Posted on 11/22/2006 7:19:29 AM PST by Nevadan
Woman testifies Jeffs pressured her into marrying at 14. A young woman who said she was ordered to marry her cousin at age 14 by polygamist leader Warren Jeffs testified in court Tuesday that she repeatedly begged Jeffs to let her out of the union.
Jeffs refused, she said, telling her the marriage was God's will.
During a felony preliminary hearing for Jeffs under tight security in Washington County, Utah, District Court, the woman, now 20, gave her first public account of her arranged marriage to a first cousin.
"I told him (Jeffs) I just wanted two years before I get married, and he told me that this was a revelation from God," said the woman, who cried during her testimony. "They made me feel like I was denying God."
Jeffs, 50, is the leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a polygamist sect with roughly 10,000 followers in the border communities of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz. The towns are about a two-hour drive from Las Vegas.
Authorities said Jeffs arranged the 2001 marriage between the girl and her 19-year-old cousin. Prosecutors contend the resulting sex between the couple was a crime orchestrated by the FLDS leader, who became the church's prophet after his elderly father, Rulon, died in 2002.
Warren Jeffs is charged with two felony counts of rape as an accomplice, and he could face life in prison if convicted.
But his attorneys said the charges are flawed because no evidence exists Jeffs ever ordered the young woman and her cousin to have sex, as authorities have alleged.
Warren Jeffs faces similar charges in Arizona.
"He is not guilty of this," defense attorney Walter Budgen Jr. said.
The girl, whose name was ordered withheld by judicial order, said she was born into the FLDS community and raised with extensive religious schooling on FLDS doctrine. She described herself as a true believer in the faith.
Her early years were spent in Salt Lake City, where she attended a grade school that was overseen by Warren Jeffs. She said that when she was a child, she, with her siblings and her mother, were removed from her biological father's home and reassigned by church order to the home of FLDS member Fred Jessop in Hildale.
While growing up in Hildale, she wrote in her diary that she looked forward to one day fulfilling her responsibility of marrying and giving birth to a large family of "priestly" children, she testified.
But when she was 14, she learned from family members that Warren Jeffs had determined she was going to be "placed," married, in the coming days. She was not told whom she would marry.
"I was shocked," she said. "Seriously shocked. I was so young, and I was so scared. I thought he was mistaking me for someone else. There were several girls who were older than me (who weren't married)."
She said that during a family function days later, she was placed in a chair next to an empty chair. Her cousin then came into the house and sat in the chair next to her. That was how she learned the identity of her fiancé, she said.
The girl was mortified, she said, because as a child her cousin had bullied her, routinely calling her "tubby tubba."
She said she complained repeatedly to her father about the marriage. The woman said she met with Warren Jeffs and told him she did not want to marry her cousin.
"I'm not prepared for this kind of responsibility. I'm not willing to marry my first cousin," she testified she told him.
"Every part of my soul and heart told me this isn't right for me," she said.
He told her "the prophet had directed her to do this," and she then demanded to meet with Rulon Jeffs, who at the time was the FLDS prophet.
She said when she met with Rulon Jeffs and told him that she didn't want to get married, Rulon Jeffs responded: "You follow your heart, sweetheart. Follow your heart."
The woman said she left the meeting ecstatic because she knew in her heart the marriage was wrong, and the prophet had instructed her to "follow your heart."
But within minutes of leaving the room, Warren Jeffs made it clear she was expected to go forward with the marriage, she said. "Your heart is in the wrong place. The prophet has revealed this to you. It's your duty," she quoted Warren Jeffs as saying.
"It was like he hadn't heard anything I was saying," she said.
The woman said she continued to resist the marriage but was told by family and friends that she was defying God's will.
"My mother finally talked me into doing what I was supposed to do," she said.
The young woman, her husband-to-be and several other FLDS members were whisked off to the Caliente Hot Springs Motel in Lincoln County, where FLDS marriages were being performed.
The girl's sister, Rebecca Musser -- who at 19 was married to Rulon Jeffs when he was 82 -- testified Tuesday of the troubles she and her siblings had preparing her sister's wedding dress because the girl would not stop sobbing as she tried it on.
"We were trying to pin the lace on her dress, and her body was moving," Musser said. "We had to wait for her to get done (sobbing), so we could pin it."
The alleged victim described the marriage ceremony in detail and how she participated out of fear.
"My salvation would be in jeopardy," she said. "I would not be able to go to heaven. That's how I felt."
"I felt completely defeated and trapped," she said.
She described the union as "the darkest time in my life."
She said her husband had sex with her repeatedly even though she did not know what intercourse was or that it could lead to her becoming pregnant.
She said she repeatedly sought help from Warren Jeffs, who had become the FLDS prophet, to get out of the marriage.
But when she met with him, he told her to pray and read religious books about a woman's required devotion to her husband during marriage, she said.
"He told me that I needed to break off my relationship with my mother -- the tight, close bond we had -- and I needed to devote it to my husband," she said.
"Be obedient and submissive to him," she said she was told. "A woman's role is to be obedient without question."
She said she wanted to leave the FLDS community but was terrified to do so because she had nowhere to go. She said she had been taught that outsiders were "wicked."
She stopped staying at the mobile home she had shared with her husband and started sleeping in her truck.
She said her life changed when she met another man who had left the FLDS church. A relationship with the other man developed, and when her husband and church leaders found out about the relationship, she said she was ordered to sign a confession, but she refused to.
"He (Jeffs) said, 'Do you realize that adultery is a cardinal sin, and the only way someone can repent from a cardinal sin is to be destroyed in the flesh?'" the woman quoted Warren Jeffs as saying. "I was no longer welcome to see my mother or go up to Hildale."
In a cross-examination, defense attorney Tara Isaacson questioned the woman's claim that her marriage was a "miserable" experience. The defense attorney produced marriage photos and other family snapshots showing the woman smiling with her husband.
The woman said she was faking being happy for the photos.
Isaacson had the woman point out her civil attorney in court. The defense attorney said nothing more, but she appeared to be implying that the woman's allegations against Warren Jeffs might be motivated by plans to pursue a civil suit.
After courtroom testimony was completed Tuesday, Judge District Judge James Shumate ordered that the hearing would not resume until Dec. 14.
The prosecutions of the polygamist leader have drawn international media attention. Thirteen television satellite trucks were at Tuesday's proceedings, and so many reporters sought access to the hearing that authorities had to limit media credentials.
What were her parents doing during all of this?
I am not sure who her father was, but the girl was born into a polygamous family. Her mother went along with everything. God's will, you know.
All the new reports left this out. I was under the impression that the parents had nothing to do with it. If the parents didn't give permission, then Jeffs should get it good.
Either way, being married against your will is unacceptable.
>>>What were her parents doing during all of this?>>>
Apparently telling her she would go to hell if she didn't do what this wackjob said.
The parents are JUST as guilty IMO. And should be brought up on charges!
Her real father was tossed out of the cult/church and her mother was given to another man. When they toss you they no longer let you be a part of your children's lives. Warren Jeffs took over all of his fathers wives after he died. I think the old man had near 100 of them. He married them against some of their will and I think one actually ran away. Jeffs has had total control over the people in his cults lives. From who they marry to how much money they give to him. The man is known to take another man's wife away if he felt the husband wasn't giving the cult enough money. He doesn't care about ripping families apart. He believes hes the Prophet and all he says is must be obeyed. He is also known to run the younger men out of the cult to leave the young girls for the old men. Hes a pervert.
Jeffs should be nailed to the wall, if any of the parents didn't consent to the marriage. State law, although Utah state laws against polygamy are starting to become unenforced.
Sometimes you Americans are quite strange people. Isn't it a nice try to tell us old Europeans something about moral values (deep, deep sacrcasm)? Although it is indeed true that European societies have their very own problems, this party here is also not that different to a nice muslim wedding.
But his attorneys said the charges are flawed because no evidence exists Jeffs ever ordered the young woman and her cousin to have sex, as authorities have alleged.
This is exactly the same crap polygamist muslims say when they refer about their (illegal) "Imam-weddings" in Europe or Turkey.
Greetings from good old Europe
A.B.
Exactly.
I do not doubt all these things you say about him, but the mother should still be held responsible. Cult or not. If drugs cannot be blamed for poor parenting, why should a cult be allowed?
And did the father push for custody knowing all he knew about this cult? Same for him.
Sorry, not much sympathy for the parents.
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