by now-jailed polygamist leader Warren Jeffs was sparked by a 16-year-old girl's call to authorities that she was being abused and that girls as young as 14 and 15 were being forced into marriages with much older men.
Dressed in home-sewn, ankle-length dresses with their hair pinned up in braids, some 133 women left the Yearning for Zion Ranch of their own volition along with the children.
State troopers were holding an unknown number of men in the compound until investigators finished executing a house-to-house search of the 1,700-acre property, which includes a medical facility, numerous large housing units and an 80-foot white limestone temple that rises discordantly out of the brown scrub.
"In my opinion, this is the largest endeavor we've ever been involved in in the state of Texas," said Children's Protective Services spokesman Marleigh Meisner, who said she was also involved in the 1993 siege of the Branch Davidian compound in Waco.
The members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints spent their days raising numerous children, tilling small gardens and doing chores. But at least one former resident says life was not some idyllic replica of 19th-century life.
"Once you go into the compound, you don't ever leave it," said Carolyn Jessop, one of the wives of the alleged leader of the Eldorado complex. Jessop left with her eight children before the sect moved to Texas.
Jessop said the community emphasized self-sufficiency because they believed the apocalypse was near.
The women were not allowed to wear red - the color Jeffs said belonged to Jesus - and were not allowed to cut their hair. They were also kept isolated from the outside world.
They "were born into this," said Jessop, 40. "They have no concept of mainstream society, and their mothers were born into and have no concept of mainstream culture. Their grandmothers were born into it."
Meisner said each child will get an advocate and an attorney but predicted that if they end up permanently separated from their families, the sheltered children would have a tough acclimation to modern life.
Tela Mange, a spokeswoman for the state Department of Public Safety, said the criminal investigation was still under way, and that charges would be filed if investigators determined children were abused.
Still uncertain is the location of the girl whose call initiated the raid. She allegedly had a child at 15, and authorities were looking for documents, family photos or even a family Bible with lists of marriages and children to demonstrate the girl was married to Dale Barlow, 50.
Efforts to locate the girl are hampered because the women and children in custody are related to one another, share similar names or were given different names at different times, reports CBS News correspondent Hari Sreenivasan.
Under Texas law, girls younger than 16 cannot marry, even with parental approval.
The church members were being held at Fort Concho, a 150-year-old fort built to protect frontier settlements, to be interviewed about the 16-year-old girl and whether, in fact, the teenager was among them.
DPS troopers arrested one man on a charge of interfering with the duties of a public servant during the search warrant, but it was not Barlow, Mange said.
"For the most part, residents at the ranch have been cooperative. However, because of some of the diplomatic efforts in regards to the residents, the process of serving the search warrants is taking longer than usual," said DPS spokesman Tom Vinger, who declined to elaborate. "The annex is extremely large and the temple is massive."
Barlow's probation officer, Bill Loader, told The Salt Lake Tribune that he was in Arizona. Phone messages seeking comment from Loader and Barlow were not immediately returned Monday.
Barlow was sentenced to jail last year after pleading no contest to conspiracy to commit sexual conduct with a minor. He was ordered to register as a sex offender for three years while he is on probation.
The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, headed by Jeffs after his father's death in 2002, broke away from the Mormon church after the latter disavowed polygamy more than a century ago.
The group is concentrated along the Arizona-Utah line but several enclaves have been built elsewhere, including in Texas. Several years ago it paid $700,000 for the Eldorado property, a former exotic animal ranch, and began building the compound as authorities in Arizona and Utah began increasingly scrutinizing the group.
On Monday, a woman who had once been in a similar sect told The Early Show that women are treated like "breeding machines" in the sects.
"(Polygamy is) a life where, as a female, you really don't think for yourself, you're basically told what to do. You really are just a breeding machine to further the agenda of the male patriarchy," said Laurie Allen to anchor Julie Chen. "This is what I experienced."
The compound sits down a narrow paved road and behind a hill that shields it almost entirely from view in Eldorado, a town of fewer than 2,000 surrounded by sheep ranches nearly 200 miles northwest of San Antonio. Only the 80-foot-high white temple can be seen on the horizon.
Jeffs is jailed in Kingman, Ariz., where he awaits trial for four counts each of incest and sexual conduct with a minor stemming from two arranged marriages between teenage girls and their older male relatives.
In November, he 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.
The investigation prompted by the girl's call last week was the first in Texas involving the sect.
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See all 327 CommentsI guess you finally woke up and saw that point, in spite of yourself. Yes, many people USE the Bible to justify their own means. That does not mean that what you do not comprehend actually justifies their deeds.
I am beginning to wonder about your fixation on rape. Perhaps you have had some traumatic experiences while camping or incarcerated? Maybe some secular counseling would be of help.
Posted by BillORights at 09:41 PM : Apr 09, 2008
Ho-key, and that distinguishes them from any other religious organization? Hmm, Bill, you''re not lookin'' too bright here. Anyone can use the Bible to just their acts, it''s so full of BS, contradictions and plain evil that those who bend over backwards to accomodate and to give it legitimacy ought to be ashamed of themselves, but then, that assumes they are capable of feeling shame, which in turn, implies that they have any interest in being moral, which Bible thumpers, almost by definition, do not.
Posted by BillORights at 09:41 PM : Apr 09, 2008
LMAO -- rape is considered barbaric by modern standards, but not by Biblical standards! You''re killing me, Bill. Thanks for proving my point. The Bible is evil!
Posted by BillORights at 09:47 PM : Apr 09, 2008
What''s that I hear? The sound of Bill''s a__ sucking wind? LOL Grasping at straws again, are we?
The Bible condones rape: "Only the young girls who are virgins may live; you may keep them for yourselves." Numbers 31:18
You''re very welcome....and thank you for saying so....and don''t give up on your quest for knowledge pertaining to religion and/or whatever your heart desires.....best of luck to you!
Was there something posted about consequences for refusal? I did not see that. Is this more extrapolation?
What about the woman in an arranged marriage that may not be too wild about her new husband? I would imagine that you are aware that most marriages until fairly recently, historically speaking, were arranged by family or community leaders. If the woman marries only because of the fear of the consequences if she does not, is that rape, too?
Correction: You posted numerous biblical verses relating to events which illustrate behavior considered barbaric by modern standards, none of which were relevant to the debate as to whether there is anything in the Bible that justifies or condones child molestation or armed compounds full of religious zealots.
Do you understand either of the words condone or justify? Try to find something in the Bible which says %u201CI want you to take it upon yourselves to molest children, for it is good%u201D. It is not there.
The main point is, these criminal nitwits are doing what they want to do, and they are trying to say they are justified in doing so because the Bible directs us to do this. It does not. They are doing so, only because they want to and they take biblical verses out of context in their attempts to justify their acts.
Posted by BillORights at 09:26 PM : Apr 09, 2008
Well, you''re one sick puppy if you think it''s not rape when a woman submits to s_e_x out of the fear of the consequences that will follow if she refuses. Only a conservative nutcase would materially distinguish that from holding a gun against her head. And certainly, this passage is all a man would need to justify holding a gun against her head if she resisted, so the point is well made, and you are just showing your capacity to be an idiot, apparently because you are still SORE about an argument you once lost very badly. :-)
Can you say, "rape"? - Posted by Voltaire333 at 09:11 PM : Apr 09, 2008
I can say forced or compulsory marriage against her will, something possibly not too different from arranged marriages common in that day, from the bride''s perspective, which probably has no equivalent today.
Rape, in the ordinary sense, is not the same thing. Even the previously provided example portrayed rape as an offense which required the offender to pay restitution and submit to marrying the victim, who by then would have been view by society as damaged goods.
Can you say, "rape"?
Posted by BillORights at 08:52 PM : Apr 09, 2008
Of course, your only "arguments" have been to jump up and down screaming that I''m wrong, while I gave you cite after cite in proof of your idiocy. Face it, you couldn''t win a debate with a third grader, unless it was about the "prior restraint" of guns. LOL
Your victory today is every bit as decisive as every previous encounter - in an utterly dismal failure sort of a way.
You have consistently failed to provide any valid support of your arguments. Your victory is in your consistency.
Posted by BillORights at 08:44 PM : Apr 09, 2008
I''m surprised you haven''t already. I feel my victory is not nearly as decisive today as it was on the gun control stuff, which had you in such a panic that you couldn''t think of any response but to censor.
Careful! I might delete all of your drivel again!
Posted by BillORights at 08:21 PM : Apr 09, 2008
Well, at least I have one, which puts me miles ahead of BillyBoy. Instead of censoring for CBS, you should write for the New Republic! With all your totally unfounded and unwarranted arrogance, you''d fit right in! Another nitwit educated beyond his capacity to think! :-)
You are still obviously deeply confused. Your only real point is of the parietal variety.
Posted by BillORights at 07:45 PM : Apr 09, 2008
My only REAL point is that someone is still SORE about losing an argument over gun control!
How''s your well regulated militia doin'', Billy? Is it in good working order today? Will you protect me when the jack-booted Feds come to take me away? LMAO!
Posted by BillORights at 07:45 PM : Apr 09, 2008
LOL, I never said the Bible says "GO DO THIS NOW." I only said that it condones it, and plainly, it does! Go read your Bible and weep!
"Only the young girls who are virgins may live; you may keep them for yourselves." Numbers 31:18
Marrying a Woman Taken Prisoner in War
Moses said to Israel:
From time to time, you men will serve as soldiers and go off to war. The LORD your God will help you defeat your enemies, and you will take many prisoners. One of these prisoners may be a beautiful woman, and you may want to marry her. But first you must bring her into your home, and have her shave her head, cut her nails, get rid of her foreign clothes, and start wearing Israelite clothes. She will mourn a month for her father and mother, then you can marry her.
Later on, if you are not happy with the woman, you can divorce her, and she can go free. But you have slept with her as your wife, so you cannot sell her as a slave or make her into your own slave.
Again...your point?
Where does this say GO DO THIS NOW? Do we go to war and take prisoners to bring home with us as souvenirs?
Thou shalt plunder, rape and pillage to thine heart%u2019s content, whensoever and wheresoever thou chooseth, and upon questioning by the King%u2019s henchmen, tell unto them that biblical authority granteth thee immunity from prosecution.
If you really want to pick and choose to find something that will support your position, try the dictionary. It is full of silly words, many of which can be twisted and rearranged to mean anything you want. Posted by BillORights at 07:26 PM : Apr 09, 2008
"After she has mourned her father and mother for a full month, you may have relations with her . . . but you shall not sell her or enslave her, since she was married to you under compulsion." Deuteronomy 21:10-14 NAB
Again, Billy Boy, what is it about "relations" under "compulsion" that you don''t want to understand?
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