you (the authorities) say nearly 2/3 of the children

of this sect were abused YET YOU RETURNED ALMOST EACH AND EVERY ONE OF THEM? you say 12 girls who are between the ages of 12 and 15 were married (to OLDER MEN of course) and 7 of them gave birth to babies? this sect (i must add, along with many 'mainstream' religions and beliefs)believes women are practically meaningless. they're used to sew and cook and clean and pop out young 'uns (the girl children to be married off to geezers of course). wtf? why did you return the children? why? just because someone f**king bears a child or is the biological father of a child DOES NOT MEAN THEY ARE A PARENT

Texas report: Abuse widespread in polygamist sect
By MICHELLE ROBERTS

SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Nearly two-thirds of the families living at a polygamist group's ranch — targeted in a high-profile raid last spring — had children who were abused or neglected, Texas child welfare officials said in a report released Tuesday.

The Department of Family and Protective Services concluded there was evidence that 12 girls, ages 12 to 15, were "spiritually" married to adult men in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, which runs the Yearning For Zion Ranch in Eldorado. Seven of them had one or more children, the report says.

Another 262 children were listed as neglected because the agency said their parents knew there was sexual abuse in the household but did not move to protect their children from possible abuse.

The report, which summarizes the investigations done on all 439 children at the West Texas ranch, was issued at the request of the Health and Human Services executive commissioner, a gubernatorial appointee who oversees the protective services agency.

"We received what we believed was a bona fide abuse/neglect report. We were required by law to investigate," said DFPS spokesman Patrick Crimmins.

The report, an unusual step taken to help satisfy expected questions from the state Legislature when it convenes in January, summarized individual investigations and the history of the case. The findings, though shared with law enforcement, are separate from the ongoing criminal cases..........

ms hamilton gets it right

(in a way that is). of course we could stop a LOT of this shite if we (canada included) PROSECUTED polygamists. it's against AMERICAN LAW AND CANADIAN LAW. when one knows 13 and 14 and 15 year old girls are FORCED into 'marriage' and raped and FORCED to have children and young teen aged boys are FORCED to leave the only world they know and one does nothing, one deserves to be publicly flogged (figuratively, that is). f**k 'religious' rights. when you're torturing children, THEIR rights take precedence. ms hamilton is wrong in her thinking we actually WILL start prosecuting more of these cases. hell, our politicians are committing THE most heinous crimes and we're letting THEM get away with it. why should we make another bunch of old white guys pay for THEIR crimes? (my anger is not only directed at THIS religious sect but ALL religious sects who abuse children - or even adults - in the name of THEIR god)

Prosecuting Polygamy
By Marci Hamilton, Huffington Post
There is nothing so dangerous for a child as an insular, patriarchal religious organization, and the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints, whose compound in El Dorado, Texas, is now under control of the Texas authorities, is one of the scariest examples. It took the extraordinary bravery of a 16-year-old girl to set in motion a chain of events that should have happened long ago.
She reported that she had been "married" to a 50-year-old man, forced to have sex, get pregnant, and have a baby. Because of her, Texas authorities have taken hundreds of children and women to safety. From all reports, they have yet to find her.
I give the Texas law enforcement and child protective agency officials a great deal of credit for moving in on the compound. They bucked the three trends in our culture that have kept these children at risk for far too long.
First, authorities in general are too fearful of intervening in religious enclaves, even when the harm is so awful and apparent. Yet, there is no right of religious liberty to engage in child and spousal abuse, or polygamy for that matter. The taboo against holding religious entities accountable is simply foolhardy.
In fact, enforcement of the polygamy laws could have stemmed many of these abuses. Yet, it is the rare prosecutor who will prosecute on the basis of the polygamy laws, despite the fact those laws are utterly clear and repeatedly have been upheld against constitutional attack. The largest enclave of FLDS resides in Bountiful, British Columbia. A misguided Canadian public official announced just yesterday that the government cannot go forward with a prosecution of polygamy against the FLDS (where the accounts of abuse are legendary), because of concerns about religious liberty. If Canadian law, though, protects polygamy, it also protects the child and spousal abuse that inevitably follow. That is not religious liberty, but rather religious licentiousness. American prosecutors have been marginally better, though there are many more cases out there that they ignore on daily basis..........

national enquirer headline?

does it rank up there with the batboy? no, it's REAL
Polygamist sect gets millions from U.S. government
By Jack Douglas Jr. McClatchy Newspapers
FT. WORTH, Tex. _American taxpayers have unwittingly helped finance a polygamist sect that is now the focus of a massive child abuse investigation in West Texas, with a business tied to the group receiving a nearly $1 million loan from the federal government and $1.2 million in military contracts.
The ability of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or FLDS, to operate and grow is largely dependent on huge contributions from its members and revenue from the businesses they control, according to a former accountant for the church, and government officials in Utah and Arizona, where the sect is primarily based.
One of those businesses, NewEra Manufacturing in Las Vegas, has been awarded more than $1.2 million in federal government contracts, with most of the money coming in recent years from the Defense Department for wheel and brake components for military aircraft.
A large portion of the awards were preferential no-bid or "sole source" contracts because of the company's classification as a small business, according to online databases that track federal government appropriations..........

can you imagine being so uneducated

you couldn't spell your own last name? you didn't know your bithdate? can you imagine at the age or 13 or 14 being forced into a plural 'marriage' (or even a SINGLE marriage), being forced to bear babies? being beaten?

there is a reason most of the children removed were girls. why? because the leaders get rid of the boys and young men. competition you know. they find some excuse and boot them out or excommunicate them.

my question is, WHY DID IT TAKE SO LONG TO RESCUE THESE CHILDREN (and women)? why? they've crossed state lines.

it's ok, they're only women and children. that's why. who gives a flying yoo hoo about THEM?

Late-Night Call Revealed Secret World
Sect Had Moved to Compound After Fleeing Utah, Colorado



By Sylvia Moreno and Adam Kilgore Washington Post Staff Writers
SAN ANGELO, Tex., April 8 -- The cry for help came late at night -- at 11:32 p.m. -- and it came in a whisper. Speaking in a low voice to avoid being overheard, the 16-year-old girl -- mother of an 8-month-old baby and pregnant with a second child -- sketched out chilling tales. She spoke of teenage girls, some as young as 13, being forced to have sex with older men for the purpose of bearing their children. She said she was the seventh "spiritual" wife of a 49-year-old man. She described beatings by him as so vicious that one time several of her ribs had been broken.
The March 29 phone call, and one the next day from the compound run by an insular and secretive splinter sect of the Mormon Church, prompted raids by authorities; they took 416 children into protective custody, the largest child removal in Texas history. The children, mostly girls, ranged in age from infants to 17. Several have babies or are pregnant. ..........