Posted on 04/06/2008 5:27:22 AM PDT by SkyPilot
Local and state officials entered the temple of a secretive polygamist sect late Saturday, said lawmen blockading the road to the YFZ Ranch near Eldorado.
The action comes hours after local prosecutors said officials were preparing for the worst because a group of FLDS members were resisting efforts to search the structure.
The Texas Department of Public Safety trooper and Schleicher County sheriff’s deputy confirmed that officials have entered the temple but said they had no word on whether anything occurred in the effort.
The incursion into the temple caps the three-day saga of the state’s Child Protective Services agency removing at least 183 women and children from the YFZ Ranch since Friday afternoon. Eighteen girls have been placed in state custody since a 16-year-old told authorities she was married to a 50-year-old man and had given birth to his child.
Saturday evening, ambulances were brought in, said Allison Palmer, who as first assistant 51st District attorney, would prosecute any felony crimes uncovered as part of the investigation inside the compound.
“In preparing for entry to the temple, law enforcement is preparing for the worst,” Palmer said Saturday evening. They want to have “medical personnel on hand in case this were to go in a way that no one wants.”
Apparently as a result of action Saturday night at the ranch, about 10:15 p.m. Saturday, a Schleicher County school bus unloaded another group of at least a dozen more women and children from the compound.
Although members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or FLDS, have provided varying degrees of cooperation to the sheriff’s deputies and Texas Rangers searching the compound, all cooperation stopped once authorities tried to search the gleaming white temple that towers over the West Texas scrub, Palmer said.
“There may be those who would oppose (entry) by placing themselves between law enforcement and the place of worship,” Palmer said Saturday afternoon. “If an agreement cannot be reached … law enforcement will have to — as gently and peaceably as possible — make entry into that place.”
Sect members consider the temple, dedicated by then-leader of the sect Warren Jeffs in January 2005 and finished many months later, off-limits to those who are not FLDS members, said Palmer, who prosecutes felony cases in Schleicher County.
Palmer said she didn’t know the size or makeup of the group inside the temple.
The earlier refusal to provide access was even more disconcerting because CPS investigators have yet to identify the 16-year-old girl or her roughly 8-month-old baby among the dozens removed from the compound, Palmer said.
“Anytime someone says, ‘Don’t look here,’” she said, “it makes you concerned that’s exactly where you need to look.”
The girl told authorities in two separate phone calls a day apart that she was married to a 50-year-old man, Dale Barlow, who had fathered her child, Palmer said.
The joint raid included the Texas Rangers, CPS, Schleicher County and Tom Green County sheriff’s deputies and game wardens from the Texas Department of Parks and Wildlife.
Although CPS and Department of Public Safety officials have described the compound’s residents as cooperative, Palmer disagreed.
“Things have been a little tense, a little volatile,” she said.
Authorities removed 52 children Friday afternoon and 131 women and children overnight Friday. About 40 of the children are boys, said CPS spokeswoman Marleigh Meisner.
No further children have been taken into state custody since Friday, when 18 girls were judged to have been abused or be at imminent risk for abuse. CPS has found foster homes for the girls, Meisner said, and will place them after concluding its investigation.
Meisner declined to comment on the fate of the 119 other children and said authorities were still searching the ranch for others Saturday evening.
“They’re in the process of looking,” she said. “They’re literally about halfway through.”
In the eyes of the LDS church I was approved and ordained to be a High Priest. Whether or not I'm a High Priest in the eyes of God is certainly a debatable issue. But in the eyes of the LDS church I'm considered a High Priest. However I'm guessing that if certain LDS leaders were to read this thread they might decide to have me excommunicated for "apostasy". Excommunication has proven to be one of the church's ways of silencing individuals who won't coverup secret abominable actions of church leaders. For example, when Joseph Smith took young girls as plural wives (just as was happening at the YFZ ranch near El Dorado, Texas) it was technically against the laws of Illinois, against the Doctrine and Covenants and against the Book of Mormon. Well he plagiarized the wordings/symbols/rituals of some Masonic ceremonies to create a ceremony called the Endowment that setup a secretive circle of LDS members who would be "ready" to accept the new and everlasting covenant of eternal plural marriage without worry over whether or not they'd think about whether or not what they're doing was against the laws of the land and against the laws of the church's scriptures. Well one of the counselors in the First Presidency named William Law was outraged by Joseph Smith doing these activities in secret and his marrying 15 year old girls when he was more than 2 decades older than them. But Joseph Smith was able to discredit William Law within most LDS circles by having him excommunicated. Maybe the LDS church will eventually do the same to me in order to protect the good reputation of the church that they are working hard to establish through cunning marketing programs.
You wrote: Were you aware that when Joseph Smith took his second wife he violated the 1835 Doctrine and Covenants prohibiting polygamy, in violated of the 12th article of faith, and was contrary to Jacob 2:27-30?
My response: I wasn’t aware of this issue BEFORE I wrote my last big tithing check to the LDS church. But since I became aware of this issue they have only received a token small payment from me and they only got that payment because my wife insisted that we give them some money because she believed that the LDS church’s Council on the Disposition of Tithes and Offerings was God’s only authorized financial comptroller organization on earth. Frankly I think it’s time for the top leadership to acknowledge the truth on this issue and to stop sending out missionaries who they know will tell lies about the church’s polygamy history because they will be clueless and under tremendous pressure to find people to get baptized and assimilated into Mormonism.
On the contrary, there's plenty of evidence that the Israelites were NEVER in the US and that the Native Americans were descended from the Oriental culture.
There's DNA evidence that disproves the whole American Indians are descended from the Israelites belief. I don't have time to find it now, but I'm sure there's a FR thread I saw addressing it. I'll look later.
I've got another message crossed with this. Thanks for this reply. How did you find out about this?
I applaud you sir for your honesty. However, giving all the lies and deceptions down from the beginning of the LDS which you have just affirmed to be so, aren’t you the least bit concerned that this may be evidence that Smith was NOT of God since God doesn’t lie?
Bring it on!! It's a no-win for the church to have someone report me. It'll only bring them more unwanted publicity and scrutiny. First of all the local Bishop and Stake President know that they are forbidden to try to contact me for any individual interviews/discussions unless they first get me official answers to a few questions. Otherwise they risk personal legal liability for defamation/harassment lawsuits. Secondly, I doubt they really want to engage in a discussion with any sunlight on it about Joseph Smith's history with polygamy and marrying young girls. Thirdly, though I value my church membership, I value being honest about the religion even more. The church claims to be the most true and honest church on the planet and I intend to keep reminding them that they have a long way to go to live up to such a reputation. All my family knows how I feel. And all the friends I care to keep in frequent touch with know how I feel too. When they bother me with ideas of changing my point-of-view about honesty then it shuts them up quickly when I say, "on exactly what subject is it OK for the Brethren to deceive?"
According to who!
I will pray for you and your family.
It must have been shocking to find out some of that stuff.
Great work.
I am in awe of your courage.
May God Eternal bless you and your family. You are the first LDS person (and I know you are in high standing) to say something like this. I am actually very humbled by what you said, and I stand in great admiration of your right now.
Blessings to you and yours sir.
Genesis 1:1
Categorically UNTRUE.
been butting heads with him for a while now. Have a pretty good ammo locker established to deal with his challenges. Jim Rob, probably dreads the hard drive and band width we've chewed up in the past with each other LOL
I’m not ignoring Resty, I was away from a computer for a couple of hours. I have answered EVERY one of Resty’s questions, she has answered NONE of mine.
As one FR poster just asked me in FM, I wonder how long it will be until the LDS posters here start badgering you to “do the honest thing, live by your convictions and quit the LDS Church.”
They (the Mormons Freepers) still ask me to resign all the time, like it is any of their business.
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