My Life in a Polygamist Compound

Slate ^ | 04/16/08 | Torie Bosch

[lucysmom]

This is the most evil cult spawned on USA soil and needs to be dissolved and all the perpetrators arrested and charged with slave trafficing of the worst kind.

I don't know about most evil (Jim Jones comes to mind) but I agree with the rest.

[Colofornian]

You and I have witnessed countless people here declaring that many obvious crimes had been committed at Eldorado. If so, where are the indictments? Where are the massive arrests of the adult men?

Let's say you're a detective specializing in juvenile crime. You are out driving around on an assigned beat. From your departmental updates, you "know" which perps are essentially doin' "what" in some of the evidence-dragging cases. For example, you know there are certain "perps" that are "bustable" with evidence in hand...but you're not going to get access to the narcotics in their vehicle unless their headline is out. [You can't just pull a guilty party over...now why do I have to explain that to you if you're such a "due process" protector?..talk about crazy role reversal].

This perhaps the single most 'gonna have it both ways' attempt I have seen in my life. I have seen folks rail on the people at Eldorado non-stop for two weeks. I have seen them get quite exorcised at anyone who would suggest that due process was important. I have seen them take every comment made concerning the case as proof positive that crimes had been committed and people's heads should roll. Some were already calling for the death penalty. Now I ask where the primary charges are concerning these crimes, and you ask me what's my hurry? WHAT????? This was supposed to be a cut and dried case until I asked the question about where are the charges. It seems to me some preliminary charges should be coming down the pike by now. Are there cut and dried infractions of law at Eldorado or not?

Once again, you are confusing the two agencies. CPS plays "defense." (child removal). Law enforcement agencies working with prosecutors play "offense" to get the perps off the streets. What you saw was child removal, not men arrested.

Back to my "beat" illustration when you "know" who the perps are. You can't as a law enforcement agency, simply bust down a door based upon indirect evidence. But, let's say there's a domestic violence call from the wife of a suspected perp. If, in the process of carrying out a p.d. response to that residence, the officer sees marijuana plants growing in the backyard or a meth lab on the premises, the evidence for that is secured.

Unfortunately, child rape isn't as easy to collect evidence on as plant or lab. But a pregnancy is.

Bottom line...you're mistaken if you think law enforcement agencies already had firsthand direct evidence on most of the men in that compound when they entered. They had hearsay information on most of them; and probably direct evidence on some of them, but not enough to satisfy prosecutors.

If you're a known perp who's on parole and shouldn't be out beyond curfew associating with other felons, and you're driving around minus a headlight...you've just given the invitation to be busted if you're pulled over in that situation. Likewise, in this scenario, the call has given law enforcement officials the invitation to collect firsthand evidence on suspicions and hearsay. The evidence-collecting stage in these kinds of cases IS NOT ALWAYS the press-charging stage.

I was led to believe that there were a number of underage women at the compound who were pregnant. Weren't you? If nothing else, charges of conspiracy and contributing would be in order. I don't think I'm out of line to wonder why the adult men have not been taken into custody, and charges filed.

(yeah, well tell that to the law enforcement labs...maybe you could open a Burger King DNA Lab Drive-Thru to help them out)

[DoughtyOne]

Thanks for the additional comments Dan. I’ve looked at them and don’t have anything to add. You take care.

[SkyPilot]

There is a female LDS member on FR who will tell you all about the LDS church.

Here are her postings. You may need to read several pages into them to get her true story.

http://www.freerepublic.com/tag/by:restornu/index?brevity=full;tab=comments

[PennsylvaniaMom]

Thx for the link...I’ll read up.

[lucysmom]

It's not a matter for gov't raids if minor women have sex with multiple minor men...

So its okay for mature men to have sex with multiple minor girls as long as it take place within the context of religious belief?

[Old Mountain man]

SkyPilot recognizing the truth? Now that’s funny!

[wardaddy]

Indeed since I question Lord Colofornian’s supreme wisdom on all things about the Bible, Polygamy, and Slavery I must therfore be a polygamous slave mongering manstealer...lol

You’re mighty full of yourself dear.

[DoughtyOne]

I agree with that Tammy. Folks get pretty worked up, and it’s obvious why. Thanks for the note.

[wardaddy]

I understand there are allegations aplenty.

But there have been no convictions and the witness is where?

I don’t care for their lifestyle but I’d like to see more concrete evidence that every man and every mom there were up to this.

We are taking 400 kids from their families...that is pretty tough stuff before more than whispered phone calls come to light.

What age do you consider underage for concensual marriage.

My great grandmother married at 14 in 1899 and had her forst a year later. My great grandpa was 18. I do think old men doing this is wrong of course but I do wonder what do folks here think is appropriate underage.

Again as I stated before, the culling of young boys bothers me too. And it does seem like a cult....but that is not enough to take the kids.

Raping young girls is and that is about all so far I’ve heard alleged that rises to Class A felony. Those child graves I don’t know about. Feel free to elaborate.

[lucysmom]

These girls aren't being kidnapped and forced into a lifestyle foreign to them by anyone except by the state of TX.

No, they're born into the "lifestyle" and don't have the benefit of any outside experience.

[DoughtyOne]

While I do see other areas for concern in your post, I don’t absolve the men for what they are doing at the farm, providing they are doing what we suspect they were.

I realize you have a right to you point of view on this, but I don’t agree with it at all.

Kids should make the decisions that impact their lives when they become young adults. They MUST be able to look back and realize they were the ones who made the mistakes, mistakes are realized later on.

I won’t wish on anyone the idea that they should hit 45 and realize they’ve been on the wrong track for 30 years, and they didn’t have a part in the decision concerning the track they would take.

Thanks for the response.

[wardaddy]

it’s the usual pitchforks and torches stuff mixed in with a wee bit of antiMormonism

but the hysteria zeal runs on a lot of police action threads

ye dare not question!

this is not to say there is no there there.....I’d just like to know more

[PennsylvaniaMom]

Page 404: Jessop heard "rumors that children were being taken from their mothers and sent to the FLDS compound in Texas. … We heard they were being sent away to be raised the way Warren wanted them to be raised." This is the ultimate sin to modern society and must be destroyed at all costs. A patriarchial model where the husband/male leader sets the rules. To reach this goal, politically-unpopular male-led societies must be shown to be criminal and 'mean'.

And, I'm still curious...do you really and trully believe in Jeffs' patriarchal model? Crickets...

[AppyPappy]

Wardaddy

We all know it is a polygamous sect. That’s not debatable. We don’t need an American Jim Jones situation.

[PennsylvaniaMom]

And, if there is a ‘Guyana’ here on US soil, the hue and cry will be ‘why didn’t the authorities DO SOMETHING...they had to know what was going on on the compound!’

[lucysmom]

In the span of history, marrying young women to older men wouldn't even merit a second glance. It has been practiced as long as their have been humans. It is only in this politically-correct environment against a minority population (e.g., try it against the homosexuals, for instance.) that the charge of 'criminality' can be leveled.

A friend was married, by her own choice and parent's consent, at the age of 15. She now says that she thinks her parent's were out of their minds to allow it and never would have given permission for her own daughter to marry at the same age.

[SkyPilot]

Well, hey! It's Old Mountain Man.

You didn't want to leave an insulting message in my mailbox instead?

I mean, you could have called me gutless, a coward, and a drunk, and then called it a "conversation" and ran away.

Are you going to debate any points of the thread this time, such as whether Matthew 5:28 meant what Christ said it meant vis a vis polygamy?

Thanks.

[Texas_shutterbug]

Geesh

You are one scary dude.

A sick, vile man makes a determination about the children of OTHER men, and you defend that?

Oh, my goodness. If you aren't FLDS, I shudder to think what you really are.

You DAMN well better know that I think it's criminal to rape young girls. And I hope their asses sit in jail a long, long time.

[colorcountry]

Ahhh, the disruptor is here, trying to inflame and shut down this thread. (Not that that would help, there are 30 other threads currently running about Mormon polygamy)

I suggest we not touch this tar baby.