Child welfare in Texas removes children from polygamist compound UPDATE #13

[momoffuzzyfaces]

I know that I do not agree with this religious group, and think they are a bunch of nutballs. BUT.....this is about religious beliefs....and I wonder why our government has the right to barge in and take children.

So, if someone's "religious beliefs" included sacrificing children to a volcano god or something, the government should let them?

[RICHARD]

Did anyone notice that they have a washed out, 1850's style of the Stepford Wives.

If anything the men should have their arse kicked for making women look that way...

And what was going on with the cult woman and that UNIBROW.

That was frigging scary to look at.....I'm still skeezed out about it!

[lizbud]

And what was going on with the cult woman and that UNIBROW.

That was frigging scary to look at.....I'm still skeezed out about it!

I noticed that too.......hard NOT to.


They act like robots. Wierd.

[Catty1]

http://ca.news.yahoo.com/s/capress/0...gamist_retreat

Some of the children seized from Texas polygamist compound are Canadians

1 hour, 58 minutes ago

By Michelle Roberts, The Associated Press



SAN ANGELO, Texas - The attorney general for British Columbia said Friday he was alerted by officials in Ottawa that some of the children taken from a polygamist compound inhabited by members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints are Canadians.

The confirmation came hours after Angie Voss of Texas Child Protection Services testified at a custody hearing for 416 children, seized in a raid earlier this month because of evidence of physical and sexual abuse, that some of the children before the court are Canadians.

State District Judge Barbara Walther, meanwhile, ruled that the children will stay in state custody.

She also ordered that all children and parents be given genetic testing. Child welfare officials have said they've had difficulty determining how the children and parents are related because of evasive or changing answers.

In Vancouver, Attorney General Wally Oppal said he had been alerted about some Canadians.

"I received the same report from Ottawa so it seems that that is accurate," said Oppal.

He said the Justice Department or External Affairs called "indicating that there are Canadians."

"What that means is that External Affairs would get involved in something like that."

But Foreign Affairs in Ottawa did not confirmin what Oppal said he was told by federal officials privately.

"To date no confirmation has been received on the citizenship status of the children," said Eugenie Cormier-Lessonde, a department spokeswoman.

Canadian consular officials have been in contact with Texas officials, she said.

Oppal said "this has been an issue for quite some time in that it has been said that at Bountiful there are said to be some Americans there as well."

"It sort of adds another dimension to the problem here. That is, that people move in and out of these communities and it's sometimes difficult to find out who's where and what."

Bountiful, located in southeastern B.C., is home to a polygamist compound.

Oppal said the call from Ottawa was "giving us a heads up because they know that we're involved in that same issue here.

Earlier in San Angelo, Voss testified that some of the children are Canadian citizens, although the New York Times reported that she did not say how many, or their age or sex.

Girls in the west Texas polygamous sect enter into underage marriages without resistance because they are ruthlessly indoctrinated from birth to believe disobedience will lead to their damnation, experts for the state testified Friday.

The renegade Mormon sect's belief system "is abusive. The culture is very authoritarian," said Dr. Bruce Perry, a psychiatrist and an authority on children in cults.

But under questioning from defence lawyers the state's experts acknowledged that the sect mothers are loving parents and that there were no signs of abuse among younger girls and any of the boys.

A witness for the parents who was presented by defence lawyers as an expert on the FLDS disputed the state's contention that a bed in the retreat's gleaming white temple was never used to consummate the marriages of underage girls to much older men.

Instead, John Walsh testified, it is used for naps during the sect's long worship services.

"There is no sexual activity in the temple," Walsh said.

Lawyers for the children and the parents appeared to be trying to show in cross-examination that their children were fine and that the state was trying to tear families apart on the mere possibility that the girls might be abused when they reach puberty several years from now.

Only a few of the children are teenage girls. Roughly a third are younger than four and more than two dozen are teenage boys. But about 20 women or more gave birth when they were minors, some as young as 13, authorities say.

The judge controlled the hundreds of lawyers with a steelier hand Friday than she did the day before.

Under cross-examination, Voss conceded there have been no allegations of abuse against babies, prepubescent girls or any boys.

But her agency, Child Protective Services, contends that the teachings of the FLDS - to marry shortly after puberty, have as many children as possible and obey their fathers or their prophet, imprisoned leader Warren Jeffs - amount to abuse.

"This is a population of women who appear to have a problem making a decision on their own," Voss said.

In response, the FLDS women, dressed in long, pioneer-style dresses with their hair swept up in braids, groaned in chorus with their dark-suited lawyers.

Walsh disputed that young girls have no say in who they marry.

"Basically, they're into match-making," he said of the sect, adding that girls who have refused matches have not been expelled.

"I believe the girls are given a real choice. Girls have successfully said, 'No, this is not a good match for me,' and they remained in good standing," he said.

Jeffs is in prison for being an accomplice to rape. He was convicted in Utah last year of forcing a 14-year-old into marrying an older man. W

-With files from The Canadian Press.

[Catty1]

And one more...

http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/pre...420485585.html

April 10, 2008

HOUSTON: Child welfare investigators who raided a polygamist sect in Texas found many pregnant teenagers and under-age girls who claimed they were forced to marry, according to court documents.

The documents, unsealed on Tuesday, contained details of evidence Texan officials presented to a judge to justify taking temporary state custody of 416 children at the Yearning for Zion ranch, operated by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

They disclosed that in responding to an initial report that a 16-year-old girl had been sexually abused at the ranch, a guarded complex with a limestone temple at its centre, investigators found many young girls who were either pregnant or had given birth.

Click on link to read more

[NicoleLJ]

I have been reading this in the paper and it all sickens me. I am a mormon. Member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Not the fundamentialist group that they are talking about here. We do not practice polygamy. but because of these groups many people think we still do or are a part of this group or believe as they do. We do not, I do not.

I personally am glad the children were removed and an investigation is being done. I hope it makes it's way to the Canadian ones here to put a stop to all this. Abuse in any form is wrong.
Nicole

[Pam]

Did anyone notice that they have a washed out, 1850's style of the Stepford Wives.

That was my first thought (Stepford Wives) when I saw a couple of the women interviewed. They appeared to be like robots almost. I have mixed emotions about all of this. On the one hand the children need to be removed from any situation where there has been abuse, or even the suspicion of abuse. On the other hand I feel for the mothers. I can't imagine having my children snatched from me. This whole situation requires a balancing act of wisdom and compassion. I hope those in authority are capable of that. The whole inter-marrying thing is just amazing to me. It almost reminds me of a puppy mill.

[RICHARD]

That was my first thought (Stepford Wives) when I saw a couple of the women interviewed. They appeared to be like robots almost. (

But what about the uni-brow?

The thing that made me shiver was the way the unibrow woman gave the tour.

"This is the bedroom where XXX sleeps, she's not here...."

Overstating the obvious??? Too scary.

[Catty1]

I think you might want to start a thread about tweezing.

When I was in my early teens, I was close to having a 'unibrow'. I've tweezed the 2 inches between the brows ever since.

Bet that woman just doesn't tweeze...a lot of us women might look more like her than most people know!

[RICHARD]

I think you might want to start a thread about tweezing.

When I was in my early teens, I was close to having a 'unibrow'. I've tweezed the 2 inches between the brows ever since.

Bet that woman just doesn't tweeze...a lot of us women might look more like her than most people know!

And what makes you think I know anything about make-up?

And where are the men in this story?

[Catty1]

the men will be in court - if they can get any of the present women to speak.

Or the DNA testing!

[NicoleLJ]

I hope if the women get the right counsling that they will talk. But it might not happen. They were raised and brainwashed extensively into this religion. And we might never know the full extent of the abuse many of them have gone through also. To many of them what went on may have seemed normal and ok because that is what they were raised with and brainwashed with. Which is the sad state of it. I just hope a few or more of them with the right kind of treatment and therapy can come forward and give a full account of what went on there so that the men can be charge with the full extent of their crimes.

One of the sad parts though is should the adult women be charged too for being a part of it or allowing it to happen? The thing that will have to be looked at is how brainwashed were they? Did they honestly know deep down that what was going on was wrong? If they didn't and they had no real contact with the outside then what can they be charged with? They were raised to believe such was ok. In fact that if they didn't they were going agianst God or some such thing. How ingrained was this in their minds so that we can fully see who all is at fault?

We could easily say that both parents are at fault because they were both adults and so on. But is that totally true? I am not saying it is or isn't. I personally have not made up my mind yet. But if the women were raised in this enviroment, with no influence to the outsides thinking, then how much fault can you place on them? Honest question. Just something to think about.
Nicole

[lizbud]

But what about the uni-brow?

The thing that made me shiver was the way the unibrow woman gave the tour.

"This is the bedroom where XXX sleeps, she's not here...."

Overstating the obvious??? Too scary.

Maybe they don't allow mirrors in the compound.

One thing that was interesting was their explanation of the big bed in the
temple. They said it was not for sex, but was a bed for people to rest during
their long prayer meetings. Right.

[shepgirl]

If you've ever been in a Mormon temple you would be amazed at what you saw. And not to mention the the money to build those temples, money that could be used to help poor families. And I hear people criticizing the royals all the time. At least they were from money in the first place.

[K9soul]

If you've ever been in a Mormon temple you would be amazed at what you saw. And not to mention the the money to build those temples, money that could be used to help poor families. And I hear people criticizing the royals all the time. At least they were from money in the first place.

I don't think it's very appropriate to make broad generalizing comments on a whole faith. Why would you assume there are no people of the Mormon faith on this board or people with family who are Mormon?