| 3 FLDS members surrender in Texas Men were wanted by authorities on felony charges | |||||
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By Ben Winslow Deseret News | |||||
The leader of the Fundamentalist LDS Church's YFZ Ranch has surrendered to authorities in rural Texas after being indicted by a grand jury. Fredrick Merril Jessop, 72, and other indicted FLDS members surrendered on Monday at the Schleicher County Sheriff's Office in the company of Texas Rangers and their attorneys. Jessop was indicted earlier this month on a charge of conducting an unlawful marriage ceremony involving a minor, a third-degree felony. Documents seized from the YFZ Ranch by law enforcement and entered into court evidence indicated that Jessop performed a marriage ceremony between his 12-year-old daughter and FLDS leader Warren Jeffs. The girl, now 14, is back in foster care after a judge ruled her mother failed to protect her from abuse. Wendell Loy Nielsen, 68, another leader in the FLDS Church, surrendered to face three charges of bigamy, a third-degree felony. Nielsen owns NewEra Manufacturing. Leroy Johnson Steed, 42, surrendered on a charge of sexual assault of a child, a first-degree felony; bigamy and tampering with physical evidence, both third-degree felonies. Steed was arrested on the evidence tampering charge in the early days of the raid but was only recently indicted. All three men were released after posting bond, the sheriff's office said. Nielsen and Jessop each posted $30,000; Steed posted $120,000. "Today's arrests reflect a nearly two-week-long effort by the Texas Rangers and the Texas Attorney General's Office to arrange for the defendants' arrests," Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said in a statement Monday. Fredrick Merril Jessop declined to comment to the Deseret News, but FLDS Church spokesman Willie Jessop suggested Texas authorities had ulterior motives in indicting church leadership. "It's just a desperate attempt from the state officials to justify carrying out this massive raid based on Rozita Swinton's hoax phone call," he said Monday. Others were pleased to hear of the surrenders. "I'm relieved that Texas is actually going to prosecute the men who are responsible for crimes going on down there," said Carolyn Jessop, who was Merril Jessop's fourth wife. "He's right at the top. He should be charged." Carolyn Jessop left the FLDS Church in 2003 and chronicled her experiences in her best-selling book "Escape." To date, 12 men have been indicted in connection with allegations of underage marriages involving the Utah-based polygamous sect. Jeffs was also recently indicted by the Eldorado grand jury on a charge of sexual assault of a child. Jeffs, 52, was indicted in July on another sexual assault charge and again in August on a bigamy charge. Jeffs is currently incarcerated in Arizona where he is facing trial on charges related to performing underage marriages. He was convicted in Utah of rape as an accomplice for performing a marriage between a 14-year-old girl and her 19-year-old cousin. He is also facing a federal charge of unlawful flight to avoid prosecution, stemming from his time on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list. The YFZ Ranch was raided in April, and hundreds of children living there were removed after officials received phone calls alleging the abuse of a pregnant teenage girl in a polygamous marriage to an older man. The call is believed to be a hoax, but at the scene Texas authorities and child welfare workers say they saw other signs of abuse. The children were returned to their parents two months later when a pair of Texas courts ruled the state acted improperly and the children were not in immediate danger of abuse. Swinton, 33, is considered a "person of interest" by Texas authorities in the hoax calls. Only 36 children remain under court supervision in what was the nation's largest child custody case. The rest have been "nonsuited" after Texas Child Protective Services investigators either determined there was no evidence of abuse or their parents took steps to protect them. "We're grateful to have the children back, and we'll be grateful to have the state of Texas leave us alone," Willie Jessop said. | |||||
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DeseretNews.com Originally published Monday, Nov. 24, 2008 | |||||
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