Polygamy Sect's Kids Face Tough Transition

Radical Culture Shift Awaits More Than 400 Children Placed In Texas' Foster Care System

(CBS/AP)  The hundreds of children from a polygamist compound taken into state custody are on their way to group homes, shelters and residences, but experts and lawyers fear their transition may be much harder than it is for other foster children.

The number of children in Texas custody after being taken from a polygamist retreat now stands at 462 because officials believe another 25 mothers from the compound are under 18.

Child Protective Services spokesman Darrell Azar says the girls initially claimed to be adults but are now in state custody. Earlier they had been staying voluntarily with their children at a shelter at the San Angelo Coliseum.

The official number of children taken from the ranch controlled by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints has been rising since a state raid three weeks ago. One reason is that some mothers under 18 claimed to be adults.

Roughly 260 children remain at the coliseum. The others were bused to foster facilities.

The 462 children taken from the compound in West Texas will be plunged into a culture radically different from the community where they and their families shunned the outside world as a hostile, contaminating influence on their godly way of life.

Many of the children have seen little or no television. They have been essentially home-schooled all their lives. Most were raised on garden-grown vegetables and twice-daily prayers with family. They frolic in long dresses and buttoned-up shirts from another century.

"There's going to be problems," said Susan Hays, who represents a toddler in the custody case. "They are a throwback to the 19th century in how they dress and how they behave."

Safety concerns are also worrying advocates for the children. There were four deaths in two facilities supervised by the state foster care system in 2006, reports CBS News correspondent Randall Pinkston.

Another facility - Boys and Girls Country - northwest of Houston has also reportedly had problems in the past and it is on the placement list for the children removed from the compound, Pinkston reports.

Buses have already shipped 138 children to group homes or boys' and girls' ranches, but most of the remaining children will be separated from their mothers for the first time when they are sent out of San Angelo in the coming days.

The state Child Protective Services program said it chose foster homes where the youngsters can be kept apart from other children for now.

"We recognize it's critical that these children not be exposed to mainstream culture too quickly or other things that would hinder their success," agency spokeswoman Shari Pulliam said. "We just want to protect them from abuse and neglect. We're not trying to change them."

The children were swept up in a raid earlier this month on the Yearning for Zion Ranch run by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a renegade Mormon splinter group. Authorities say it believes in marrying off underage girls to older men, and that there is evidence of physical and sexual abuse at the ranch.

The youngsters are being moved out of the crowded San Angelo Coliseum and will be placed in temporary facilities around Texas - some as far away as Houston, 500 miles off - until individual custody decisions can be made.

Those decisions could result in a number of possibilities: Some children could be placed in permanent foster care; some parents who have left the sect may win custody; some youngsters may be allowed to return to the ranch in Eldorado; and some may turn 18 before the case is complete and be allowed to choose their own fates.

Pulliam said the temporary foster care facilities have been briefed on the children's needs. "We're not going to have them in tank tops and shorts," she said.

Pulliam said the children will continue to be home-schooled by the temporary foster-care providers instead of being thrown into big public schools, where they could be bullied because of their differences.

In a related development, an arrest warrant affidavit made public Wednesday shows that a phone number used to report alleged abuse at the Texas retreat had been used previously by a 33-year-old Colorado woman.

It's not yet clear whether authorities suspect Rozita Swinton, of Colorado Springs, made any of the calls that triggered the April 3 raid of the compound.

Texas authorities have said a 16-year-old girl called a crisis center claiming she was abused at the compound. Authorities have not found that girl but say they have found evidence other children were abused.

In February, a woman calling herself "Jennifer" called 911 in Colorado Springs from the same number, claiming that her father had locked her in her basement for days, the document said. Swinton was arrested in connection with that incident on April 16 and later released.

[markcfl1]

Pensacola88- Your explanation of the legal powers of Texas CPS is stikingly similar to the Fed''s powers that detained witnesses in Guantanomo. I pray Texas does not resort to waterboarding to extract evidence from these children against their parents. They have suffered enough.

[markcfl1]

Pensacola88- In layman''s terms I believe you just said that the State of Texas used perceived powers to raid and invade a peaceful commune with hundreds of jack-booted goons armed with automatic weapons, backed up by armored personnel carriers, and strip women of their basic rights to love and raise their children in a society different from yours. That is all fine with your legal explanation. The uneducated and antisocial demand to know why?

I am curious how stable your children are. Maybe you can quote some legal jargon that explains why you are America''s best parent.

[pensacola88]

The so-called legal delemna is just a media release by a defense criminal lawyer or a sympathetic one from out of state. The Broad powers of the Texas State CPS services are streamlined compared to other states, so that Texas CPS officials can have leeway to pursue an investigation once they receive a complaint. In Texas, once the Grand Jury hands down the indictment and decide to go forward with a felony prosecution, the state has up to 6 months to prosecute. The Grand Jury will be quite busy on this one, because there are multiple victims.

It is clear that sympathizers don''t want to see this case go to trial or get prosecuted. It is clear that supporters who are posting on this comment stream will write anything to displace factual comments posted by those in favor of the prosecution.

The Foster Care part of the CPS provisions come with a special provision rider under the law that says, since the children are witnesses for the State of Texas, then anyone attempting to tamper with the investigation or acquire custody of the child can be charged with a felony for Tampering with a State''s witness.

There is no legal delemna on the State''s part. Texas can prosecute as many or as few offenders as they see fit. The accused witness clearly has a legal problem. There are no shortages of sympathizers, but most are undereducated and antisocial candidates for similar criminal behavior demonstrated in this crime. The State of Texas will be watching them.

[moonshadow22]

Since when is it our policy to take rumor, inuendo and an alleged informant as "reasonable cause" to rip more than 400 kids away from their families, expose them to a society that they have been taught to be evil, and challenge their very way of life simply because their philosophy is not fully understood?

Was there "hanky-panky" going on? Probally, but what about in YOUR neighborhood? Who''s sleeping with their babysitter? Who has a "special" secretary? Could YOUR neighborhood stand up-as a group, regardless of your individual actions- to the scrutiny that these folks are facing?

Face it, these folks have just chosen to follow a different path than the mainstream, and that scares some shallow but powerful people whose grip on that power relies on intimidation and subjugation.

This case is definitive of religous persecution.

[truthalways]

PLEASE GO TO THESE SITES AND SEE & READ THE TRUTH FOR YOURSELF...ABOUT THE ABUSE OF POWER FROM CPS AND THE STATE..AND WHAT EXPERTS AND LAWYERS ARE SAYING

http://www.captivefldschildren.org/

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080425/ap_on_re_us/polygamist_retreat;_ylt=Ag0xKJrHe_P9has2mV6nSxtvzwcF

[truthalways]

to Gr8ful4Tx

go to this website and you will see the girls and boys and what the true abuse...was it cps and the state coming to take all the children without evidence that all the families were guilty...see how happy the kids were before they got traumatized by the raid..there are pictures and videos there...

http://www.captivefldschildren.org/

There were more than 3 dozens of teenage boys sent to facilities and lots of little boys stayed with their mon and to foster recently...just watch the happy kids video on the website and it will make you cry...and also when all the kids were crying duting the raid...

today there was recent news on yahoo...here is the link:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080425/ap_on_re_us/polygamist_retreat;_ylt=Ag0xKJrHe_P9has2mV6nSxtvzwcF

The raid is rasing many legal questions among children'' experts, lawyers, civil rights organizations and constitutional lawyers...many are not approving the raid of all the children...1/2 of the families DOES NOT live in polygamous marriages and have little kids...

MANY had no pregnant teenagers living in their home!!!

to put all the families in one basket because of their religion is not right...not all of them are the same...there has been more than 130 little kids under 5 taken away from their mothers!!!

CPS and the State has gone over the limit...some children experts are saying that they have never heard of such a case before...read the yahoo article...

[michellem99-2009]

I am a american with english born here. The name calling..

[cpaide]

r-e-t-a-r-d is a fibonacci_ with less-than-perfect skills in English. Probably lesbian too.

[fibonacci_]

Wow, you cant even type r-e-t-a-r-d in here.

[fibonacci_]

cpaide is a *** with less-than-perfect skills in English. Probably religious too.