Ten men from a polygamist ranch in west Texas will be in court this week for a crucial hearing ahead of their trials on criminal charges including bigamy and felony sexual abuse of girls allegedly pressed into marriage.
Their organization - the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or FLDS - is facing far broader legal challenges, and mounting financial pressures, too.
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Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints were relocated from their Eldorado, Texas, ranch in April 2008. Associated Press
Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints were relocated from their Eldorado, Texas, ranch in April 2008. Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints were relocated from their Eldorado, Texas, ranch in April 2008. Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints were relocated from their Eldorado, Texas, ranch in April 2008.
A year after Texas authorities, alleging widespread abuse, removed more than 400 children from the Yearning For Zion Ranch in Eldorado, most of those children are back on the ranch after a court ruled last year that Texas didn't have solid grounds for keeping them. But during the raid, law enforcement seized what authorities believe to be conclusive evidence of bigamy and underage marriages - including family photos, diaries, church records and computer files. The state also conducted DNA tests to determine familial relationships.
The 10 men from the Eldorado ranch who will be in court on Wednesday argue that Texas rangers illegally seized the photos and records during the raid. At the hearing in nearby San Angelo, they will press for the evidence to be thrown out of court, which could devastate the case.
The Texas attorney general says the seizure was legitimate.
The sect is waging legal battles in other states and in Canada, weighing it down with legal bills just as the recession is constricting income.
One fight is in Utah, where the church, which broke from the mainstream Mormon church decades ago and continues to practice polygamy, is trying to regain control of a trust valued at more than $110 million. Utah courts seized the trust in 2005 after some church members complained that FLDS leaders were using the assets to reward trusted allies instead of following fiduciary rules set up when the trust was founded.
The church has amassed considerable wealth through ventures ranging from farming to a machine shop that built parts for military aircraft. But the bulk of FLDS business involves construction. With that industry in decline, income has dropped, according to both church spokesmen and authorities investigating the group.
With legal bills mounting, said Rod Parker, a church spokesman, "there's a huge hemorrhaging of money."
Willie Jessop, a leader of the Texas church community, accused state and federal authorities of setting out to bankrupt the FLDS - an allegation that the authorities deny.
In an interview, Mr. Jessop struck a defiant note: "We're here to stay." He also acknowledged financial strain. "We do our best to pay our bills," he said.
That effort has taken the insular and secretive church in a strikingly new direction, especially evident at its Eldorado ranch. Members who once kept close to the gated compound are now taking construction jobs across several counties. "They're doing a lot of work around the community," said Randy Mankin, editor of the Eldorado Success, the local paper. "Prior to the raid we hadn't seen them stepping out."
Women of the church run an online venture selling ankle-length prairie dresses, handmade wooden toys and a DVD showing how to replicate their distinctive braided hairstyles. And the church ran an aggressive media campaign to mark the anniversary of the April 3 raid, even hosting Oprah Winfrey at the Eldorado ranch.
State officials, meanwhile, say they are hopeful - but not certain - that underage marriages at the ranch have stopped. The officials required many girls to learn the law on sexual abuse - and many mothers to take parenting classes - before returning children to the ranch.
Mr. Jessop said the church hasn't permitted underage marriage in the past and won't do so in the future. "I don't know that a lot of things are different," he said.
The one minor still in state custody was photographed about two years ago, at age 12, locked in a kiss with church leader Warren Jeffs, now 53 years old, at a ceremony the state considers a wedding. Mr. Parker, the FLDS spokesman, said he "would characterize it more as an engagement." The girl's parents, who are church members, are contesting the state's bid for custody.
Mr. Jeffs has been convicted in Utah as an accomplice to rape for arranging an underage marriage. He is in custody and faces additional criminal trials in both Arizona and Texas.
