315 now dropped from FLDS custody case

Boxes filled with files of children are stacking up in the clerk's office at the Tom Green County Courthouse in San Angelo, Texas.

More children from the Fundamentalist LDS Church's Yearning for Zion Ranch have been dropped from court oversight in the ongoing custody case in Texas.

Eleven more children were "nonsuited" on Tuesday, Texas Child Protective Services spokesman Patrick Crimmins said. That brings the total number of people dropped from the court case to 315.

The Deseret News' ongoing tally includes 26 so-called "disputed minors," women whom CPS initially believed were minors but were later nonsuited when they were determined to be adults.

The reasons for nonsuiting a child vary, CPS said, including no evidence of abuse or the parents taking appropriate steps to protect the child from harm. A nonsuit effectively ends the court oversight and requirements for the parents, although CPS could still maintain some role in working with the families.

Hundreds of children were taken into state protective custody in April when authorities raided the YFZ Ranch near Eldorado after receiving a phone call alleging abuse, including underage marriages. The 439 children were ordered returned to their families two months later when a pair of Texas courts ruled the state acted improperly and the children were not at immediate risk for abuse.

Since then, CPS has nonsuited as it moves through the massive custody case involving the Utah-based polygamous sect. So far, only one child — a 14-year-old girl believed to have been married at age 12 to FLDS leader Warren Jeffs — has been ordered back into foster care after a judge ruled her mother could not protect her from abuse. The parents of six other children signed family service plans in a deal with CPS that avoided having their children returned to foster care.

Nine people, including Jeffs, have been indicted by a Texas grand jury on a series of charges ranging from sexual assault to bigamy to failure to report child abuse, connected to underage marriages. The men are scheduled to appear in an Eldorado court again on Oct. 27.

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E-mail: bwinslow@desnews.com

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