Posted on 05/22/2008 10:46:31 AM PDT by ElkGroveDan
SAN ANGELO, Texas - A state appellate court has ruled that child welfare officials had no right to seize more than 400 children living at a polygamist sect's ranch.
The Third Court of Appeals in Austin ruled that the grounds for removing the children were "legally and factually insufficient" under Texas law. They did not immediately order the return of the children.
Child welfare officials removed the children on the grounds that the sect pushed underage girls into marriage and sex and trained boys to become future perpetrators.
The appellate court ruled the chaotic hearing held last month did not demonstrate the children were in any immediate danger, the only measure of taking children from their homes without court proceedings.
You have a terrific memory.
As I said, these cases show the real intentions of the “do-gooders.”
Wait a minute! Wasn’t their past leader put in prison for breaking the law in regards to these people? He was proven to have done those things, wasn’t he? Do you think these people just went on and instantly changed their lives after he was gone? What am I missing? Isn’t the behavior he was imprisoned for still illegal? Is Carolyn Jessop, Flora Jessop, and some other people who have left lying? Shouldn’t people be proving whether they are lying or not?
Why is it that 31 of those so-called “children” are pregnant, and several already had children? Isn’t that considered illegal for them to have been impregnated that young? They’re not even old enough to consent to getting married, let alone consent to sex!
If their leader was imprisoned for marrying off these very young girls, don’t you think that something very wrong was happening? If it wasn’t for that leader being imprisoned for doing the things he was proven to have done, I would agree with a lot of the people on here. If he had been proven innocent of those charges, and sent back to the ranch, I would agree with a lot of people in saying the government was wrong in harassing these people.
But he was proven to have done these things. These things did really happen in the past. I have no reason to believe they just suddenly stopped! A lot of those adults were involved. Many didn’t realize it was wrong, and they went along with it. But the fact remains that they went along with it!
Have you read the Appellate Courts decision? Obviously not. Ignorance is no excuse at this stage of the game.
I live in Arizona. A local award winning reporter, who escaped from the cult, has been reporting on it for years. I have not followed the Texas events.
POLYGAMY DIARIES
Extensive collection of video reports produced for KVTK, Arizona, by reporter Mike Watkiss.
http://www.azfamily.com/sharedcontent/southwest/azfamily/features/polygamy/index2.html?iq_id=43440
You said a mouthful here- and I really thought it needed to be repeated. It really did frighten me that so many felt the way this was handled was find and dandy. This is a conservative site- I would have never believed not only that so many here did not see what was wrong with this- but many also tried very hard to silence those that did see the wrong in this from the get go.
I may owe you an apology for attacking you, based on the responses I have seen.
Next time we cross paths, don't automatically assume that I am the enemy and I will do likewise : )
We all have our opinions but this must work thru the courts.
“Why is it that 31 of those so-called “children” are pregnant, and several already had children?”
Because as it turns out, and the state finally admits, they weren’t children afterall. Not that the state would actually care anyway. Since most of it’s children wind up drug addicted prostitutes. Finally they are productive citizens generating power, influence, and income for the state busy prosecuting them, their clients, and their drug dealers.
For these folks, life is like a vicious cycle of moral ambiguity ruled by a generous dose of corrupt ineptitude.
Hmmm...choices, choices...better in the custody of a weird cult or custody of the State? Which choice would lead to higher crime rates against/by the kids? ...teen pregnancies, abortions, drugs, poverty,...? A weird cult would probably be safer.
I hear you- don't hold your breath on that one- I actually posted several times to one that claimed I was a cult defender to find a post of mine that showed that or take it back...this was at the beginning of all this- and still not a word. I was saddened by some that I had always thought were thoughtful...well nice posters. Hah! Some showed their true colors on these threads.
But all written *before* the Court of Appeals ruling, which likely makes further proceeding somewhat moot. The Appeals court ruled that the initial "taking" of the children was contrary to the law, at least for the vast majority of the children and the mothers.
...or then again you can just be a ‘player’ and have three or four lovelies havin’ your babies and collecting the welfare checks, food stamps, WIC etc...
Of course if you don’t marry any of them then it isn’t polygamy??? mixed up way of looking at things in this world!
Go to the barrio, projects, ghetto... what have you.... the same craziness goes on and on.
In the 70’s I actually saw welfare moms encouraging their daughters to have babies to get more gov’t money coming into the house. Nobody took these 14 yr olds away... they handed them a check instead.
Today we are handing the checks to 15 yr olds that cross the border to have their anchor baby!
Where’s the LE when that is happening... crickets!
I witnessed a very young... not more than 15 y.o. at the market with four older men... demanding the store manager (thru an interpreter) give her the entire WIC allotment for the month. Most likely so it could help feed all the bodies in the ‘clown house’.
Crazy.
Why not pull all the kids out of foster care then and send them to the FLDS. Would you be comfortable with that?
That needs to be investigated in a legal proper way- there are steps to deal with such a thing if it indeed is happening. The court did not rule that nothing could be done- they just ruled that the way it was done was not right.
Better the devil you know....
I'm beginning to wonder if this particular group, the ones that are living in Texas, might have done exactly that.
They surely knew they were being watched closely by the authorities. They may have known or suspected that the sheriff had an informant inside. They certainly knew the legislature had changed the age of consent laws specifically to target them. They may have expected to be raided at some point.
So many of the supposed "underage girls" who are pregnant or are mothers are turning out to be adults. Maybe all of them are. I don't think it's likely that no statutory rape happened on their place, but I'm beginning to think it's possible.
Then to find out that they are filthy, stinking rich on the top of it! They have no business going to get welfare benefits, if they are capable of taking care of these wives and children! If everything is above the board, then I guess old Jeffs wasn’t guilty, and he should be let go! If all these women were in their 20’s and everything was above board, why was Jeffs even prosecuted?
Maybe if this is all on a hoax, then they should let him out, apologize, and let him go back to his ranch! I wonder what answer I get from some people on here? Yeah, I agree that they better have good evidence against them. Doesn’t it have to be proven also that C. Jessop and some other dissidents are lying or not? They did live in the compound in UT/ARZ border. They know what was going on in there.
I don’t believe that Jeffs was alone in these proven crimes! I don’t think they just stopped when he was imprisoned, either! There was some evidence at least, that underage women were forced to marry. Then they were told that they would be against God if they didn’t marry and have children with these annointed men!
I guess if I didn’t know better, I would believe it, and go along with it! Then what about other adults in there who went along with it, and covered it up? They might not have realized it was wrong, but it was!
“Why not pull all the kids out of foster care then and send them to the FLDS. Would you be comfortable with that?”
Based upon the evidence thus far, yes. But I doubt the FLDS folks would want to have their children corrupted by the state’s children.
Foster care is a horrible solution for children. The evidence of it’s failure rate speaks for itself. I accept there are exceptions to the rule. But overall, foster care is a miserable failure ripe with corruption.
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