St. George, Utah - Fifth District Judge G. Rand Beacham issued an order Tuesday denying a motion to dismiss charges of rape against Allen Glade Steed based upon the statute of limitations. Court Order
Attorneys for Steed petitioned the court to have the charge of rape dismissed because the state waited too long to file the charge. Steed was charged September 26, 2007 shortly after a St. George jury had found Warren Steed Jeffs guilty of being an accomplice to rape. The decision by Judge Beacham allows the case to go to trial.
It was Steed’s marriage to Elissa Wall at 14-years of age when he was 19-years old that was the premise under which FLDS leader Warren Jeffs was tried and convicted of being an accomplice to rape and found guilty. The case against Steed is for alleged non-consensual intercourse between him and Wall. Jeffs performed a spiritual marriage between the pair in 2001 and allegedly encouraged the nonconsensual relationship as ordained of God.
Utah law required rape charges to be filed within four years of an alleged offense until 2005 when the law was changed to allow rape charges to be filed for up to 8-years as long as the rape allegation was reported to law enforcement with 4-years. Judge Beacham determined that a conversation between Gary Engels, a Mohave County investigator and Lamont Barlow, Wall’s boyfriend at the time, met the requirements of the statute. Elissa Wall had taken leave of Steed and began a relationship with Barlow 2004.
Salt Lake City attorney James Bradshaw remains optimistic that in an evidentiary hearing the facts presented in court about who said what and when and how the information was conveyed to the Washington County Attorney’s office will clear his client.
In July the Utah Supreme Court reversed the Jeffs’ convictions, ruling he didn’t receive a fair trial based on faulty jury instructions. The court remanded the case to Fifth District Court for a new trial. Washington County Attorney Brock Belnap hasn’t determined whether to retry the case.
Meanwhile, Jeffs has refused to sign extradition papers to stand trial in Texas on charges of bigamy, aggravated sexual assault and sexual assault which is alleged to have taken placed at the FLDS ranch near Eldorado, Texas. Jeffs remains in the Utah State prison at Draper, Utah.
