SAN ANGELO, Texas — It was no secret that a polygamist sect that built a compound in the West Texas desert believed in marrying off underage girls to older men. And the sheriff had an informant for four years who was feeding him information about life inside the sect.
But authorities say their hands were tied until last week, when they finally obtained the legal grounds to move against the group.
The trigger for the raid was a call from a 16-year-old girl to a family-violence shelter to report that her 50-year-old husband had beaten and raped her.
On Thursday, state and local law-enforcement authorities defended their decision to leave the sect alone for four years after it moved in.
“We are aware that this group is capable of” sexually abusing girls, said Sheriff David Doran. “But there again, this is the United States. We are going to respect them. We’re not going to violate their civil rights until we get an outcry.”
Doran said it was not until after the raid began that he learned the sect was marrying off underage girls and had a bed in its temple where the girls were required to immediately consummate their marriages.
Authorities in Texas suspected there would be trouble ever since members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints bought the ranch in 2004.
Doran had been making occasional visits, but he said he saw nothing to warrant a criminal investigation.
“You can only press someone so far without having a criminal investigation going on,” he said. “This group doesn’t openly talk, and they do not openly answer questions.”
Texas Attorney General Gregg Abbott said authorities handled the case properly.
“You cannot go in and bust in someone’s house if there’s not probable cause to do so,” Abbott said.
What’s ahead for the children in the Texas polygamy case
Here are some questions put Thursday to Marleigh Meisner, spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, and John Sampson, a University of Texas law professor who teaches the Children’s Rights Clinic, which provides legal representation for abused and neglected children in Travis County. He is not involved in the case.
Q: What’s the next legal step?
MM: April 17, a full adversarial hearing. At that point we will make a recommendation to a judge. There will be attorneys appointed . . . to represent the children.
Q: For each child individually, or as a group?
MM: Normally, it’s each child individually, but the judge is making a decision (about) how she’s going to do that.
JS: You have X number of mothers and Y children and Z number of fathers, presumed fathers, alleged fathers, unknown fathers. All of the fathers are entitled to service. All mothers are entitled to service. All children are entitled to representation.
Q. Sounds like a crowded courtroom.
JS: It would actually be more or less a crowded stadium. I’ve never seen a case tried in a stadium, but this might be a first.
Q: What if the judge decides not to grant custody?
MM: This is all to do with temporary custody. If the judge decided the children needed to be returned, then the children will be returned.
JS: Each case is an individual case, however many children there are. I read in the paper there’s a whole lot of problems in identification. That does not help the parents get the children back when the children are not identified.
Q: Is it possible the 139 women could be separated from their kids?
MM: That’s a decision that’s to be made later.
JS: The reluctance of a parent to cooperate doesn’t facilitate the parents’ situation.
Q: How much interest have you received from the public regarding foster care or adoption?
MM: Have a lot of people come forward saying: ‘Hey, we’d like to foster these children’ or ‘we’d like to adopt these children’? Yes. However, it’s way too soon to be looking at adoption issues.
The Associated Press
