Sect leader Jeffs indicted in child sex case

Sect leader Jeffs indicted in child sex case A Texas grand jury indicted polygamous sect leader Warren Jeffs on sexual assault charges, and five of his followers also face a variety of charges, state Attorney General Greg Abbott said. Jeffs was charged in the indictment with sexual assault of a child, a first-degree felony. He could face a another possible life sentence in the Texas case, a spokesman for Abbott's office said Wednesday. Jeffs is serving two consecutive sentences of five years to life in prison in Utah, and he is awaiting trial in Arizona. Both cases involve arranged marriages between sect members and underaged brides. Jeffs, 52, is the leader and "prophet" of the estimated 10,000-member Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, an offshoot of the mainstream Mormon church. The FLDS openly practices polygamy at its Yearning for Zion Ranch outside Eldorado, Texas, and in two towns straddling the Utah-Arizona state line: Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Arizona. It was not immediately clear when Jeffs would be brought to Texas from Arizona, where he is currently being held, to face the new charge, which was handed up by a grand jury in San Angelo, Texas. Jeffs is accused in the indictment of assaulting "a child ... younger than 17 years of age and not legally married to the defendant" in January 2005. The alleged victim, whose name is redacted on the document, "was a person who the defendant was prohibited from marrying or purporting to marry or with whom the defendant was prohibited from living under the appearance of being married" under Texas law. The indictments also charge four of Jeffs' followers with single counts of sexually assaulting a girl under the age of 17. One of the four also faces a count of bigamy. A fifth follower is charged with three counts of failure to report child abuse. The five followers were not publicly named, and their indictments remain under seal because they have not been taken into custody. Authorities raided the Texas ranch in April, seizing more than 400 children. The children later were returned to their families after the Texas Supreme Court ruled that the state had no right to remove the children and lacked evidence to show that they faced imminent danger of abuse. In May, DNA samples were taken from Jeffs as part of a criminal investigation into allegations that he "spiritually" married four girls ranging in age from 12 to 15, authorities said. A search warrant seeking the DNA samples said marital records -- known as bishop's records -- from the ranch show that Jeffs married a 14-year-old girl on January 18, 2004, in Utah. The records showed that Jeffs "married" three other underage brides -- two 12-year-olds and a 14-year-old -- at the YFZ Ranch, according to the search warrant. One of the 12-year-olds, believed to have married Jeffs on July 27, 2006, was sexually assaulted by Jeffs later that day, the search warrant said. The warrant made reference to pictures of Jeffs with his alleged underage brides. In one photograph, the warrant states, he is kissing one of the 12-year-olds. In another, he is shown with a 15-year-old wife at the birth of their child in October 2004. Authorities had said the DNA samples would determine whether he is the father of the children born to underage mothers. In November, Jeffs was sentenced to two consecutive terms of five years to life in Utah after being convicted on two charges of being an accomplice to rape in connection with a marriage he performed in 2001 between a 14-year-old girl and her 19-year-old cousin. FLDS spokesman Rod Parker, who is vacationing in Colorado this week, had no immediate comment on the indictment Tuesday. "As far as an indictment of Warren Jeffs, I'd want to know a little more before I start talking about it," he said (http site) Sect leader Jeffs indicted in child sex case [Webwarper] [Anonymization] [Anonymizer] [@nonymouse] [proxy.mxds.ch]