Texas To Reunite 12 Kids With Sect Parents

Families Will Be Supervised While Court Considers Appeal Of A Ruling That The State Had No Right To Take The Children

(CBS/AP)  State child welfare authorities have agreed to reunite 12 children from a west Texas polygamist sect with their parents until the state Supreme Court rules on their custody case.

Teresa Kelly, a spokeswoman for the parents' lawyer, says Child Protective Services agreed on Friday to allow the parents to live with their children in the San Antonio area under state supervision.

Texas child welfare authorities asked the state Supreme Court Friday to block a stinging appellate court ruling that they had no right to round up more than 440 children from a polygamist sect's ranch.

Child Protective Services also asked the high court to allow it to keep the other children in foster-care facilities around the state while justices consider their appeal.

"This case is about adult men commanding sex from underage children; about women knowingly condoning and allowing sexual abuse of underage children; about the need for the department to take action under difficult, time-sensitive and unprecedented circumstances to protect children on an emergency basis," the state agency said in its appeal.

The filings Friday come one day after the Third Court of Appeals in Austin said the state failed to show the children were in any immediate danger when they were rounded up last month.

Some court-appointed attorneys for the children are in a holding pattern, reports CBS News correspondent Hari Sreenivasan. Susan Hayes, who represents a 2-year-old, says she is not worried about abuse if the child is returned.

"I have not seen anything about my client, and there are a lot of ad litems that have seen nothing about their particular clients and their families," she said.

On Thursday, the Third Court of Appeals in Austin ordered a lower-court judge to rescind her decision giving the state custody of more than 100 of the children. The appellate court said state law allows children to be taken without court order only when they are in immediate physical danger, and that only five children at the ranch have apparently been abused.

The ruling technically applies only to the 38 mothers who filed the complaint, but it was broad enough to cover nearly every child swept up in the April raid on the Eldorado ranch run by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

CPS said the appellate court overstepped in its ruling because the lower court had discretion in the custody case.

In the appeal, CPS cited as "documented" sexual abuse a statement from a girl who said she knew a 16-year-old who is married with a 5-month-old baby; and a statement from another girl that "Uncle Merrill" decides who and when she will marry. The state also cited five underage pregnant girls.

The agency also said it can't return 124 children to the mothers who filed the complaint against the state because the agency can't sort out which children belong to which parent.

State-ordered DNA test results are not expected back for at least another week, the agency said.

"The department is not in a position to properly identify the correct mothers or fathers at this time," CPS said in its appeal.

The agency accused parents of being uncooperative and not providing proper identification - though in dozens of individual custody hearings this week, parents provided state-issued birth certificates. Other sect members mistakenly believed to be minors also provided drivers' licenses as proof of their age.

The state conceded this week that at least 15 of the 31 mothers they held in foster care as minors were actually adults; one is 27.

FLDS spokesman Rod Parker said the CPS appeal was no surprise "although one would hope that at some point they would realize the futility."

The parents were prepared for extended legal wrangling, he said.

"They're hopeful to get on with their lives, but in reality, they understand," he said.

The FLDS, which teaches that polygamy brings glorification in heaven, denies allegations by child-welfare officials that church officials pressure girls into underage spiritual marriages with older men.

The Third Court of Appeals said the state acted hastily - especially with regard to the boys and younger girls who were removed. Half the youngsters taken from the ranch were 5 or younger.

"Even if one views the FLDS belief system as creating a danger of sexual abuse by grooming boys to be perpetrators of sexual abuse and raising girls to be victims of sexual abuse ... there is no evidence that this danger is 'immediate' or 'urgent,"' the court said.

"Evidence that children raised in this particular environment may someday have their physical health and safety threatened is not evidence that the danger is imminent enough to warrant invoking the extreme measure of immediate removal," the court said.

The children were taken into custody more than six weeks ago after someone called a hot line claiming to be a pregnant, abused teenage wife. The girl has not been found and authorities are investigating whether the calls were a hoax.

Five judges in San Angelo, about 40 miles north of Eldorado, had been holding hearings on what the parents must do to regain custody when the appellate decision was issued. Those hearings were suspended after the ruling Thursday.

The youngsters are in foster homes all over the sprawling state, with some brothers or sisters separated by as much as 600 miles.

[killface7]

Supervised, yes! Otherwise, no!

[dsr57]

DON"T DO IT....THEIR JUST GOING TO HAVE *** WITH''EM AGAIN

[markcfl1]

There is something really wrong here. Below is an excerpt from a report that has been printed numerous times by the networks:
"It was no secret that a polygamist sect that built a compound in the West Texas desert believed in marrying off underage girls to older men. And the sheriff had an informant for four years who was feeding him information about life inside the sect."

Now, the stated reason for removing all the children was because everyone on the ranch knew what was going on inside the ranch and everyone had the opportunity to stop the child abuse, but did not. Apparently, this knowledge includes the local sheriff. Why didn''t the sheriff or CPS come to these children''s rescue long before the "phone call."

[messiahx4eve]

"Stupid is as stupid does" befitting epitath for this particular story. Welcome to shrubcountry, home of the shrubmonkey!!!!!!!!

[jd2408]

jd2408, I believe the correct word you were trying to use was ACCEPT, not EXCEPT
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Yes it was. Thank you.

[messiahx4eve]

jd2408, I believe the correct word you were trying to use was ACCEPT, not EXCEPT.

[wlmrtpatriot]

"The entire mental health support were ''fired'' the second week: "we were sent home due to being ''too compassionate''," one report stated...
"dallas morning news''

[beehive21-2009]

The State of Texas is a disgrace to the United States of America.The state should be know as the Taliban State as they act the same, violating the peoples Civil Rights,etc.The Judge , DA , and Sheriff should be arrested and charged with violating the Civil Rights of these people,Fools.

[jd2408]

Memerider, the key word is "reportedly". Reported by the agencies that carried out this raid. Why do you believe these reports? Why don''''t you look and listen to the people themselves - collectively, not a stooge. Look at them in their classrooms, working on their land. Why do you want to break their community? No-one''''s making you join it. And if there is an abuse, they can investigate that abuse without using it as an excuse to destroy the community and its families.

Posted by kamsack50 at 08:18 PM : May 23, 2008
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No one was required to own slaves but America decided it was wrong to force someone to live a lifestyle they did not choose. This is no different. Girls born and raised with restrictions on education, freedom of thought, no access to outside information and no freedom to come and go are no better then slaves were. They are brainwashed to except a life they have no control over.

This in itself is child abuse.

[wlmrtpatriot]

If this is the case that these people were undocumented, which I doubt, due to the lies already told about this bunch. How soon will it be before it is totally illegal to be illegal in this country? These people according to one source, were some of the biggest taxpayers in the state of Tx. You don''t pay taxes if you''re illegal. None of the things slandered from the mouths of sociopaths have proven true. Truth is, they have nothing on these people.
Was there polygamy, underage brides etc. etc? Not in this raid. Do I believe in the FDLS theology? No, I think it''s strange and alien.
These women and children, who previously lived in individual homes, in a productive community seem now to be homeless. Did these teenaged brides bring this on themselves? No.
I hope this country is more than advocates of burning up children and women. I had hoped we had progressed a little beyond that. The CPS system apparently should be reigned in just a little.
This seemed to be a well thought out raid in some areas, in others it has limped along like a wounded pup.
Give these "poor sad teens" some of the sects money and land so they can become productive and model citizens like the rest of us. Allow these abused women to return to some sort of normalcy.
These women "the very ones who have allegedly already been abused" are further being abused within a system who have threatened these women with arrest if they waved to friends.
This is justice?