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Posts: 4669
05/29/08 9:30 AM
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05/29/08 1:42 PM
05/29/08 2:29 PM
MJM40 wrote: I haven't read his name at all in regards to this incident. He is a federal prosecutor is he not? Why would a federal prosecutor be involved in a family court situation?
It was as tongue in cheek comment. Not to be taken literally. Sorry if I tried to inject a bit of humor into a serious subject.
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05/29/08 4:30 PM
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VXerick wrote: I haven't kept up with this topic or thread but I was wondering, as I passed by - Did Johnny Sutton have anything to do with this raid?
Sure has the same level of competence!
05/29/08 4:36 PM
SAN ANTONIO (AP) - In a crushing blow to the state's massive seizure of children from a polygamist sect's ranch, the Texas Supreme Court ruled Thursday that child welfare officials overstepped their authority and the children should go back to their parents.
The high court affirmed a decision by an appellate court last week, saying Child Protective Services failed to show an immediate danger to the more than 400 children swept up from the Yearning For Zion Ranch nearly two months ago.
"On the record before us, removal of the children was not warranted," the justices said in their ruling issued in Austin.
The high court let stand the appellate court's order that Texas District Judge Barbara Walther return the children from foster care to their parents. It's not clear how soon that may happen, but the appellate court ordered her to do it within a reasonable time period. The ruling shatters one of the largest child-custody cases in U.S. history. State officials said the removals were necessary to end a cycle of sexual abuse at the ranch in which teenage girls were forced to marry and have sex with older men, but parents denied any abuse and said they were being persecuted for their religious beliefs.
Every child at the ranch in the west Texas town of Eldorado was removed; half were 5 or younger.
"The moms are clearly very happy at the news that it looks like they're going to get their kids a lot sooner than expected," said Cynthia Martinez, a spokeswoman for legal aid attorneys representing 38 mothers who filed the complaint that prompted the ruling. "It's definitely an emotional day."
The case before the court technically only applies to the 124 children of those mothers, but it significantly affects nearly all the children since they were removed under identical circumstances.
The Third Court of Appeals in Austin ruled last week that the state failed to show that any more than five of the teenage girls were being sexually abused, and had offered no evidence of sexual or physical abuse against the other children.
The ranch is run by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, which teaches that polygamy brings glorification in heaven. It is a breakaway sect of the Mormon church, which renounced polygamy more than a century ago.
Roughly 430 children from the ranch are in foster care after two births, numerous reclassifications of adult women initially held as minors and a handful of agreements allowing parents to keep custody while the Supreme Court considered the case.
Texas officials claimed at one point that there were 31 teenage girls at the ranch who were pregnant or had been pregnant, but later conceded that about half of those mothers, if not more, were adults. One was 27.
Under Texas law, children can be taken from their parents if there's a danger to their physical safety, an urgent need for protection and if officials made a reasonable effort to keep the children in their homes. The high court agreed with the appellate court that the seizures fell short of that standard.
CPS lawyers had argued that parents could remove their children from state jurisdiction if they regain custody, that DNA tests needed to confirm parentage are still pending and that the lower-court judge had discretion in the case.
The justices said child welfare officials can take numerous actions to protect children short of separating them from their parents and placing them in foster care, and that Walther may still put restrictions on the children and parents to address concerns that they may flee once reunited. Source: http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080529/D90VIO000.html
05/29/08 5:49 PM
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05/29/08 6:56 PM
Administrator/Editor SPAM SQUAD
"On the record before us, removal of the children was not warranted,"
05/30/08 5:31 PM
SAN ANGELO, Texas (AP) - A plan to begin reuniting parents with more than 400 children removed from a polygamist group's ranch has been thrown into doubt because a judge and the families are clashing over proposed restrictions.
Texas District Judge Barbara Walther has refused to sign an order restoring custody to the parents until they agree to more restrictions than state child-welfare officials have proposed.
Walther was directed by an appeals court to reverse her ruling last month putting all children from the Yearning For Zion Ranch into foster case. The Texas Supreme Court affirmed the appeals court's decision Thursday and rejected the state's argument that all the children were in immediate danger from what it said was a cycle of sexual abuse of teenage girls at the ranch. Source: http://apnews.myway.com/article/20080531/D9109KBG0.html Walther seem to think she is above the law! - JH
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05/31/08 5:48 AM
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05/31/08 6:09 AM
05/31/08 9:09 AM
05/31/08 9:55 AM
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05/31/08 10:16 AM
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05/31/08 10:35 AM
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TXSammie wrote: "spiritual marriage" is that like a one night stand?
05/31/08 11:57 AM
the 38 mothers who filed the complaint that led the Texas Supreme Court to reject the state's massive seizure must personally sign an agreement their attorneys and state child-welfare officials have proposed.
05/31/08 10:42 PM
06/04/08 10:37 PM
SAN ANGELO, Texas - The polygamist sect raided by authorities two months ago has its children back. But with a criminal investigation under way into allegations of sexual abuse, the splinter group's troubles are not over.
Child-welfare officials have alleged that members of the sect pushed underage girls into marriages with older men, and while the last of 440 children seized from the ranch were returned to their parents Wednesday, prosecutors could still bring criminal charges.
"There have been criminal problems located out there," said Schleicher County Sheriff David Doran, who was with state troopers and child welfare authorities when they raided Yearning For Zion Ranch in west Texas on April 3.
The Texas Department of Public Safety and the attorney general's office have taken over the criminal investigation at the request of authorities in the rural ranching community. While they confirm they are investigating, neither will say how long the investigation may take.
Obtaining the DNA evidence and the testimony necessary to prove such a case could prove difficult.
DNA evidence acquired in the custody case is off limits to criminal investigators unless child welfare investigators find wrongdoing or law enforcement gets court permission, and a prosecution probably would go nowhere without at least one willing witness in the insular ranch community. Members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints had a strong distrust of outsiders even before all the children at the ranch were taken away.
Child-welfare officials had said that 31 teenage girls at the ranch were pregnant or had had children, but nearly all those the mothers turned out to be adults.
No more than five minors who are pregnant or have given birth were identified during the child custody hearings. Under Texas law, girls younger than 17 generally cannot consent to sex with an adult.
Children from the ranch were allowed to leave foster care after a judge bowed to a Texas Supreme Court ruling last week that the state overreached by taking all of them even though evidence of sexual abuse was limited to five teenage girls. Half the children taken from the ranch were no older than 5.
All 440 children were returned to parents by Wednesday, Child Protective Services spokesman Patrick Crimmins said.
The high court ruling and state District Judge Barbara Walther's orders returning the children do not affect the criminal investigation, which involves several trailer loads of documents confiscated during a raid lasting nearly a week. Authorities removed all documents and photos they say might show relationships between underage girls and older men.
"It's going to take awhile. With any criminal case we investigate, we do as much as we possibly can before turning the case over to the prosecutors," said public safety spokeswoman Tela Mange.
Last week, investigators from the attorney general's office took DNA from Warren Jeffs, the jailed prophet of the FLDS church, saying they were looking for evidence of relationships between Jeffs and four girls ages 12 to 15.
At a custody hearing, state attorneys introduced a photo they said was a wedding picture showing Jeffs embracing a girl and kissing her on the mouth.
Jeffs has been convicted in Utah as an accomplice to rape in the marriage of an underage sect member. He faces similar charges in Arizona, though no trial date has been set.
Authorities have DNA from all the children and many of the parents at the YFZ Ranch - 603 samples in all - but those results cannot be used by law enforcement without a finding of wrongdoing by child abuse investigators or a court order because they were taken from parents and children as part of a civil custody case, not with a criminal search warrant.
Even if the DNA shows children were born to underage girls and adult men, any prosecution will probably be difficult unless a victim testifies.
Utah successfully prosecuted three FLDS members and got a no-contest plea from Jeffs after years of investigation, but Arizona authorities have had to drop some charges because the victim quit cooperating.
Without a victim's testimony, it's impossible to establish jurisdiction for prosecution, a key element that has prevented some charges of members who frequently move among the sect's residences in Arizona, Utah, Texas and elsewhere.
In any sexual assault case, it can be difficult to persuade victims to assist in prosecutions, but such cases are even more challenging when they involve a community as insular as the FLDS, said Paul Murphy, a spokesman for the Utah Attorney General's Office.
Sect members are raised and work within the community, developing few financial or personal resources away from other members.
Texas authorities raided the YFZ Ranch after three calls to a domestic abuse hot line, purportedly from a 16-year-old mother who said she was being abused by her middle-age husband. The calls - which Doran said continued even after all the children were removed from the ranch - are now being investigated as a hoax.
The children and their mothers were taken to a shelter in San Angelo, where they were later separated. E-mails obtained by The Dallas Morning News under Texas public records laws show state officials had proposed sending them to another location because of fears of violence. A judge rejected conducting the separations in Midlothian, and the children were taken from their mothers without incident.
The e-mails also showed state officials' concerns that some of the mothers were planning a "run" from the shelter before they were separated, something FLDS elder Willie Jessop called absurd.
"We never, never did anything other than to comply and to endure what they put us through," he told the newspaper in a story published Wednesday.
The FLDS, which believes polygamy brings glorification in heaven, is a breakaway sect of the Mormon church, which renounced polygamy more than a century ago. Jessop said this week that the church would not preside over marriages between sect members who were not of legal age.
He sidestepped questions about whether such marriages ever occurred but has said the sect has been unfairly portrayed. Source: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,363341,00.html
06/08/08 12:45 PM
Published Friday, June 06, 2008 6:05 AM
Perry defends state raid on sect ranch
Associated Press
DALLAS -- Gov. Rick Perry took personal responsibility Thursday if Texas "stepped across some legal line" in the April raid on a West Texas polygamous sect's ranch while defending the state's action, The Dallas Morning News reported.
Perry, who was in La Baule, France, for a European business conference, said the state has an obligation to protect young women from being forced into marriage and underage sex.
"That's my bottom line on this," Perry said in a story for the newspaper's online edition.
He also warned members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints that child sex abuse won't be tolerated and even suggested that followers of the renegade Mormon sect may want to leave the state.
"If you are going to conduct yourself that way, we are going to prosecute you," Perry said. "If you don't want to be prosecuted for those activities, then maybe Texas is not the place you need to consider calling home."
Willie Jessop, a Utah-based FLDS elder, said Perry's remarks were shocking, particularly given a Texas Supreme Court ruling that forced this week's return of 440 sect children on the grounds that Child Protective Services had provided scant evidence that the children were in danger.
"It's an outrage that he should even make such gross and broad allegations," Jessop said. "He's listening to people that tell lies about the FLDS."
FLDS officials have accused the state of persecuting sect members for their religious beliefs.
Texas authorities raided the sprawling compound near Eldorado on April 3 after three calls to a domestic abuse hot line.
purportedly from a 16-year-old mother living at the sect's Yearning For Zion ranch who was being abused by her middle-aged husband. The calls are being investigated as a possible hoax.
Perry said based on the information state authorities had at the time, "they acted with the best interest of those children."
"If responsibility needs to be taken for [court edicts] saying that we stepped across some legal line, I'll certainly take that responsibility," the governor said. "I am substantially less interested in these fine legal lines that we're discussing than I am about these children's welfare, that's where my focus is. That's where CPS' focus is."
Jessop, who has insisted that children at the ranch were not mistreated, has sidestepped questions about underage marriages at the YFZ ranch. But he did announce this week that the church would no longer sanction marriages of any girl under the legal age of consent in the state where she lives.
Though the children have been returned, a criminal investigation continues.
06/09/08 9:24 AM
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06/09/08 9:57 AM
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