Posted on 06/24/2008 9:41:49 AM PDT by Alice in Wonderland
SAN ANGELO, Texas — A court-appointed attorney for a 16-year-old FLDS girl caught up in a grand jury investigation will go to court today under armed guard. Natalie Malonis confirmed to the Deseret News she has received death threats since she sought a restraining order against a high-profile member of the Fundamentalist LDS Church to prevent him from contacting her client.
"I've been getting death threats and I am being provided a security detail," she said this morning. "That was not even at my request. Law enforcement recognized the need for it."
Malonis said she did not know who has made the threats. She represents four FLDS members — including Pamela Jeffs, for whom she was praised by FLDS supporters when she managed to secure additional rights in court for the woman once declared by Texas authorities to be a minor.
Malonis' 16-year-old client, meanwhile, has fired off several e-mails asking her to step aside.
In e-mails sent to the Deseret News and posted on pro-FLDS Web sites, Teresa Jeffs accuses her court-appointed lawyer of not acting in her best interest.
"My attorney is going against my wishes. Maybe you need a restraining order that you can absolutely have nothing to do with me and you have to stay 1,000 feet away from me! What do you think of that?" she wrote in an e-mail to Malonis.
Jeffs has been subpoenaed to testify Wednesday before a grand jury investigating crimes involving FLDS members. The Texas Attorney General's Office said it could not find Jeffs to subpoena her, and Malonis went to court seeking a restraining order against FLDS member and spokesman Willie Jessop. In court papers, she accused Jessop of coercing the girl to avoid the subpoena and interfering with her relationship with her client. Judge Barbara Walther signed a temporary restraining order that technically prevents Jeffs' mother from allowing her daughter to have any contact with Jessop. A hearing on a more permanent restraining order will be held this afternoon.
On Monday, Malonis said she spoke with the attorney for Jeffs' mother, but no agreement could be reached.
"I hoped we could, but no ... ," she told the Deseret News.
Malonis said she is prepared to call witnesses and present evidence to suggest that the girl is being intimidated and pressured by FLDS members. The judge is not expected to consider Jeffs' request for a new lawyer.
Rod Parker, a Salt Lake attorney acting as a spokesman for the FLDS, believes Malonis is not following her court-appointed duties. Because Malonis is Teresa Jeffs' attorney ad litem and not her guardian ad litem, her job is to be an advocate for the child, he said.
"I think that she's really out on a limb in doing what she's doing and injuring her own client in a very public way," Parker said. "This is just a very unhealthy and dysfunctional attorney-client relationship. The court ought to grant Teresa's wish and give her another lawyer. This system of justice does not work appropriately when attorneys and their clients are at odds with each other." When the Texas Supreme Court ordered the hundreds of children taken in the April 3 raid to be returned to their parents, Jeffs was exempted.
Malonis said in court papers it was because the girl was an identified sex-abuse victim who had been "spiritually united" to an older man at 15. A special order was put in place for Jeffs, preventing her from contacting her father — FLDS leader Warren Jeffs — and a man named Raymond Jessop, who was not further identified.
The Deseret News normally does not name sex-abuse victims, but the girl has gone public in media interviews and in an e-mail forwarded to the Deseret News. She insists she is not a victim. In her e-mail, the girl said neither Willie Jessop nor Raymond Jessop has ever threatened her.
"That have treated (sic) so very kindly," she wrote.
Jeffs wrote in the communication with Malonis that she did not want the grand jury subpoena, but acknowledged being served.
"Well, they want me to appear before a grand jury. I do not have confidence in you and how can I get you to help me in such a situation that I am in when it feels like to me all you are doing is going against me," she wrote. "So, that is the reason that I am asking you to step aside and let me do what I need to do to and get me a different attorney."
thanks enosh - I knew a freeper would come through
thanks enosh - I knew a freeper would come through
Yes, I do. Although baptists are not known for their high levels of intelligence or morality.
This happened in TX, not UT. Besides, everybody knows UT has been handing out fake driver's licenses to illegal aliens for decades. That makes every document they issue highly suspect anywhere else.
You guys will learn someday that UT is not the center of the universe.
This happened in TX, not UT. Besides, everybody knows UT has been handing out fake driver's licenses to illegal aliens for decades. That makes every document they issue highly suspect anywhere else.
You guys will learn someday that UT is not the center of the universe.
My ignorant spouting last night has shown me wrong, again.
Thank God, for forgiveness! I don't have to keep track. He has the list, and is checking it twice. But, for the umbrella of His Blood, I would be destined for Hell...
always the charmer
always the charmer
revised with no comma, to clarify thought!
Thank you so much for saying it twice. I will assume that you agree with me 100% since you said it twice.
Willie Jessop himself would be banned for making that claim ~ and he's been on here several times defending his position (regarding child rape).
Quite entertaining if not enlightening.
Frankly, when they banned the color red they stepped off the planet thereby severing all their historic or theological connections with anything here.
I thought their “legal name” had something to do with “the Trust”. Besides, no legal action is being brought against the church at all. The Trust owns the YFZ ranch (which I call “the camp”).
Really, but some definitions, all religions can be considered a type of cult, so what makes one group labeled a cult versus, say, a sect.
The definition I would like to use is: a religion or sect considered to be false, unorthodox, or extremist, with members often living outside of conventional society under the direction of a charismatic leader..
I know one will say that all religions are considered 'false or unorthodox' by another. I think the key points here are it is labeled false or unorthodox by the religious mantle it falls under, such as the Branch Dividians being considered false by the Christian Church. The other points are 'extremist and living outside a conventional society'. This part is very tough to put a judgment on because you have cases like the Amish who live outside conventional society but I doubt anyone would consider them a cult. This is because they don't meet the first criteria that they are considered false or unorthodox by the religious mantle they fall under. Extreme? Another tough one to judge because it is a relative term. "Under the direction of a charismatic leader", this is the one that I think sets a cult apart from others. In this case, do you have a charismatic leader who becomes a Deity symbol and encourages followers to shun society, laws, and tenants of the religious mantle. The leader becomes more important than the faith.
With that said, all religions can be 'cults' before they become established. 'Cult' is a term that is relative to the society they live in. So, let's go back and look at FLDS.
Do they have false or unorthodox beliefs as defined by the mantle religion they claim?- Check.
Are they considered extremist by conventional society standards?- Check
Do they live outside conventional society?- Check
Do they have charismatic leader(s) who become a Deity figure and/or replace the moral structure of society or the mantle religion?- Check.
So, here is the rub. IS being a cult a crime? Heck no. It is what they do under the name of that cult that determines if they are criminal or not, just like with any group.
If we want to keep going, I think we should take this to a religion thread to keep the mods at bay. This is a news thread after all.
The Catholic Church claims, of course, that through Apostolic Succession they are, in fact, that same First Century Church.
Obviously both churches claim the same origin, with the same people, in the same period of time. However, the DofC is NOT the RC, nor the RC the DofC.
They are different (and the only differences they have are pretty much Ecclesiastical and not Theological).
Jim Jones was a problem who bit the DofC in the bu++. No one in his right mind claims that Jim Jones bit the RCs.
We have a similar situation here. LDS, except that it has members in Utah and Arizona, has no relationship to F(lds).
End of story. Warren Jeffs and his funny little friends are not an LDS problem (beyond the normal concern of Christians of all stripes for the well being of the victims).
JR: Whine, whine, whine. Boo hoo. Why am I not allowed to bash Mormons on Free Republic? Sob, sob, sob.
OMM: baptists are not known for their high levels of intelligence or morality.
thank for provong my point, OMM
sorry for the double posts, fr is buggy this am
[If the 16-year-old wanted an Abortion she’d be considered competent to get one, without anybody asking if the father of the child, or her friends, or her family, were coercing her.]
So are you suggesting she get an abortion as well as be raped by old codgers?
[If the 16-year-old wanted an Abortion she’d be considered competent to get one, without anybody asking if the father of the child, or her friends, or her family, were coercing her.]
So are you suggesting she get an abortion as well as be raped by old codgers?
Ironic, ain’t it...
Sorry, that's just not true.
Well, she's proved herself to be at least a 2-Act lawyer. First, when she represented Pamela Jeffs and now while representing Teresa Jeffs.
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