"Sister Wives" family moves from Utah to Nevada
 
By James Nelson
Reuters
 
LEHI, Utah | (Reuters) - The family featured on the reality TV series "Sister Wives," about an advertising salesman and four women he calls spouses, has moved to Nevada from Utah following a criminal bigamy investigation sparked by notoriety surrounding the show.

"The family is pursuing new opportunities in Nevada. I see no legal reason why their family cannot live and continue to thrive in Nevada as they have in Utah," Jonathan Turley, a lawyer for the family, told Reuters this week.

"Sister Wives" premiered in the U.S. on the TLC cable network in September, earning strong ratings while also drawing the attention of authorities in the Utah town of Lehi, just south of Salt Lake city, where the family shared a large house.

The show documented the world of ad executive Kody Brown, then 41, the four women he lives with and their 16 children as they sought to make their home and work in mainstream society.

Brown is legally married to just one of the women, but counts the three others as "sister wives," a term in polygamous sects that refers to a husband's multiple marital partners.

Production on a second season of the series has begun, and nearly half of the new episodes due to begin airing in the fall have been shot, according to the show's executive producer.

Plural marriage, an early tenant of the Mormon faith and once common in Utah, was renounced by the church more than a century ago and outlawed, as it already was in the rest of the country, as Utah was seeking statehood.

But polygamy persists in secluded communities scattered mostly around the West, especially among followers of a Mormon splinter group called the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, or the FLDS.

Plural marriage was largely overlooked by Utah authorities until 2001, when polygamist Tom Green went on national TV to espouse his lifestyle. He ultimately was convicted of bigamy for being married to five women simultaneously and of child rape in connection with his 1986 marriage to a 13-year-old girl. He served several years in prison.

Following the debut of "Sister Wives," and for weeks afterward, law enforcement officials in Utah received numerous complaints from the public, many from residents who felt the show depicted their community in an unsavory light.

The Lehi Police Department completed an investigation and turned its findings over to the Utah County Attorney's Office. No charges have been filed, and the case remains open.

"There is nothing new. I heard they are moving. It doesn't change anything that we are doing," said Utah County Attorney Jeff Buhman in a statement to Reuters on Tuesday.

Turley said prosecutors in Utah have shown "commendable discretion and judgment" in this case.

"In the past, state officials have made it clear to polygamous families in Utah that they would not proceed against them absent evidence of some collateral crime such as child abuse. No such crimes were found in the Brown family after an extensive field investigation," Turley said.

(Editing by Steve Gorman and Greg McCune)
 
Reuters.com
Originally published Fri Jan 21, 2011
 
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