From the category archives:

Mormon

A Texas judge will require the state to redact references to certain people and multiple marriages involving Raymond Merril Jessop from numerous documents it plans to use during his trial.

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“The value of polygamy was that it allowed the woman to have her agency in a very distinctive way. It had a sense of community and of individual agency,” he explained. “The thing that I’ve been amazed at in studying Mormon history is that so many of the women were such strong-willed, capable women, which they felt came out of the polygamy.”

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Survey Finds Increase In Polygamous Communities

by Staff on September 28, 2009

An new informal survey by a Utah-based polygamy advocacy group estimates 38,000 people believe in or are living the practice – an increase of about 1,000 in about two years.
The survey by Principle Voices includes adults and children in polygamous and monogamous families who consider themselves fundamentalist Mormons.

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Women in Bountiful Have More Power Than You Think

by Staff on September 25, 2009

Bountiful women whom she has interviewed are clear thinking, resourceful and in some cases well educated. Not to be underestimated. They “cast Bountiful as a heterogeneous and dynamic social and political space,” Prof. Campbell wrote in, “Bountiful Voices” an academic paper written earlier this year, “where at least some women are able to wield considerable authority in their marriages, families and community. Their stories thus seem inconsistent, at least to some degree, with pre-existing presumptions about polygamy and its harms for women set forth in conventional public discourse.”

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Polygamy Charges in Bountiful, B.C., Thrown Out

by Staff on September 23, 2009

Polygamy in Bountiful, B.C.

A B.C. court has thrown out polygamy charges against two religious leaders, ruling former B.C. attorney general Wally Oppal was wrong to ask a third special prosecutor to take the case after the first two prosecutors decided the men should not be charged.

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Tour Of Polygamist Communities

Those curious about the polygamous community that has thrived on the Utah/Arizona state line for nearly 75 years may now take a guided tour through what promoters bill as “the largest and most secluded polygamist colony” in America.

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Texas vs. FLDS: A Year After The Raid

by Staff on March 29, 2009

Yearning For Zion Ranch

Women and children, members of the FLDS, are taken to the First Baptist Church in Eldorado, Texas, at the beginning of a raid on the YFZ Ranch that resulted in 439 children being removed from their families under allegations of abuse.

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A West Texas judge on Friday agreed to end court oversight of 34 children from a polyamist group. Child Protective Services indicated last week that it would no longer pursue legal action against the parents of 34 children because the agency felt they were not in immediate danger. On Friday, State District Judge Barbara Walther agreed to the motion, without comment.

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Person of interest in polygamy raid in

by Staff on July 15, 2008

A woman considered a person of interest in an investigation of phone calls that may have sparked a raid on a Texas polygamist group appeared in a Colorado courtroom Tuesday, a day after she was supposed to appear in a separate case.

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Love Your Lawyer Suit!

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Two Alpine attorneys help win back custody of hundreds of children taken by Texas’ Department of Family and Protective Services in the April raid on the Yearning for Zion Ranch in West Texas.

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CPS concedes sect mom was 18 when she gave birth

Texas Child Protective Services conceded Tuesday a pregnant teen taken from a polygamists’ ranch in West Texas was an adult when she gave birth in San Marcos last month, casting some doubt on the statistics released by the agency that more than 20 underage girls were pregnant or had given birth.

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Does Teen Bride at Center of Polygamy Case Exist?

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Cops Can’t Find Sect Teen Who Supposedly Called for Help. If she doesn’t exist, it’s going to make it very difficult to defend this search. Several women who live on the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints ranch told ABC News that Sarah does not exist.

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Who’s Behind the Texas FLDS Raid Fiasco?

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Sheriff Doran was itching for just one legal premise, no matter how tenuous it might be, to conduct such an operation against the FLDS. All he needed was the outcry from one person allegedly inside the ranch and a judge willing to subvert the Constitution. All Sheriff Doran had to do was to get his foot in the door, so to speak, of the YFZ ranch and law enforcement would be able to conduct an unhindered fishing expedition for the “evidence” necessary for the state to roundup all the children.

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Mothers Tell Their Side of Polygamy Story

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The women are heartbroken at having had their children taken away. They’re angry at the government for doing so, and for allegedly tricking them into returning to the ranch Monday without their children. They all denied their children were sexually or physically abused. They said all women are free to leave the ranch anytime they wish. And, they suspect the phone call from a 16-year-old mother alleging abuse was a hoax from outside the compound.

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Utah Polygamists Rally in Support of Children Taken in Texas Raid

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Principle Voices and the Principal Voices Coalition have collected hundreds of packages to be sent to the children and women in Texas, containing school supplies, toys and toiletries.

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Polygamist Moms Fight for Custody of Kids

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Mothers are mounting a campaign to get back their children, who were taken by the state after a raid on the compound. The mothers say the conditions at the state shelter are so cramped that the children are scared and many are sick. At least a dozen children have contracted chicken pox. Dr. Stephen Smith has been providing medical care at the state shelter, and he says he is upset by what he has seen there. “All of the mothers and children that I spoke with wanted to go back to the ranch, without a doubt,” Smith told ABC News. “Personally, it makes me very sad for what we have done.”

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Cops Talk to Suspect in Polygamist Probe, But Don’t Arrest Him

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You can’t hold over 400 children & keep them from their parents unless you can establish that those parents are directly linked to a criminal allegation or abuse. To prosecute the other families & children, authorities may have to assume they were all accused. Making such an assumption would be a serious problem as they go forward. The court will give the state a fair degree of deference in protecting children initially, but that deference quickly evaporates with time. You can’t say they’re all vicariously guilty because they belong to a certain religion.

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