Raids Have Strengthened Polygamous Sect

Associated Press - April 9, 2008

by Jennifer Dobner

SALT LAKE CITY (AP) — The recent raid on a polygamist sect's compound by child welfare investigators has been tried before — but only temporarily interrupted the sect's way of life.

Authorities previously burst into the rural Utah-Arizona border home of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in 1935, 1944 and 1953.

Children were shuffled off to foster care and their parents imprisoned. But the families came back, time after time, more committed to their religion and to polygamy.

"It ended up strengthening them in the long run," said Ken Driggs, an Atlanta attorney and polygamy historian.

Last week, state troopers and child welfare officials began a search of the FLDS compound in Eldorado after a 16-year-old girl there called a local family violence shelter to report her 50-year-old husband beat and raped her.

Driggs, who is not an FLDS member but has spent a lot of time with the community and became close to several members, said the latest raid won't change much.

"It's not going to make it go away," he said.

Polygamy in Utah and Arizona is primarily a legacy from Joseph Smith, the founder and first prophet of what today is the mainstream Mormon church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

Mormons brought the practice to what is now Utah in 1847 and soon began to openly preach it. As pressure mounted from the U.S. government, the church discontinued polygamy in 1890.

That, however, birthed an underground movement to which today's self-described Mormon fundamentalists tether their beliefs. The Mormon church renounces polygamy, excommunicates members who engage in the practice and disavows any connection with the FLDS church.

The FLDS is the largest-known polygamous sect. Although its membership is not published, figures from the 2000 U.S. Census show roughly 6,000 residents were living in the twin towns of Colorado City, Ariz., and Hildale, Utah.

The recent raid at the Yearning For Zion Ranch is having a "shockwave" through the fundamentalist communities of Utah and Arizona, said Mary Batchelor, a co-founder of Principle Voices, a polygamy advocacy group.

"We've been working for years so that this exact thing would never happen, so it's very disappointing and heartbreaking," she said. "I think it will impact a lot of the work we have done to build bridges."

Church leaders have kept a strict hold on every aspect of FLDS life — from the modest prairie-style clothes worn by members, to amount of time their kids stay in school and which house a family calls home.

Marriages, which sometimes have included unions between teenage girls and older men, are arranged through the church's prophet and leader. Sect dissidents say the rules got even tighter in 2002, when Warren Jeffs took over the church.

Jeffs, now 52, demanded more from followers, asking for steep increases in the 10 percent monthly tithe. Dozens of men were excommunicated. Their wives and children were given to other men deemed more worthy. Many say the number of child brides also increased dramatically.

Taking a less confrontational approach to polygamous sects may not work any better, as Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff learned in 2006 when he took on another secretive clan — the Kingston family, a 1,500-member group based in the Salt Lake City area but scattered across the state.

Shurtleff told KTVX-TV in Salt Lake City that instead of conducting a sweep to serve 80 search warrants for DNA samples and other evidence, he tried to work with the family's attorney.

"And, of course, the result of that was all our subjects disappeared, our targets disappeared and we didn't get the warrants served like we hoped to do," he said.

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