An Investigation into Whether a Middle-Aged Man Married a Teenage Girl Spurred the Action
By Nate Carlisle and Russ Rizzo
The Salt Lake Tribune
April 4, 2008
http://origin.sltrib.com/ci_8809472
An investigation into whether a middle-aged man married a teenage girl has spurred child services agents in Texas to remove 52 girls from an FLDS compound there.
Eighteen of the 52 girls have been taken into state custody. The rest are being interviewed away from the compound. The girls range in age from 6 months to 17 years of age.
&bsp; A spokesman for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, Patrick Crimmins, said he did not know why the children were removed.
A search and arrest warrant shows Texas authorities are investigating whether 50-year-old Dale Barlow married and fathered a child with a 16-year-old girl.
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| An aerial view of YFZ Ranch, owned by the polygamous Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Photo by J.D. Doyle |
Barlow, 50, is a son of former Colorado City, Ariz., mayor Dan Barlow; he also was one of eight Colorado City men accused by Arizona prosecutors in 2005 of marrying underage girls and committing sex crimes.
He pleaded no contest in Superior Court in April 2007 to conspiracy to commit sexual conduct with a minor, and a second charge was dropped. The victim was a 16-year-old girl with whom he had a son. He was later sentenced to 45 days in jail and three years on probation.
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| Passengers sit inside a bus removing children from a polygamist retreat today in El Dorado, Texas. Child welfare officials and state troopers removed children from the secretive West Texas religious retreat built by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs following a complaint to state authorities. Photo by Harry Cabluck |
The Texas warrants, provided by the San Angelo Standard newspaper, allow police to arrest Barlow and seize records of his alleged marriage to the girl and records of a baby girl he may have fathered with the teenager. The baby is believed to be 8 months old, the warrant says.
Barlow and the teenager are the only people named in the warrant. It's unclear how an investigation into their relationship lead to the removal of 52 other girls.
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| Officials escort two buses today from the retreat built by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, located near El Dorado, Texas. Child welfare officials and state troopers removed at least one busload of children from the secretive West Texas religious retreat built by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs following a complaint to state authorities. Photo by Harry Cabluck |
On Friday afternoon, police were serving arrest and search warrants in the compound at the YFZ Ranch, owned by the polygamous Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Its traditional home base is in Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz.
Hearings to review whether Texas authorities have sufficient evidence to keep custody of the children are scheduled in district court in San Angelo on Monday before 51st District Judge Barbara Walther, said Randy Mankin, editor of the Eldorado Success.
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| Officers stand at the entrance to the El Dorado Civic Center today in El Dorado, Texas, after children were removed in the buses in the background from a nearby polygamist retreat. Child welfare officials and state troopers removed a busload of children from the secretive West Texas religious retreat built by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs following a complaint to state authorities. Photo by Harry Cabluck |
The raid swiftly drew criticism from polygamy supporters and foes alike.
"I would like to know what all of a sudden provoked this overwhelming response," said Mary Batchelor, a founder of Principle Voices, an advocacy group for women living in polygamy. "I'm concerned about these people and about law enforcement overreaching."
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| Texas DPS troopers block Schleicher County Road 300 near the entrance to the YFZ Ranch. Photo by Kathy Mankin |
Flora Jessop, a former FLDS member who has been instrumental in highlighting abuses, argued the raid would set back efforts to help those enduring abuses. "Anyone who would have needed help is now terrorized back into the hole," she said.
But Rowenna Erickson of Tapestry Against Polygamy, a group opposed to plural marriage, supported the raid and said she hoped it would spur law enforcement in Utah to further investigate possible child abuse in polygamous homes.
"These groups will open up and people will know the truth about them," Erickson said.
Questions at the ranch. At the Texas ranch, investigators interviewed children throughout the morning. Schleicher County Attorney Raymond Loomis said a girl's accusation that she was sexually abused triggered the raid, which began about 5:30 p.m. on Thursday. "Some girl at the compound called the sheriff's office and said she was being abused," Loomis told The Salt Lake Tribune.
Children at the ranch are are home-schooled.
In general, Crimmins said, children are removed when authorities determine they have been or are in immediate risk of being abused or neglected. Crimmins said a questionable marital lifestyle would not be grounds for removal.
A spokeswoman for child protective services said the residents at the ranch were "cooperating fully" with investigators.
Residents were not allowed to come in or go out of the compound while people were interviewed, said Department of Public Safety spokeswoman Tela Mange.
The Federal Aviation Administration placed flight restrictions around Eldorado, citing hazards.
Schleicher County Attorney Raymond Loomis Jr. said this is the first accusation of criminal activity on the 1,691-acre ranch he was aware of since FLDS members bought the land in 2003. They began moving there in large numbers starting in 2004, he said, and remain mostly to themselves.
"They've been real quiet," Loomis said. "They keep to themselves, and we don't hear or see much of them at all. There really hasn't been any problem with them."
Evoking dark memories
The 1953 raid on the sect's traditional twin towns of Hildale and Colorado City, deteriorated into a public relations disaster when newsreels showed photos of children being yanked from their parents. About 160 children from the community, then called Short Creek, were removed and sent into foster care.
Allegations that the community's children were being abused were "the main motive behind the '53 raid," said Ken Driggs, an Atlanta attorney and historian who has studied fundamentalist Mormon groups and specifically the FLDS.
Such sects adhere to a 19th century version of Mormonism that includes the practice of plural marriage. The mainstream Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints publicly disavowed polygamy in 1890 and now excommunicates those who espouse or practice it.
"Frankly, I don't think there's another instance of detention of that many kids in any fundamentalist group," Driggs said.
Teachings of the FLDS do not condone child sexual abuse, he said, and the police force in the twin towns of Colorado City and Hildale have prosecuted such cases.
"They would be as horrified as any one on the outside would be," he said.
An open relationship
It is estimated that 200 people or more live at the ranch. Schleicher County Sheriff David Doran has had an open relationship its residents and has visited the compound several times over the past several years. He has previously resisted pressure from other law enforcement agencies to conduct a forced search of the compound, particularly when police were searching for sect leader Warren S. Jeffs.
Jeffs, arrested in 2006 outside Las Vegas, was sentenced to two consecutive five-to-life prison terms in Utah for convictions on two counts of rape as an accomplice. He was charged in connection with his 2001 marriage of Elissa Wall, then 14, to Allen Steed, then 19. Wall had objected to the marriage and later asked to be released, but Jeffs counseled her to stay married.
He is now in the Mohave County jail in Kingman, Ariz., awaiting trial on four counts each of incest and sexual conduct with a minor stemming from arranged marriages.
Who's there?
Salt Lake City accountant Bruce Wisan, appointed by a judge to take over a trust connected to the sect after leaders were accused of mishandling its assets, said he is glad Texas authorities are acting swiftly to investigate whether the allegation is true.
"The FLDS have used the cloak of religion for too long to shield their illegal activities," Wisan said.
He is eager to learn from Texas authorities who is living at the ranch, as he has been looking for certain FLDS leaders to serve them with legal documents.
He said he is especially interested in speaking with William Shapley, the head of the Twin Cities Improvement Association. Businesses in Hildale and Colorado City have been paying rent to the association, rather than the trust Wisan is overseeing.
The United Effort Plan Trust was set up in 1942 for communal management of properties of the church members. The Utah Attorney General's Office convinced a court to take over the trust in 2005, alleging leaders were mismanaging it.
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