AG's office to prosecute FLDS cases
Texas judge signs order involving kids from compound
Court clerks said the order was signed for the magistrate case, which was the case involving the initial search warrants for the FLDS compound.
"The state prays this honorable court appoint the office of the attorney general of the state of Texas as special prosecutors to assist with the prosecution of any criminal cases that may arise in relation to the above numbered search warrant investigations," Tom Green County District Attorney Stephen Lupton wrote in a motion obtained by the Deseret News Tuesday.
Judge Barbara Walther approved the request. The Texas Attorney General's Office did not return calls seeking comment on Tuesday.
An estimated 1,000 boxes of evidence were seized from the YFZ Ranch and the material is currently being reviewed by an appeals court judge. At issue is whether some of the evidence is protected under priest-penitent privilege and the First Amendment.
An 88-page search warrant return listed items seized from the compound, including photographs, computers, hard drives, journals, temple clothes, cameras, cell phones, scriptures, tax records, baby books, letters from attorneys, letters dubbed "prison mail," "mail from Canadian Saints" and "mail from houses in hiding."
No criminal charges have been filed in connection with the raid. Two men, however, were arrested for allegedly interfering with the police raid.
Lawyers for the FLDS Church are challenging the seizure of the evidence from the ranch, saying it was improperly obtained based on a hoax phone call. Prosecutors in Utah and Arizona have sought to get their hands on that evidence, to see if it could assist their criminal investigations against the FLDS Church and its leader, Warren Jeffs.
On April 3, Texas law enforcement and Child Protective Services workers responded to a call to a San Angelo family crisis shelter by a 16-year-old girl named Sarah, who claimed she was pregnant and in an abusive, polygamous marriage to a man named Dale Barlow. When authorities went on the ranch, Texas CPS said it found evidence of other abuses, including teenage mothers.
That prompted Walther to order the removal of all of the children from the ranch. A series of search warrants were also served, including a federal search warrant on the last day that law enforcement was on the ranch.
Authorities have not found Sarah, and have declared a Colorado woman a "person of interest" in their investigation into whether the call was a hoax. Dale Barlow, a convicted sex offender who lives in Colorado City was questioned by Texas Rangers, but never arrested. An arrest warrant for him was dropped last week.
Attorneys for the 464 children in Texas custody have said that the initial call that prompted the raid will not likely affect the custody case, because it is what CPS workers saw when they responded that led to the removal of the children.
After spending weeks in makeshift shelters, the children are now in foster care facilities scattered across Texas.
E-mail: bwinslow@desnews.com
Recent comments
FLDS meets the same challenges any organization made up of humans...
Keith Richard Radford Jr. | May 12, 2008 at 1:17 p.m.
so what do you suggest? perhaps the CPS is the wrong approach....
To Robin | May 8, 2008 at 5:34 p.m.
The DNA won't lie.
Heap ItAll Fair | May 7, 2008 at 10:03 p.m.
