4 more in 'cult' cited in death

Gus G. Sentementes and Annie Linskey
Baltimore Sun
August 12, 2008

5, including boy's mother, charged with starving him

Baltimore police have obtained warrants charging four more members of what authorities call a religious cult in the death of 2-year-old Javon Thompson, whose body was found in May in a suitcase in Philadelphia. The warrants bring the number of people charged in the boy's death to five.

Charged with murder in warrants were Queen Antoinette, 40, Trevia Williams, 20, Marcus Cobbs, 21, and Steven Bynum, 42. All but Bynum are in jail on other charges, and the Warrant Apprehension Task Force is looking for Bynum in the New York area, said Sterling Clifford, a spokesman for the city's Police Department.

With the most recent charges, police have charged all but two known adults associated with the tiny religious group, 1 Mind Ministries, in the boy's death. The gruesome details of that crime were outlined in a 12-page statement of charges written over the weekend by homicide Detective Vernon Parker.

Police say the five suspects belonged to a small group of adults and children who operated for a time in East and West Baltimore. Police allege that the victim's mother, Ria Ramkissoon, 21, the first to be charged with murder, and others neglected Javon and allowed the boy to starve to death because they thought he was a demon for not saying amen after he was fed, according to police charging documents.

Javon is believed to have died in December 2006 in a West Baltimore house, according to police charging documents. The cause of death was ruled homicide by unspecified means, according to court papers.

In early February 2007, police say, the group fled to Philadelphia, taking the boy's body in a green suitcase with wheels. They stayed at various places, settling for about a week at the home of a man the group befriended, according to police. Police found Javon's body in a shed behind the house in May this year. He was wearing a diaper.

DNA evidence provided preliminary confirmation that the remains are those of Javon, according to a police source close to the investigation. Authorities are awaiting complete results.

In early May, three members of the group - including its alleged leader, Toni Ellsberry, also known as Queen Antoinette - were arrested in Brooklyn, N.Y., on outstanding warrants connected to an unrelated Baltimore case in which they are accused of assaulting a city officer who had gone to their home to retrieve a child involved in a custody dispute. The suspects were returned to Baltimore and held on charges that they had failed to show up for a court date.

Ramkissoon, also known as Princess Marie, was to have had a bail hearing in district court in Baltimore yesterday, but the proceeding was postponed because she was under psychiatric observation at the Women's Detention Center, according to court and correctional officials.

Judge Charles A. Chiapparelli postponed Ramkissoon's hearing until this morning. Ramkissoon and the other four are charged with first- and second-degree murder, child abuse, assault, reckless endangerment and conspiracy charges, police said.

Ramkissoon's mother, Seeta Khadan-Newton, said she was pleased to hear that others have been charged in her grandson's death. Referring to her daughter, Khadan-Newton said: "She had no control. They made the rules."

She still struggles with why her daughter joined the group. "I don't think my daughter knew what she was getting into," she said. "The baby's father was in jail. She was going through a long time."

Ramkissoon was with the other members in Brooklyn, but when they were arrested in May she returned to Baltimore and was staying at the Mattie B. Uzzle Outreach Center in the 1200 block of N. Chester St. in East Baltimore. A woman answering the door there yesterday declined to comment.

In court documents charging Ramkissoon, Parker, the homicide detective, recounts eyewitness accounts from a source within the religious group. The source said the group's leader, Queen Antoinette, "had a problem with baby Javon, who would not comply with mealtime ritual by saying 'Amen' after meals," Parker wrote. "The more the Queen pressed Javon, the more resistant he became."

The child stopped getting food and water, and he became thin with dark circles under his eyes, according to the document. Javonstopped breathing and was placed in a back room of a house in the 3200 block of Auchentoroly Terrace. At one point everyone was instructed to pray around the boy's body, the document said.

"The Queen told everyone that 'God was going to raise Javon from the dead,'" according to Parker's statement of charges. "That resurrection never took place."

After the child died, Bynum rented a silver Chevrolet Impala from Enterprise Rent-A-Car and drove to Philadelphia, according to court documents. Records obtained by the detective showed that the car was rented from Feb. 13-16, 2007.

The group stayed at the Red Roof Inn near the Philadelphia airport through March 9, when they were evicted, according to charging documents. Next they lived for a while on the streets, and Bynum left the group, according to charging documents.

On March 16, the group encountered the Philadelphia police who notified the city's social services department, which took two "school-aged children," according to the charging documents.

Queen Antionette then befriended Samuel Morgan, an elderly man living in South Philadelphia. "The Queen was able to gain the confidence of Morgan, who allowed the group to stay at his residence approximately one week," Parker wrote.

The group - it is unclear how many people were left - decided to go to Brooklyn. But they stored their belongings in Philadelphia - leaving behind the green suitcase, police allege.

After receiving a tip from a caseworker with the New York City Administration for Children's Services in early February, Baltimore homicide detectives went to Philadelphia and found the suitcase in early May.

annie.linskey@baltsun.com
gus.sentementes@baltsun.com

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nation/bal-te.child12aug12,0,4021858.story

25 students got no-good degrees from New Birth campus

Christopher Quinn
Atlanta Journal-Constitution
August 11, 2008

Twenty-five students who attended a satellite program of North Carolina Central University at Bishop Eddie Long's Lithonia megachurch earned bachelor's degrees that are not recognized by the school's accrediting agency.

A school spokeswoman said 39 other students were in the program earlier this year when it was shut down.

Long and the school, in Durham, started the satellite campus four years ago. They closed it in June after the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools learned of it, reviewed the program and refused to sanction it. All extension programs have to be approved by SACS for degrees to be recognized.

Tom Benberg, chief of staff at the Commission on Colleges at SACS, said any degrees earned in the program at New Birth Missionary Baptist Church, "would not be a degree from an accredited operation."

Long released a statement saying the church has partnered with various education programs to hold classes at the church.

"Regrettably, the university did not seek appropriate approvals at that time prior to launching the program. Last month [SACS] denied approval for NCCU to continue the program offerings at the New Birth site."

Long said the church and the school are continuing to work toward getting the program recognized by SACS so it can continue.

Long is a graduate of NCCU, a school trustee and announced a $1 million gift to university last week.

The University of North Carolina system, of which NCCU is part, learned of the program last week, according to a spokeswoman. The program should have been vetted by the system's board of governors.

Erskine Bowles, president the University of North Carolina system, said in a written statement, "I can think of no justifiable reason why the former NCCU leadership would have completely ignored and failed to abide by the appropriate approval process in creating this program. Such action is contrary to all university policy."

Bowles continued, "This circumstance is one of many problems Chancellor [Charlie] Nelms inherited when he arrived last year, and he has managed each of them professionally and effectively."

The university system and the staff at NCCU are investigating the situation and trying to answer the legal and academic questions caused by it, said Joni Worthington, vice president of communications at UNC.

The school and Long's church tried to get the program approved ex post facto, but SACS denied their request in June.

A SACS report said the program did not prove that faculty was qualified or that it had adequate library and learning resources. The program was unable to measure whether students were adequately leaning the subject matters and it did not provide an adequate financial statement from the program.

NCCU provided The Atlanta Journal-Constitution a list of 11 NCCU faculty members who taught in the program, all of whom had graduate degrees. However, four were listed as non-compliant because they had no graduate course work in the classes they were teaching. The university paid the teachers and their travel expenses.

The program also had adjunct faculty members from the Atlanta area.

The college offered business, criminal justice and hospitality degrees at New Birth. The program began under then-Chancellor JamesAmmons of NCCU, who left to become president of Florida A&M University in 2007.

Calls and an e-mail Monday morning to Ammons were not returned. Ammons was engaged in board meetings there, an A&M spokeswoman said.

A statement from Chancellor Nelms at NCCU denied responsibility for the program. A university spokeswoman referred questions to Kimberly Phifer-McGhee, director of distance education at NCCU.

Phifer-McGhee said she did not know why or how the program started, did not know how much the university paid to run the program, or why SACS was not notified of it.

"I was not part of the leadership," she said.

She said that faculty members had degrees, but may not have had course work to teach what they were teaching at the school.

The university is trying to work out a program that would allow current students to remain in school in good standing, she said.

Benberg said that SACS would not likely recognize the degrees already awarded.

"I am not aware that we have ever done that," he said.

http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/dekalb/stories/2008/08/11/long_college_degrees.html?cxntnid=amn081208e

5 Christian bikers accused of weapons and gang crimes

Tony Barboza
Los Angeles Times
August 9, 2008


Orange County prosecutors scale back charges against the Set Free Soldiers in a Newport Beach bar brawl with members of the Hells Angels, one of whom faces a weapons charge.

Five members of a Christian motorcycle gang were charged Friday with a variety of felony weapons and gang crimes after high-profile raids this week targeting the Anaheim-based group.

The charges marked a retreat from Wednesday, when authorities arrested seven members of the Set Free Soldiers, including founder and pastor Phillip Aguilar, on charges of conspiracy to commit murder. An eighth member was arrested on suspicion of attempted murder.
The charges were in connection with a double stabbing during a bar brawl with the Hells Angels late last month.

On Friday, the Orange County district attorney's filed just one attempted murder charge, against Jose Quinones, 42, and charged Glenn Schoeman, 56, with being an accessory after the fact. They were being held on $1-million and $100,000 bail, respectively.

Aguilar, 60, the group's leader and pastor; his 29-year-old son, Matthew Aguilar; and Michael Timanus Jr., 29, face felony charges of illegal weapons possession.
They were expected to post bail, which was set at $50,000 each, according to their attorneys.

Phillip and Matthew Aguilar also were charged with possessing brass knuckles.

All five were accused of street terrorism for being part of a criminal street gang.

One Hells Angel member, John Lloyd, 41, also was charged with having a loaded firearm in a vehicle.

Additional charges may be filed, said Deputy District Atty. Erik Petersen, adding that the Set Free Soldiers are a violent street gang because "they carry on a pattern of criminal gang activity."

Set Free members say they are a Christian ministry that helps rehabilitate ex-convicts and recovering drug addicts. But authorities maintain that they are an outlaw motorcycle gang.

In Wednesday's raids in Anaheim, Costa Mesa, Rancho Santa Margarita and Norco, more than 150 police, SWAT teams and federal agents arrested eight Set Free Soldiers and three Hells Angels.

The raids included four homes that Aguilar owns in the 300 block of South Archer Street in Anaheim, where authorities found multiple firearms.

The arrests followed a July 27 fight between Set Free members and Hells Angels at a Newport Beach bar.

Police said Set Free members stabbed two Hells Angels and one Hells Angel struck a Set Free member in the head with a pool ball.

Attorneys on both sides said the case will hinge on a surveillance video taken of the brawl.

Sandra Aguilar, Phillip Aguilar's wife, said after the court hearing that the group had been unfairly targeted by police, who she said terrorized the group's children and grandchildren during the raids and "turned our homes upside down."

"They cannot believe that we're Christians because we have tattoos and ride motorcycles," she said. "It's sheep in wolf's clothing."

tony.barboza@latimes.com

http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-bikers9-2008aug09,0,4535714.story

4 polygamist sect members post bond in Texas

Michelle Roberts

Associated Press

August 7, 2008

SAN ANTONIO (AP) — Four polygamist sect members indicted on charges of sexual assault of a child were released from jail late Wednesday after posting bond.

Schleicher County Sheriff David Doran said the men — Raymond Merrill Jessop, 36; Allan Eugene Keate, 56; Michael George Emack, 57; and Merrill Leroy Jessop, 33 — posted bonds of $100,000 per charge and were likely headed home to the Yearning For Zion Ranch in Eldorado. They had been jailed since turning themselves in more than a week ago.

Each of the men from the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, which runs the YFZ Ranch, was indicted last month on one count of sexual assault of a child. Merrill Leroy Jessop faces an additional charge of bigamy.

Under the conditions of their bonds, the men must stay in Schleicher County unless they notify authorities and must stay away from their alleged victims.

They were indicted July 22 along with imprisoned FLDS leader Warren Jeffs, who was also charged with sexual assault of a child, and Lloyd Hammon Barlow, a 38-year-old physician who was charged with three misdemeanor counts of failure to report child abuse. Barlow posted bond last week.

Prosecutors have declined to provide details on what the men are accused of doing, but documents from a separate custody case included a journal entry from Jeffs indicating Raymond Merrill Jessop was married to Jeffs' daughter the day after she turned 15.

The journal entry also indicates Merrill Leroy Jessop married another sect daughter that day, though it's not clear how old she was.

Jeffs is jailed in Arizona awaiting trial on charges related to the marriage of underage girls to older sect members there. He was convicted in Utah last year as an accomplice to rape for marrying a girl to her cousin.

Under Texas law, a girl younger than 17 cannot generally consent to sex with an adult.

The state's bigamy statute applies to legal marriages and to couples who purport to marry, a lower standard adopted in part to target unions like the spiritual marriages practiced by FLDS members.

Prosecutors and law enforcement say their investigation continues.

Child Protective Services, which launched the initial investigation into possible underage marriages, is also still investigating. On Tuesday, CPS asked a judge to place eight children in foster care, saying their mothers refuse to limit their contact with men accused of being involved in underage marriages.

The FLDS, which believes polygamy brings glory in heaven, is a breakaway sect of the mainstream Mormon church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which officially renounced polygamy more than a century ago.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iIdMpRHjN4hpNKBhfYyAsR4DDo4QD92D7ELG0

7 Christian bikers arrested in Orange County raid

Tony Barboza and H. G. Reza, Staff Writers

Los Angeles Times

August 7, 2008

Long controversial for its aggressive evangelism aimed at those with a troubled past -- ex-convicts and drug addicts among them -- the Anaheim-based Christian motorcycle gang known as the Set Free Soldiers found itself in deeper trouble Wednesday when its leader and half a dozen members were arrested on suspicion of attempted murder.

The arrests, which followed a double stabbing in a brawl with the Hells Angels at a Newport Beach bar July 27, was the latest brush with the law for the group of black-leather-clad bikers, which has straddled the line between Christian outreach group and outlaw motorcycle gang.

By late Wednesday, authorities had arrested 10 members of the Set Free Soldiers and the Hells Angels during raids in Anaheim, Costa Mesa and Rancho Santa Margarita that started at 5 a.m., said Sgt. Evan Sailor of the Newport Beach Police Department.

The operation involved more than 150 officers, including SWAT teams and federal drug enforcement agents.

Seven members of the Set Free Soldiers, including leader Phil Aguilar, 60, have been charged with conspiracy to commit murder and are each being held on $1-million bail, police said.
Three members of the Hells Angels are also in custody, including John Phillip Lloyd, a 41-year-old Costa Mesa man charged with assault with a deadly weapon. The other two were arrested on drug charges.

Others are still being sought on arrest warrants.

The arrests stemmed from a 15-person brawl at the Newport Beach bar Blackie's by the Sea, where Set Free members allegedly stabbed two Hells Angels members.

During the brawl, the Hells Angels also allegedly struck one of the Set Free members in the head with a pool ball.

On its website, which appeared to have been taken down Wednesday evening, Set Free Soldiers call themselves "a group of men who love Jesus and love to ride hard."

"We are not your normal motorcycle club," the statement reads. "Some say we are too good for the bad guys, and too bad for the good guys."

Aguilar, a Harley-riding ex-convict and former drug addict who served time for child abuse in the 1970s, converted to Christianity in prison. He became the founding pastor of Set Free Worldwide Ministries in 1982. But he and his ministry have been highly controversial.

His MySpace.com page describes Aguilar as pastor or "the Chief" of the group. Next to his photo is the statement: "Sinner or Saint you be the judge!"

Police said that through its ministry, the gang recruited people discharged from parole, state prison and county jails and has an outreach program for convicted felons.

Although Set Free has been praised for its streetwise approach, its detractors say it is an autocratic organization that exerts too much control over its members by confiscating their belongings and forcing them to break off relationships with friends and families.

Law enforcement officials and former members say that the group has devolved into a motorcycle gang like any other, and that it has ties to the Mongols, an outlaw biker gang that has engaged in warfare with the Hells Angels.

Set Free chapters in the Midwest have provided security at Mongol funerals, said Steve Cook, an Independence, Mo., police officer and president of the Midwest Outlaw Motorcycle Gang Investigators Assn.

"It is an outlaw club," Cook said. "Their supposed Christian affiliation doesn't change my opinion."

A former Set Free member said Aguilar has performed Mongol weddings and officiated at their funerals. The man, who asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation, said he left the group about five years ago when Aguilar began taking the church in a new direction and started recruiting tattooed bikers. Some members carry guns, he said.

"Phil always wanted to be somebody in the outlaw biker world, and he's been hiding behind the cross for a long time," the former member said. "When he began recruiting members, he figured the badder they were the better."

Members of other Christian motorcycle groups said they are afraid Set Free's troubles will give them all a bad name.

"It puts all of us Christian bikers in a negative light, that all of a sudden we're gangs too," said Radawn McKinney, vice president of a motorcycle ministry based in Orange. "We're not all thugs and don't have gang behavior. We have to go out and do God's work."

Despite Set Free's hard-core reputation -- its website features videos of members in fistfights -- some who have worked with the group were surprised at the gravity of the charges.

Sandie Moore, 52, a retired nurse who lives in Fountain Valley, said Wednesday's arrests shocked her. She said she had worked with Aguilar's group on charity events for organizations such as the Children's Hospital of Orange County, where they had provided security.

"What I saw today is far, far, far from how I know them," Moore said. "I can't believe they are being portrayed as thugs. I think maybe some of them who haven't corrected their ways got rowdy, but their behavior is totally contrary to how they acted in front of me."
Carol Cantiberos, 47, of Buena Park, a Set Free member who lived at one of its group homes in Anaheim for three weeks and goes to its church services every Saturday, said Aguilar and the gang helped her stay sober for the last 86 days.

"He doesn't ask you about your history or what you've done bad; he just accepts you with open arms," she said. "I don't believe he would do anything unless he was protecting himself, because he's turned around."

But news of the raid was no surprise to Rose Lambie, 65, who lives three houses down from one of the four South Archer Street homes in Anaheim that were targeted. Aguilar owns several houses in the 300 block of South Archer.

Aguilar, she said, is well-known and the gang had "taken over the neighborhood in a lot of ways."

She said the gang has a history of intimidating neighbors, who had met with one another and with police to raise concerns about their behavior.

Ronald Enroth, a sociology professor at Westmont College in Santa Barbara who featured Set Free in his 1992 book "Churches That Abuse," said the group is a "control-centered, authoritarian organization" that has displayed cult-like behavior, even as it cozied up to mainstream evangelical groups and Aguilar appeared on Trinity Broadcasting Network programs.

"They feel they're reaching a kind of person the larger religious community can't reach," Enroth said. "A lot of people on the margins of society may have been helped, but they are not always aware of the tentacles that an organization like this can have on their lives."tony.barboza@latimes.com

hgreza@latimes.com

Times staff writer Francisco Vara-Orta contributed to this report.

http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/california/la-me-bikers7-2008aug07,0,2191642.story

5 indicted FLDS men appear before judge

Ben Winslow
Deseret News

July 30, 2008

Five members of the Fundamentalist LDS Church indicted by a Texas grand jury made their first appearances before a judge.

The men were arraigned before Schleicher County Justice of the Peace James Doyle late Tuesday afternoon, where they were handed papers spelling out their rights and told not to contact their alleged victims.

"All I do is an admonishment," Doyle told the Deseret News. "I read the warrant so they know what's been charged by the grand jury. I go through their rights."

One man, Dr. Lloyd Hammon Barlow, 38, posted a $15,000 bond late Tuesday and was released from jail pending his next court appearance. The rest remained in jail pending the posting of $100,000 bail, Texas Department of Public Safety spokeswoman Tela Mange said. The men's next court appearance will then be set by the district court judge, who is based in nearby San Angelo.

Raymond Merril Jessop, 36; Allan Eugene Keate, 56; Michael George Emack, 57; and Merril Leroy Jessop, 33, are all charged with first-degree felony sexual assault. Merril Jessop is also charged with bigamy, a first-degree felony. Barlow was indicted on misdemeanor counts of failure to report child abuse.

Also indicted is FLDS leader Warren Jeffs, who remains in an Arizona jail. Jeffs, 52, is accused of performing child-bride marriages there. -->Texas authorities have said they will seek to have the FLDS leader extradited as soon as possible to the Lone Star state to face a sexual assault charge -->. Jeffs was convicted in Utah of rape as an accomplice for performing a marriage between a 14-year-old girl and her 19-year-old cousin and was sentenced to a pair of 5-to-life sentences.

In April, child welfare authorities and law enforcement raided the YFZ Ranch outside Eldorado, Texas, after a phone call from someone claiming to be a pregnant 16-year-old in an abusive marriage to an older man. On site, authorities said they saw other signs of abuse, prompting a judge to order the removal of all of the children.

The ranch's 440 children were ultimately returned to their families when two Texas courts ruled the state acted improperly and there was no imminent danger of abuse. The original calls that sparked the raid are still being investigated as a hoax.

Hundreds of boxes of evidence were seized from the ranch, including diaries, photographs, thousands of pages of dictations by Jeffs and other FLDS records. These are believed to have contributed to the indictments, which may be the first of a series. The Schleicher County grand jury will meet again next month.

Raymond Merril Jessop is believed to have married Teresa Jeffs (now 17) a day after her 15th birthday in July 2006. Jeffs repeatedly has gone public denying she was a sex abuse victim but was subpoenaed to testify before the Schleicher County grand jury anyway. In the indictment, he is accused of sexually assaulting a girl under 17 in November 2004.

Merril Leroy Jessop is charged with sexual assault involving a girl in August 2006. The indictment also charges him with bigamy, stemming from a ceremony the same day Raymond Jessop married Teresa Jeffs.

"I was mouth at performing the marriage sealings," Jeffs said in a July 27, 2006, dictation filed with a child-advocate's court report and obtained by the Deseret News. "Merril Leroy Jessop received (the girl), and Raymond Merril Jessop received my daughter Teresa Jeffs."

According to the dictation, the FLDS leader himself married a girl in the same ceremony. Texas child welfare authorities believe she was 12 at the time.

A Bishop's Record seized by law enforcement indicates Allan Keate had a 17-year-old wife, and may have fathered an underage child with her. The indictment accuses him of sexual assault in April 2006.

Emack, according to the Bishop's records, has a 19-year-old wife and had a 1 1/2-year-old son with her. The indictment accuses him of sexual assault in October 2004.

Barlow is an FLDS community physician. The indictments accuse him of delivering babies in October and December of 2006 and May 2007, knowing their mothers were children and having cause to believe they were abused or neglected.

With the news of the criminal charges, Utah licensing officials said they will monitor the Texas case before deciding if they will take any action against Dr. Barlow.

"I cannot confirm or deny if we have an investigation going," said Jennifer Bolton, a spokeswoman for the Utah Department of Occupational and Professional Licensing.

E-MAIL: bwinslow@desnews.com

http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,700246826,00.html

5 indicted FLDS men surrender to Texas authorities

Pat Reavy

Deseret News

July 29, 2008

The five FLDS men indicted last week by a grand jury in Schleicher County, Texas, surrendered to authorities Monday afternoon at the Schleicher County Sheriff's Office.

The 12-member jury indicted a total of six men, including FLDS leader Warren Jeffs, on July 22. At least nine jury members must vote in favor of an indictment for one to be issued.

Five of the men, including Jeffs, were indicted on first-degree felony charges of sexual assault of a child. But the names of the other men were withheld until they were in custody.

Monday afternoon, the Texas Attorney General's Office announced the other men charged with sexual assault are Raymond Merrill Jessop, 36; Allan Eugene Keate, 56; Michael George Emack, 57; and Merrill Leroy Jessop, 33. Merrill Jessop was also charged with bigamy, a first-degree felony.

The sixth man, Lloyd Hammon Barlow, 38, was indicted on three counts of failure to report child abuse, all class B misdemeanors.

The sentence for a sex assault conviction is five to 99 years in prison, or five years to life in prison.

Bond for the men other than Jeffs was set at $100,000 per charge for the felonies and $5,000 for the misdemeanor.

The arrests "reflect nearly a weeklong effort by the Texas Rangers and Texas Attorney General's Office to arrange for the defendants' arrests," Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said in a statement.

Diaries of an FLDS member submitted as evidence in connection with the case of Teresa Jeffs, now 17, the daughter of Warren Jeffs, mentioned Raymond Jessop.

Teresa Jeffs allegedly married Raymond Jessop on her 15th birthday in 2006, according to her diary.

Raymond was described in Warren Jeffs' diary as being part of the faith's priesthood.

Jeffs is in custody in a Kingman, Ariz., jail awaiting trial on charges of sexual misconduct as an accomplice, accused of performing underage marriages. He was convicted in Utah in 2007 of rape as an accomplice for marrying a 14-year-old girl to her 19-year-old cousin. He was sentenced to two sentences of 5-years-to-life in prison.

E-mail: preavy@desnews.com

http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,700246728,00.html?linkTrack=Email%2DGME

5 from West Texas polygamy sect to be arraigned today in sex assault case

Emily Ramshaw
Dallas Morning News
July 29, 2008

AUSTIN — Five men from a West Texas polygamist sect will be arraigned this afternoon, a day after they turned themselves in on charges related to the sexual assault and “spiritual” marriage of underage girls.

Attorney General Greg Abbott said law enforcement officials and an attorney for the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints negotiated the surrender, which came sooner than expected, officials acknowledged.

A sixth sexual assault suspect – sect prophet Warren Jeffs – has already been convicted of similar charges in Utah, is in jail awaiting trial in Arizona, and could still be extradited to Texas.

The arrests follow child welfare investigators’ seizure of 440 children and about two dozen women from the polygamist community in April, over allegations the sect permitted a culture of sexual abuse and marriages between young girls and much older men.

State courts overturned the decision to take children and some young women into state custody months later, and most children were returned to their parents.

Attorneys for the sect, who have expressed outrage over the raid and subsequent criminal charges, declined to comment on Monday’s arrests. Willie Jessop, who has been speaking on behalf of the West Texas community in Mr. Jeffs’ absence, could not be reached for comment.

Mr. Jeffs and four other men — Merril Leroy Jessop, 33; Raymond Jessop, 36; Michael Emack, 57 and Allan Keate, 56 — were charged with first-degree felony sexual assault of a child. The younger Mr. Jessop, who uses his middle name, is also charged with first-degree felony bigamy, which means one of his alleged wives is younger than 16. A sixth man, Dr. Lloyd Barlow, 38, faces three misdemeanor counts of failing to report child abuse.

A grand jury received DNA evidence drawn from members of the sect before issuing the criminal charges.

All the men but Mr. Jeffs are in custody in Schleicher County, where their Yearning For Zion ranch is located. The men charged with felonies are all being held in lieu of $100,000 bond and face sentences ranging from 5 years to life in prison. Dr. Barlow’s bail is $5,000, and he faces a sentence of up to six months in prison.

It’s unclear whether the men will post bond today. Mr. Abbott, acknowledging the deep financial pockets of the Mormon breakaway sect, said that he still thought the $100,000 bail was sufficient and that authorities would keep close watch over any of the individuals who are released on bond.

Dr. Barlow is known as the chief physician at the sect’s compound outside Eldorado and is thought to have had information about young mothers there.

At least three of the other men, including Mr. Jeffs, are believed to have taken underage wives. A 2006 “dictation” from Warren Jeffs submitted as evidence in the case details the prophet choosing another wife for himself, as well as arranging the marriage of his own 16-year-old daughter to Raymond Jessop. He also chooses a bride for Leroy Jessop.

In the dictation, he refers to another man arrested Monday, noting that an FBI agent had “called Mike Emack right on Mike Emack’smobile phone, asking him if he would testify against me.”

“I don’t deserve any of my ladies,” Mr. Jeffs says in the dictation, “but I thank the Lord for every one of them, and yearn for every one of them to succeed, and all to be gathered.”

The Dallas Morning News does not name alleged victims of sexual assault.

Despite sect members’ vows last week that they would turn themselves in, state law enforcement officials had refused to estimate how long it would take to apprehend the men. They feared they had already fled to the FLDS’ home base — the Utah-Arizona border — or worse, left the country.

On Monday, Mr. Abbott confirmed that an attorney for the sect facilitated the surrender of the men, who arrived at the Schleicher County jail in two shifts. He said he didn’t know if the men had to be summoned from another state to turn themselves in.

Schleicher County Sheriff David Doran said the men were booked peacefully.

The grand jury meets again next month, and Mr. Abbott said the “investigation of this whole issue is ongoing.”

Gerry Goldstein, a San Antonio-based attorney for the sect, said he was “not in a position to discuss the case.”

But as recently as last week, Mr. Jessop said he was confident in the “character of the people from the ranch,” and that they would “certainly step up to the allegations.” He said the idea that any sect members would flee the state in fear of indictments was outrageous.

“I’ll tell you right now,” he said, “anyone under these indictments will step up and answer the charges, to show the judicial system that we’re not guilty of what they’ve accused us of.”

eramshaw@dallasnews.com

http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/dn/latestnews/stories/073008dnmetpolygamy.14277b19.html

Transcendental Meditation "Holy Tradition"

Song: "Holy Tradition" from Guru Purnima 2008
Rick , Stanley

July 18, 2008

5th District Court will take up the actions against residents who don't want to pay $100 a month fee

Brooke Adams
Salt Lake Tribune
July 17, 2008 

FLDS: Judge won't block evictions

A 3rd District Court judge refused to issue a temporary restraining order that would have halted plans to evict hundreds of people from their homes in the polygamous Utah-Arizona border communities of Hildale and Colorado City.

    Judge Denise Lindberg ruled Tuesday there were factual and procedural problems with a request from attorneys for the families. Those facing evictions are current or former members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

    Lindberg said that any eviction proceeding would be heard in 5th District Court, not by her. She also said the attorneys had not given proper notice of the action nor filed a bond required for all restraining orders.

    The judge said, however, that she would look at allegations of improper conduct by the accountant overseeing the sect's United Effort Plan Trust if brought before her separately.

    "The good news to our clients is that there is not imminent danger of them being removed without further litigation in the 5th District Court," said Bret Rawson, an attorney who, with Peter Stirba, represents those who received eviction notices. "We now have to determine [if] we ask the court to rule on the remainder of last night's filing or raise the issue again referencing facts in that filing."

    Jeff Shields, attorney for court-appointed fiduciary Bruce R. Wisan, said some residents have already moved to avoid eviction.

    "We're working with them if they're genuine and have issues," Shields said.

    On Tuesday, the attorneys charged that Wisan, appointed three years ago by Lindberg to manage the United Effort Plan Trust, was harming the beneficiaries of the trust.

    The trust holds virtually all land in the towns of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., as well as property in Bountiful, British Columbia. The communities are the traditional homes of the FLDS sect.

    Wisan had given demand notices to residents of 57 dwellings in the twin towns that gave them until Tuesday to pay or make arrangements to pay a $100 a month assessment fee.

    brooke@sltrib.com

Side Bar:

UEP at a glance     
       
    The United Effort Plan Trust was officially organized in 1942 by a fundamentalist Mormon group known at the time as The Work - now the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

    It was designed to protect property holdings and, through a communal effort, support members with plural families.

    The property trust holds virtually all land and buildings in Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., formerly known as Short Creek; it also includes property in Bountiful, British Columbia. The holdings have an estimated value around $110 million.

    The UEP Trust was placed under court management in May 2005 after the FLDS failed to defend its assets against several lawsuits that alleged wrongdoing by trustees and church leaders. Salt Lake City accountant Bruce R. Wisan has managed it since then.

    In March 2007, Wisan received a $8.8 million default judgment against the FLDS church and former trustees, a debt he has partially satisfied by seizing a farm formerly operated by the sect. Still owed: $5 million or so, with interest.

    Wisan now works with an appointed advisory board that includes: Carolyn Jessop; Seth Cooke; Don Timpson; Katie Cox; Deloy Bateman; Robert Huddleston; and Margaret Cooke. With the exception of Huddleston and Timpson, the rest are former FLDS members.

    - Brooke Adams  

http://www.sltrib.com/polygamy/ci_9890163

Aleister Crowley lived a life of rebellion

Aleister Crowley lived a life of rebellion
Victoria Advocate (TX)
July 11, 2008

Aleister Crowley (1875-1947) was perhaps the most controversial personality to figure in the new era of modern day witchcraft. Born in England, the son of Emily and Edward, he was brought up in an atmosphere of strict religious piety. His parents were devout Christians and staunch members of the Plymouth Brethren sect. His whole life seems to have been a revolt against his parents and everything they stood for. (Wikipedia, the online encyclopedia)

He was educated at Trinity College at Cambridge where he first became interested in the occult. In 1899, Crowley is reported to have become a member of a coven, but was dismissed after a time due to his contemptuous attitude toward women, his personal ego and his sexual perversion.

Crowley travelled much, especially in the East studying Eastern Occult systems including Buddhism and the ‘I Ching.’ As he delved deeper into the occult, he became infamous as a Black magician and Satanist. He openly identified himself with the number 666, the biblical number for the antichrist.

Toward the end of his life, a friend introduced Crowley to Gerald B. Gardner. A certain Leo Ruickbie has said that Crowley played a crucial role in helping Gardner establish a new pagan religion called Wicca. Wiccan initiation rituals are lifted directly from Crowley’s “Gnostic Mass” written for the Ordo Templi Orientis in 1913.

The sordid details of his life are far too lurid to repeat here, but suffice it to say that the British press dubbed him the “Wickedest Man in the World.”

His philosophy of life was: “Do as thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.”

Crowley died penniless and a drug addict. Unrepentant and unbowed, he left this world with a final snub at the society that he had rejected. He left instructions that he was to be cremated and instead of the usual religious service, his “Hymn to Pan” and other extracts from his writing were to be proclaimed from the pulpit.

Wilbur M. Smith once said, “Men who are going to be disciples of these lords of naturalism must expect never to come into the experience of joy for which their very hearts were created.” Crowley undoubtedly had times of pleasure in his sinful way, but real joy surely eluded him.

For much more on this influential Satanist, type in Aleister Crowley in Google or some other search engine. It is said that Crowley’s ideas had a part in the throwing off of moral restraints in the 1960’s as many musicians and popular personalities, including the Beatles, picked up on his ideas.

How to account for such aberrant behavior? Unfortunately, there are some who rebel against the Christian religion for any number of reasons. Then there just seems to be a group of people who want to be different and spout some esoteric ideas in order to impress people. Then, there are unstable, disordered and unthinking people who are taken in by these weird ideas.

Raymond F. Smith is a deacon at Fellowship Bible Church in Victoria and President of Strong Families of Victoria.

http://www.victoriaadvocate.com/features/faith/story/278075.html

5 Investigates: From Polygamy To Stripping

KPHO CBS News (AZ)
July 10, 2008

PHOENIX -- When Kathleen Mackert was 16 years old, her father took her out for a birthday dinner.
That night, he instructed her "of the physical demonstrations of how a woman's body responds to a man's," Mackert said.

On her 18th birthday, her father forced her to marry her step-brother.

"I thought, 'Thank God, at least I know him, and he doesn't have another wife,'" she said.
Mackert grew up in the Fundamentalist Church of Latter-Day Saints, where polygamy is a way of life.
Nevertheless, she, her husband and her four children eventually escaped the church.

Soon after, she and her husband split up. To support her children, Mackert worked as a firefighter, a police dispatcher and in health care -- but it wasn't enough.

So she turned to stripping.

"I was 31," she told 5 Investigates. "I had four children, and there were 21-year-old girls that I was competing with on stage for that dollar."

The profession gave her a sense of power, she told 5 Investigates.

"You were in a sexually charged environment, but you were in control of it," she said. "They couldn't touch you."

She said she never took advantage of the offers of drugs and sex she received; she did not want to risk losing her children.

She eventually left stripping, finding it "damaging."

"I was becoming more and more unhappy," she said.

And after years of counseling, Mackert now works as a bartender.

She likes "making people feel welcome and at home and like they belong," she said. "And I guess for me I always wanted to feel like that."

http://www.kpho.com/news/16842870/detail.html

5 arrested in Rainbow Family clash with feds

Ben Neary
Associated Press

July 5, 2008

CHEYENNE, Wyo. (AP) — About 400 members of the Rainbow Family threw rocks and sticks at 10 federal officers as they tried to arrest a member of the group, the U.S. Forest Service said Friday.

Five members of the group were arrested and one officer was slightly injured. A government vehicle was also damaged.

About 7,000 members of the Rainbow Family are camping this year on Forest Service land near Big Sandy. The Rainbow Family is a loose affiliation of eccentrics, young people and hippie types who choose a forest each year in which hold a weeklong national gathering.

Ten Forest Service officers were patrolling the main meadow of the Rainbow Family's camping area Thursday night and apprehended one person described as being uncooperative, Rita Vollmer, spokeswoman for the U.S. Forest Service, said in a statement Friday.

"Officers began to leave the gathering site with the subject and were circled by more Rainbow participants that began to physically interfere," Vollmer said.

About 400 Rainbows surrounded the officers trying to leave, she said.

"The mob began to advance, throwing sticks and rocks at the officers," Vollmer said.

Mary Cernicek, spokeswoman for the Bridger-Teton National Forest, said Friday that more officers arrived to help. Officers fired "pepper balls" — similar to paint balls but containing a pepper solution — to control the crowd, she said.

State troopers have also arrested two people this week on felony drug charges for allegedly possessing 96 hits of LSD, said Sgt. Stephen Townsend of the Wyoming Highway Patrol.

The Rainbows and federal officers have clashed repeatedly in years past, and the Forest Service in 1998 established a national response team to deal with the group. Officials have complained that the gathering can ruin forests, with the group saying members clean up and reseed afterward.

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5hN-c-3eoJ10eVh0oueH7birn-AJAD91N66O00

A hectic, and happy Father’s Day

Dan Ferguson
Surrey North Delta Leader (Canada)
June 15, 2008

Scott Grant will be enjoying a wonderfully ordinary Father’s Day today, one free of court appearances and press coverage.

He will spend it with his two children, having a nice dinner at his sister’s place.

Like they often do, 14-year-old Max and 13-year-old Josephine will probably tease their single father about being both a mom and a dad to them.

“They’ll tell me how old old I look, how badly I dress,” he says.

He will laugh along with them.

And as he often does these days, he will think he is a truly fortunate man.

“If I never had any money, and only had my children, it would be okay,” the financial planner says.

“It’s a gift to raise children.”

Since he won a long and bitter court fight two years ago to get his children back from France, Grant has been living the hectic life of a single parent, juggling family responsibilities with his career.

The hours can be long when there are both clients who need to sort out their fiscal affairs and kids who need to get to school, when you are cooking meals and doing laundry (with the kids’ help) and making early morning runs to ice arenas.

He admits he gets a little sleep-deprived sometimes.

Grant is still digging out from a mountain of legal debts accumulated over the five years he fought to have his ex-wife Nathalie Gettliffe bring his children back from France after she fled the country with them in defiance of a court order.

In 2006 she was arrested during a visit to Vancouver and convicted of kidnapping her own children.

Shortly after her arrest French police returned Max and Josephine to their father.

Things were tense at first, but the kids have settled in.

They’ve completely regained the English language skills that had rusted away during their time in France.

They live in the rooms their father kept waiting for them.

Max has repainted his space orange, because he likes the colour.

Josephine has redecorated her room in more subtle shades of blue.

Max, much to his delight, is finally taller than his sister.

On the ice, the avid hockey player is a ferocious competitor, who once got his linemates sent to the penalty box because of a confrontation over a cheap shot by an opposing player.

All five players on the ice ended up in what Max began referring to as the “party box.”

Josephine is an honours student who appears to have inherited her father’s skill with numbers.

She likes going to school dances, but not in the same outfit twice, which is how her dad has become familiar with some local dress shops.

Josephine hopes to become a surgeon one day, while her brother would like to become a judge.

Money may be tight, and the legal squabbles are far from over, but none of that matters as much to this dad as getting to be with his children and watch them grow.

“It’s the best gift in the world,” Grant says.

“It’s worth everything.”

That’s really all he needs as a present this Father’s Day.

dferguson@surreyleader.com

http://www.bclocalnews.com/surrey_area/surreyleader/news/19924924.html

143 FLDS kids are back at YFZ Ranch

Brian West

Deseret News

June 13, 2008

One third of the FLDS children seized by Texas officials have returned to their original homes on the YFZ Ranch in Eldorado.

Of the 440 children who were returned to their parents earlier this month, 143 children are living in 30 households on the 1,700-acre Yearning For Zion Ranch, said Texas Child Protective Services spokesman Patrick Crimmins.

Most of the children from the Fundamentalist LDS Church — 178 children — are living in 33 households in the San Antonio area. The rest of the children are living in different areas of Texas.

No other details about those locations were released by CPS.

The information was gathered as the parents picked up their children from various foster facilities. Each parent or guardian was required to be photographed and fingerprinted. They also filled out forms listing their addresses and telephone numbers, as well as a list of names of adults and children who would be residing in the same household with the children.

Judge Barbara Walther released the children back to the custody of their parents after the Texas Supreme Court upheld a Court of Appeals decision saying the state had acted improperly by seizing the children from the ranch. All were returned by June 4.

Some parents who are renting homes and chose not to return to the YFZ Ranch, at least for now, told the Deseret News they wanted to avoid additional scrutiny from CPS that might occur if they moved back.

CPS officials say they have no preference about where families live, but attorneys for the agency have repeatedly argued since the raid that the ranch was an unsafe environment for the children and was a single-household community that fostered a dangerous pattern of abuse.

Some attorneys have also advised the parents not to return to the ranch.

Crimmins said CPS is continuing to investigate allegations of abuse and neglect. As part of an agreement, child welfare workers can make unannounced visits to the homes between the hours of 8 a.m. and 8 p.m. each day. During such visits, medical, psychological and psychiatric examinations can be conducted, according to the agreement.

CPS has also received "partial" DNA results from the maternity and paternity testing that had been ordered from the children and parents. "The results are being reviewed and analyzed to determine if the DNA results can help investigators in the multiple investigations to determine if abuse occurred," CPS officials said in a statement on its Web site.

Many believe that DNA evidence will also be used in ongoing criminal investigations against the sect.

E-mail: bwest@desnews.com

http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,700234395,00.html

A Child's Death And a Crisis for Faith

Suzanne Sataline
Wall Street Journal
June 12, 2008

The recent death from untreated diabetes of an 11-year-old Wisconsin girl has invigorated opposition to obscure laws in many states that let parents rely on prayer, rather than medicine, to heal sick children.

Dale and Leilani Neumann of Weston, Wis., are facing charges of second-degree reckless homicide after their child, Madeline Kara Neumann, died on Easter after slipping into a coma. The death, likely preventable with insulin, has renewed calls for Wisconsin and dozens of other states to strike laws that protect parents who choose prayer alone in lieu of medical treatment.

The case also has frustrated the Church of Christ, Scientist, the main promoter of prayer as therapy, which says a few tragic cases have unfairly tarred a practice that can restore health. The Neumanns, a Christian couple who run a prayer group out of their coffee shop, are not Christian Scientists. The National Center for Health Statistics, a federal agency,
estimated in 2004 that more than 2% of the population uses prayer rituals.  "No one should be presumed to be guilty or innocent ... because they've chosen spiritual care," says Phil Davis, a Christian Science church spokesman.

Lawyers nationwide say they are eager to see if the Neumann case sparks more changes in state laws. It raises a "national discourse as to whether children can be medically neglected legally," says Marci Hamilton, a professor at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in New York who writes about children's rights. In another recent case, a 15-month-old child in Oregon died in March from a form of pneumonia and a blood infection after her parents opted to try to heal her with prayer. Oregon law provides no defense for parents charged with causing the death of a child through neglect or maltreatment, and the couple has been charged with second-degree manslaughter and criminal
mistreatment.

There's been a small, steady pushback against state provisions protecting spiritual healing. A Massachusetts bill that would have protected parents who used prayer in lieu of medical treatment stalled in committee last year, despite the measure's broad sponsorship by 33 lawmakers.

In Maryland, lawmakers in 2005 repealed part of a law that had protected parents from losing custody if they withheld medical treatment because of religious belief. And in Maine that year, legislators amended several laws regarding religious treatment, and repealed part of its family law that stated that children couldn't automatically be considered abused
solely because they were treated "by spiritual means by an accredited practitioner." Evert Fowle, the district attorney in Augusta, Maine, said the amendments would now allow him to bring charges against guardians should a child be harmed after being treated with prayer alone.

The Wisconsin case against the Neumanns also highlights an obscure area of child-protection law that will force judges to weigh seemingly conflicting laws: If a state permits people to employ prayers for healing, can it then hold a parent criminally liable if those prayers fail?

The recent deaths of children have spotlighted the little-known lobbying work of the Church of Christ, Scientist, a denomination with anywhere from 60,000 to a half-million members, according to various estimates. The group believes that health can be restored through a stronger connection with God -- in effect, willing the body to be healthy. The
church is the largest that supports relying on prayer for healing, though other small sects do, as well. Of course, many religious denominations advocate prayer in conjunction with medical treatment.

The Christian Science church doesn't provide guidance on whether members may seek medical care, says Mr. Davis, the church spokesman. He says the church does not bar members from getting medical care, nor does it advise members when they should do so.

Church founder Mary Baker Eddy believed it was "fear that creates the image of disease and its consequent manifestation in the body." Spiritual practitioners, who are trained by the church to heal through prayer, get patients to think differently about their relationship with God, says Mr. Davis, who also is a spiritual practitioner. "It's an affirmation [of truth],"
Mr. Davis says. "It's that understanding that restores harmony."

The church's Christian Science Journal prints monthly testimonies that prayer has wiped away prostate cancer, a breast lump, leukemia and other illnesses. Brian Talcott, a practitioner in Berkeley, Calif., says he has seen cases of glaucoma and cataracts disappear.

But a 2006 study in the American Heart Journal concluded that prayers for patients recovering from bypass surgery had no effect. The study was led by researchers at Massachusetts General Hospital.

Every state forbids child abuse and requires parents to provide health care. But in the 1970s and 1980s, many states added provisions offering legal protections to parents who used prayer treatment. Many of these statutes were passed after Congress in 1974 began offering money to bolster child-protection agencies. But there were strings. Federal health
and welfare officials, pressed by Christian Scientists, made the funding contingent upon the requesting state legislating legal safeguards for those opting to treat with prayer.

In all, 45 states offer some legal accommodations in child-protection laws for parents who use spiritual healing, according to the Christian Science church. The laws vary widely, with some states protecting parents or guardians from felony abuse or murder prosecutions, while others exempt prayer practice only in misdemeanor cases, according to Children's Healthcare Is a Legal Duty Inc., a nonprofit group based in Sioux City, Iowa, that opposes such laws.

Wisconsin has three statutes providing religious healing exceptions: one in the child-abuse laws, one in the laws concerning crimes against children, and one that bars the state from forcing medical care on someone who chooses Christian Science prayer. The state's child-abuse laws were amended in 1987 to say: "A person is not guilty of an
offense ... solely because he or she provides a child with treatment by spiritual means through prayer alone for healing." The wording was requested by the local Christian Science government-relations office, according to the Wisconsin Legislative Council, a state agency.

A 1998 study in the journal Pediatrics, by Rita Swan, president of Children's Healthcare Is a Legal Duty, and Seth Asser, a Rhode Island pediatrician, reported that 172 children died with no medical care because of religious reasons in the two decades after states began exempting faith healing. Of those, 140 children had a greater than 90% chance of survival
if they had been treated medically, the researchers found. "Some of the religious defenses to felonies are a chilling betrayal of children," says Ms. Swan, a former Christian Scientist who lost a child to spinal meningitis in 1977 after initially relying on church practitioners before finally seeking medical help.

Although many states allow medical personnel to seek court orders to provide emergency care if a sick child is denied treatment, parents who rely on religious healing often don't inform doctors and hospitals of their children's condition.

Since 1982, states have filed criminal charges in the deaths of 65 children whose parents practiced faith healing, according to Ms. Swan's count. The prosecutions have had mixed results.

In California, the state Supreme Court in 1988 upheld the conviction of a mother found guilty of involuntary manslaughter and felony child endangerment after she used a Christian Science healer to care for her 4-year-old daughter. The child died of meningitis. The justices found that the religious-healing clause in the state child-neglect statute was not a defense in a felony death case.

But three years later, Minnesota's Supreme Court reached the opposite conclusion. The court dismissed second-degree-manslaughter charges against Christian Scientists William and Kathleen McKown. Her son, Ian Lundman, died at age 11 of diabetic ketoacidosis, or severe, untreated diabetes. The justices ruled that the government couldn't allow someone
to "depend upon" Christian Science healing methods "then attempt to prosecute them for
exercising that right."

The court will have to wrestle with a similar legal dilemma in Wisconsin. The judge will have to decide if the Neumanns believed they were acting lawfully in choosing to treat their child with prayer. The district attorney's office declined to comment and the lawyer for the Neumanns didn't return phone calls. The judge has imposed a gag order in the case.

Christian Science church members nationwide have lobbied lawmakers not just to allow spiritual healing, but to exempt members from mandatory health insurance and to allow insurance carriers to reimburse spiritual healers. And believers in spiritual healing have chalked up some recent wins. Iowa last year allowed parents for religious reasons to opt out of mandatory childhood screenings for lead poisoning.

Massachusetts, the only state that requires residents to have health insurance, allows residents to opt out of buying medical insurance for religious reasons.

Church lobbyists are now asking that the state allow insurance plans to reimburse prayer practitioners, who can charge $20 to $50 for a day's worth of prayer, says Wanda Jane Warmack, the church's legislative manager.

A Sect’s Families Reunite, and Start to Come Home

Gretel C. Kovach

New York Times

June 6, 2008

ELDORADO, Tex. — The cows still get milked each day by machine here at the Yearning for Zion ranch, although the raw-milk cheese is stacking up uneaten. The onions in the garden are as big as grapefruits, ready for harvest, with few people to pick them.

But a woman in a pink prairie dress, surrounded by a stack of boxes on a porch, is one of the first signs that life is slowly returning to normal.

Just a handful of families have returned to the ranch, the home of a polygamist sect that was raided in West Texas in April in an investigation of possible sexual abuse. The rest of the members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints have heeded their lawyers’ warnings and moved to other cities while criminal and child-abuse investigations continue.

All of the more than 460 children seized in the raid have been returned to their parents.

“It’s getting better,” said Zavenda Young, 43, who returned to the ranch at sunrise Tuesday after driving all night to pick up her children scattered in group homes across the state. “I notice a few more people coming home. It was lonesome when they were gone.”

Ms. Young’s husband, Edson Jessop, 51, said, “It will be a long ways to get back to normal,” as he and his brother, Guy, 48, took two reporters and a photographer on a tour of the ranch on Wednesday in their dusty sport utility vehicle.

But it will happen, they said.

“It’s been really hard to understand why people say this is not a safe place to raise children,” Edson Jessop added. “To me, this is the safest place in the world to raise children. Isn’t home where children should be?”

The Jessops usually work in the furniture shop. But with so few people to work the land, Guy Jessop has started helping out in the garden.

“We’ve got 300 pounds of cabbage out of there already, and a couple hundred more coming,” he said, driving by the green stalks of a garden plot waving in the hot wind. “It’s getting really weedy on that end, we’re so short of help.”

Residents of the ranch are largely self-sufficient, but they have to stop at the nearest Wal-Mart now and then. “We don’t make watches,” Guy Jessop joked.

In the schoolhouse, all the calendars are stuck on April. The chalkboard bears a handwritten date — April 3, 2008 — when state troopers and child welfare workers came through the gates, after a caller to a domestic abuse hot line said she was a 16-year-old girl who was being abused by her 50-year-old husband.

The caller was never found, and the authorities now say that the call might have been a hoax. Two courts, including the Texas Supreme Court, have ruled that the children who were taken from the ranch by the authorities in April had to be returned to their parents because there was insufficient evidence that they were in imminent danger of abuse.

The criminal investigation, led by the state attorney general’s office, is continuing, and government officials are still expressing reservations about the court rulings.

“The governor is troubled that the children, especially those most at risk for abuse, the young girls, are being sent back to the compound in a situation riddled with uncertainty and the potential for harm, while it remains at the center of a very serious criminal investigation,” said Krista Piferrer, a spokeswoman for Gov. Rick Perry.

The sect is trying to put the pieces back together. “We’re trying to find that safe little town in Texas where we can be in peace,” said Willie Jessop, a sect spokesman.

Church members have been through this before. Most of their parents tell the tale of the 1953 Short Creek raid, when the authorities rounded up the women and children from their historic homeland on the Utah-Arizona border, only to return them after a public outcry over pictures of screaming children being ripped from their mothers’ arms.

“Our progenitors all the way down have been persecuted for their religion,” Edson Jessop said. “Now we get to have those one-on-one conversations with our fathers about what it was like.”

At the ranch, the purple petunias and white alyssum were still blooming next to the strip of green lawn and the rose bushes outside the schoolhouse. But life has been “totally disrupted,” Edson Jessop said.

Sometimes, residents of the ranch have to throw out the milk from their black and white Holsteins and the brown Swiss cows.

“You have to milk them, whether you do anything with it or not,” Guy Jessop said. “You’ve got to maintain them, so when the people come back, you’ll have something to feed them.”

Edson Jessop’s children — Zachery, 9; Ephraim, 7; Russell, 5; and Anne, 3 — have been reunited with one another and with their parents. Mr. Jessop and Ms. Young are thankful to the strangers who invited them to stay in their homes, “total strangers, very sweet people,” while they went from group home to group home across the state to visit their children.

Back at their apartment near the furniture shop, Mr. Jessop’s daughter scoots around the pavement on her purple plastic tricycle.

“Anne, come over here so we can take a picture,” Mr. Jessop calls, but she says “No!” and makes her father laugh. “She got sassy; they must have taught her that,” he jokes.

Watching her children play, Ms. Young, said, “It’s wonderful, wonderful to have them all here.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/06/us/06polygamy.html

4 incest charges against Warren Jeffs dropped

New York Times

June 5, 2008

KINGMAN, Ariz. (AP) -- An Arizona judge dropped four of eight charges against Warren Jeffs, even as authorities in Texas looked into whether the polygamist sect leader had relationships with four girls at the west Texas ranch raided in April.

Mohave County Superior Court Judge Steven Conn dismissed the charges at the request of the defense, finding that a state incest law does not apply to the arranged marriages of two teenage girls and their older male relatives.

Conn ruled the law only applies if both participants in the sexual activity are older than 18, and that the law does not apply to half cousins.

In both of the marriages Jeffs is accused of arranging, the girls were under 18 and were their husbands' half cousins. He was charged with incest as an accomplice.

Prosecutors said the law could lead to absurd results, such as an uncle having sex with two nieces, one younger and one older than 18, and being subject to harsher punishments for his conduct with the older one.

But the judge said the statute's language was clear and unambiguous, leaving no room for interpretation.

''We're obviously very pleased with the court's ruling,'' Jeffs' attorney, Mike Piccarreta, told The Associated Press. ''You can see we've chopped these things down considerably.''

In his ruling, Conn wrote that Arizona's incest law initially was enacted without reference to participants' ages. In 1985, it was amended to apply only to people who were 15 years or older, and in 1998, it was changed to its present form, applying only to those 18 or older.

Conn also wrote that because the incest law specifically mentions half brothers and sisters, it arguably excludes all other relationships of the half blood by not mentioning them.

Mohave County Attorney Matt Smith, the prosecutor in the Arizona case against Jeffs, did not return a call or e-mail request for comment Wednesday evening.

If convicted of all charges, Jeffs could face anywhere from probation to eight years in prison. Before the incest charges were dropped Wednesday and two others were dropped in March, Jeffs faced up to 27 years in prison.

Jeffs, who was already prosecuted in Utah, is still charged in Arizona as an accomplice with four counts of sexual conduct with a minor stemming from the marriages of the two girls.

Last week, investigators at the Texas attorney general's office took DNA from Jeffs, saying they were looking for evidence of relationships between him and four girls from the Yearning For Zion Ranch ages 12 to 15.

All 440 children seized from the ranch April 3 were returned to parents by Wednesday, Child Protective Services spokesman PatrickCrimmins said.

Jeffs, 52, was named president, or prophet, of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in 2002. Members of the church live in the twin border towns of Colorado City, Ariz., and Hildale, Utah.

Jeffs was convicted last year in Utah of rape as an accomplice in the arranged marriage of a 14-year-old girl and her 19-year-old cousin. He was sentenced to two terms of five years to life in prison.

Jeffs remains jailed in Kingman as he awaits his Arizona trial. No date has been set.

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Polygamist-Leader.html

Mankind Project of Houston settles wrongful death lawsuit; some mental health oversight required

Warren Throckmorton
wthrockmorton.com/
June 4, 2008

Some months ago, I reported extensively on the Mankind Project with attention to their signature program, the New Warriors Training Adventure. My interest in MKP and NWTA was provoked by a Houston Press article detailing the suicide of Michael Scinto. Mr. Scinto had attended a NWTA and reported distress thereafter. His parents Kathy and Ralph Scinto believed his death was linked to his experiences on that weekend and filed a wrongful death lawsuit on behalf of his estate in August, 2007.

In April, 2008, the case went to mediation and was settled. Although the parties to the dispute have signed a confidentiality agreement, the terms of the settlement are available for review on the Harris County, Texas District Court e-docs website. You will need to register (name, email address), verify your email and then change your password but the process is free. Once registered, search the name Scinto as Plaintiff and you will find all documents related to the case.

The terms of the settlement are found in a 20 page, May 20 document titled, Defendant's Motion to Enforce Settlement Agreement. The Scintos and their attorney won $75,000 split roughly three ways. Furthermore, MKP of Houston is required to make some changes in procedure. The changes involves screening of applicants, disclosure of activities and means to exit the weekend. Anyone who registers can preview all of the court documents for no cost. I summarize the highlights here:

MKP of Houston agreed to have its pre-New Warrior Training Adventure Adventure questionnaire reviewed by a licensed mental health professional for recommendations about how it can be improved. However, the MKPH board must approve changes before they can be implemented.

Each application for the NWTA must be screened by a mental health professional who has personal knowledge of the weekend. The screener shall determine whether the applicant shall be accepted or not with the decision written on the application.

The following changes will be made within 30 days of a required MKP of Houston Board review of the website:

Change the website to provide adequate information from which potential applicants can make an informed decision about whether to attend the NWTA.

The website shall disclose that a mental health professional will screen applications to determine suitability for participation.

The website will need to disclose that people who wish to leave the NWTA are free to do so.

Applicants will be told that the NWTA may involve optional nudity and certain elements of Native American traditions.

MKPH agrees to develop a written protocol which will allow any participant to leave NWTA safely with MKPH assistance. Participants requesting to leave shall be allowed to do so immediately unless the action would result in further risk of harm. Once a request is made, the participant is not required to do any other activities unless the participant changes his mind.

As far as I can tell, this settlement is only applicable to MKP of Houston with no requirement that MKP elsewhere implement any of these points. Given the lawsuit involved a wrongful death charge as well as claims of performing psychotherapy without a license, I would say these changes are minimal, but important. I think they are valuable and provide recognition that some form of oversight, minimal though it is, is important. While I suspect that MKP of Houston will have no problem getting a mental health professional to perform this screening function, I would recommend any mental health professional performing this duty check first with his/her liability insurance carrier to make sure such a review is covered activity

https://www.wthrockmorton.com/2008/06/

A new deal on FLDS offered

Ben Winslow
Deseret News

June 2, 2008

SAN ANGELO, Texas — A new order to return hundreds of children taken in the raid on the Fundamentalist LDS Church's YFZ Ranch will be put before a judge today.

Lawyers representing FLDS mothers, children and the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services met for several hours Sunday at a state office building, hammering out a new order for Judge Barbara Walther's consideration.

"We reached consensus on some things and other things we really didn't. We're just making an effort to try and get this worked out as soon as possible so we can get the kids home," said Brad Haralson, a San Angelo lawyer representing three FLDS mothers.

If Walther signs the proposed order, the children could be reunited with their parents as early as Tuesday. Texas child welfare authorities indicated the order would apply to all of the children in state custody — not just the children whose mothers successfully appealed the judge's decision to Austin's 3rd Court of Appeals.

Attorneys have been trying to figure out what to do after Walther abruptly left the bench on Friday, refusing to sign an order to return the children to their mothers.

The Texas Supreme Court and the 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin both ruled that Texas child welfare authorities acted improperly in removing more than 450 children from the YFZ Ranch while they investigated allegations of abuse. The courts ordered Walther to return more than 130 children to their parents — but allowed her to set conditions. It also allowed Child Protective Services the ability to continue its investigation.

Negotiations broke down in court on Friday, leaving parents and attorneys unsure of when they will be reunited with their children.

"The judge has a right to enter an order, whether or not the parties agree," said Andrea Sloan, a lawyer representing a group of young women Texas claimed were underage. "At the end of the day, because of time constraints, I would expect she will just enter the order."

Lawyers declined to detail what the new order would say but said the language that was tweaked was a compromise. There will be no hearing today; the order will be dropped in the judge's box for her to sign.

"I think she's going to sign whatever order she wants to sign," said Kirk Hawkins, a lawyer representing four FLDS mothers. "It's closer to her version."

The sticking point still appears to be a disagreement over whether the judge has the authority to impose broad conditions giving Texas CPS authority over the families, or whether the judge should just free the children.

Julie Balovich, an attorney for the Texas RioGrande Legal Aid Society (representing 38 FLDS mothers), argued in court that the judge should just release the children. She left Sunday's meeting without commenting.

Proposed orders have required parenting classes, access to homes at various times, interviews and medical evaluations, travel restrictions — and how long CPS can be involved in the families' lives.

"It's not an agreed order," Hawkins said. "It's the judge's order. We're just hoping she'll sign an order. You can't get 400 lawyers to agree. We just went over her order and tried to clean up the language some."

Some attorneys complained they weren't in on the discussions at all. Deborah Keenun, a court-appointed attorney representing 11 children in state custody, arrived as the meeting was breaking up. Others found out about the meeting from news reporters.

"There's a lot of general frustration from attorneys who have not been part of the process, when under the law we're supposed to be," Keenun said.

If the order is signed, the children will not be bused en masse to the YFZ Ranch. Instead, parents will go to foster care facilities that have sheltered the children and pick them up. Once they are reunited with their children, some families may not return to the ranch.

"Many of them will be getting independent housing," said Laura Shockley, a lawyer representing a group of young women Texas believed were underage.

She declined to say why they would not return — citing attorney-client privilege — but said some parents are trying to respect the concerns of Texas child welfare authorities and remain with their children.

"They're going to listen to what they think CPS is requiring and try to respond that way," Sloan said.

Texas CPS has claimed the YFZ Ranch is essentially "one household," with a culture of sexual abuse that grooms girls to be child brides, and boys to be sexual perpetrators.

The YFZ Ranch was raided April 3 when Texas child welfare workers and law enforcement responded to the FLDS property on a report of a 16-year-old girl who was pregnant and in an abusive, polygamous marriage with an older man. The girl was never found, an arrest warrant for the alleged husband was dropped and Texas authorities are still investigating whether the original call was a hoax.

Once on the ranch, authorities said they found other signs of abuse, prompting Walther to order the removal of all of the FLDS children.

Texas child welfare authorities had claimed to have as many as 31 pregnant or underage mothers in custody. They were young women the FLDS insisted were adults. On Sunday, Shockley told the Deseret News that the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services has declared all but "four or five" to be adults.

"We're happy that our 29-year-old client is now an adult," Sloan said.

A spokeswoman for the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services could not immediately confirm the status of the "disputed minors" on Sunday.

E-mail: bwinslow@desnews.com

http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,700231020,00.html