| Polygamist Leader May Face Tougher Case in Texas | |
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By Sanjiv Bhattacharya AOL News | |
(Aug. 12) -- Utah will have to wait in line before it gets a chance to retry polygamist leader Warren Jeffs. First he's going to a state where prosecution has been more vigorous. Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff said he believes the case against Jeffs is stronger in Texas, where he will be extradited. Jeffs, 54, is the head of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (FLDS), a Utah-based group that practices polygamy according to the Mormon tradition (the LDS Church disavowed the practice a century ago). Numerous reports allege that the group has arranged marriages in the past between men and underage girls. He was convicted on two counts of rape as an accomplice in Utah, but both charges were overturned by the Utah Supreme Court on July 27. A hearing Aug. 23 will determine whether he will face a retrial there. "We want to retry him," Shurtleff told AOL News. "We think we can. But we're going to let Texas go first because their case is not an accomplice issue, it's Warren Jeffs personally who's been accused." Jeffs' attorneys have said they will fight the extradition order. Texas prosecutors have successfully convicted seven FLDS men on crimes such as sexual assault against a child and bigamy -- a 100 percent record. The sentencing has been harsh, too. Jeffs has been charged in Texas with bigamy, aggravated sexual assault and assault based on alleged incidents with underage girls at a church ranch near Eldorado, Texas. If convicted, he could face 99 years in prison. The success rate in Texas as been largely a result of using DNA evidence to link men with underage victims. But that evidence was acquired during a raid on the FLDS ranch in Eldorado in April 2008. Church and family documents were also seized in the raid. Shurtleff remains a vocal critic of that tactic. "I don't think that what they put those children through justifies the end," he said. "That whole SWAT team, guns drawn approach is not something that we would contemplate in Utah." His position has drawn fire from polygamy opponents in Utah, but it is consistent with his longer goals of building trust between the Mormon fundamentalist community and the state, notably at the Safety Net Committee meetings to which both sides send representatives. "We ultimately succeed by getting people to trust us," Shurtleff said. "And it's working. We truly do not believe that there has been a child bride marriage in Utah since 2005. Some have gone outside the state -- that's why they went to Texas, because we started cracking down on them in 2002. But we have quite a few polygamists within the community who are against the practice [of child bride marriages] and will tell us if they are aware of it happening." Information from Safety Net Committee members has not led to any prosecutions in Utah so far, despite its high concentration of polygamists. The fundamentalist community does not have a history of cooperating with the state; rather it is traditionally suspicious as a result of a history of persecution. In Texas, FLDS members may have actively obstructed investigators and concealed the truth on the stand. Shurtleff accepted that certain fundamentalist groups may be lying to him. The Safety Net Committee, for instance, includes members of The Order (aka the Kingston Group), which reports say practice incest as a doctrine. "They tell me that they don't practice it anymore, and I don't know that I believe them, frankly," he said. "It's a religious belief, apparently. But it's difficult for us with them not cooperating and not providing their DNA." Since 2006, Shurtleff's office has received a steady supply of information about incestuous marriages within The Order from confidential sources inside the group. He has been given photographs and names of senior members of the Kingston hierarchy as well as places and times of upcoming sealing ceremonies at which all the DNA evidence he needs would be gathered in one place. But no arrests were made, and now the warrants have expired. "I'm not happy about it," he said, "but short of a Texas-style raid, there's no way of getting the evidence, and I still think that's not the right answer." A further difficulty for Shurtleff in prosecuting sex crimes within polygamy is the Utah Supreme Court, which reversed Jeffs' convictions on the grounds of erroneous jury instructions, something that many commentators regard as a technicality. "My perception is that they were looking for some excuse to overturn the trial," he said. Cardozo School of Law professor Marci Hamilton said the Utah Supreme Court decision is indicative of a pattern. "Utah is one of the worst states in the country to be a sex abuse victim," she says. "The state Supreme Court has created a set of interpretations around civil liability and criminal liability that really put the sex abuse victim at a disadvantage, particularly in cases where there is an ecclesiastical leader concerned." In Jeffs' case, she argued, it would be normal for the Supreme Court to make a recommendation to the state legislature. "They would say, 'In light of this injustice, we urge you to amend the statute.' But that didn't happen," she said. In 2007, the Supreme Court ruled against the Colosimo brothers, who alleged sexual abuse at the hands of their Catholic priest at high school and a cover-up by the diocese. The abuse was not in question, according to the decision, but the statute of limitations had expired. In Utah, child victims of sex abuse are required to report their abuse before turning 22, one of the lowest limits in the country (in Wisconsin it's 35, Connecticut, 48, and in Alaska, there's no age limit at all). "The religious groups are holding Colosimo as the most wonderful decision of its kind because it immunizes them," Hamilton said. "Victims are disabled from going after the institutions that created the conditions for the abuse." The LDS Church has experienced a sharply rising number of clergy abuse cases in recent years, though none of them have been in Utah. Four out of five of the Supreme Court Justices are LDS members. Bhattacharya is the author of "Secrets & Wives: The Hidden World of Mormon Polygamy" (Soft Skull Press). The book is scheduled for publication in January. | |
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AOLNews.com Originally published August 12, 2010 | |
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