FLDS trust settlement talks begin
 
By Ben Winslow
Deseret News
 
Lawyers for Fundamentalist LDS Church members, the Utah Attorney General's Office and the court-controlled United Effort Plan Trust have begun settlement talks.

Attorneys met Wednesday in Salt Lake City to begin a dialogue over how to resolve the ongoing legal war over the FLDS Church's real estate arm, which is now under court control.

"There seems to be a sense of trying to reach the same goal and that is to try to limit the legal costs so that properties are protected and there are assets left to be used by the people who created it," Utah Attorney General's spokesman Paul Murphy said after the meeting ended.

All sides will start drafting proposed settlements and then will begin negotiating over the terms. Murphy characterized the meeting as one where "all sides were willing to work in good faith."

"We really look at this as a chance for mediation and that everyone, whether they are FLDS or former FLDS, everyone's rights are protected," he said.

Calls to an attorney representing FLDS members were not immediately returned Wednesday.

The UEP Trust, which controls homes and property in the FLDS enclaves of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., was taken over by the courts in 2005 over allegations that leaders of the polygamous sect mismanaged it. A judge appointed a special fiduciary to manage the trust and approved a reform plan doing away with the communal property nature of it in favor of private property ownership.

The trust is land rich, but cash poor. The fiduciary has sought to sell property in the communities to pay off nearly $2 million in debts, his attorneys have said. FLDS members have filed lawsuits challenging the sale of 711 acres of farmland they claimed was prophesied to be a temple site. Another lawsuit claims the reformed trust violates their right to practice their religion by preventing them from consecrating their property to the church.

Trust attorneys disputed the temple assertions and argued that for 3 1/2 years, the FLDS refused to cooperate with the fiduciary on reform efforts. All sides agreed to enter into settlement talks just before a scheduled hearing on the sale of Berry Knoll, where hundreds of FLDS faithful showed up to a St. George court to protest it.

E-mail: bwinslow@desnews.com
 
DeseretNews.com
Originally published Wednesday, Nov. 26, 2008
 
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