Polygamy Persists in FLDS Communities Despite Arrest of Leader Warren Jeffs

Ben Bistline, a former polygamist, local historian and author of two books, laughs when asked why the practice persists in the Utah-Arizona border area. The outside world, he says, does not understand. “We just grew up in polygamy,” Bistline said. “It’s part of our life. I don’t know how else to say it.”

Bistline has lived along the border since the twin towns of Colorado City, Ariz., and Hildale, Utah, were still known as Short Creek. The towns are home to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS). He was there in 1953, when Arizona authorities raided the community in an attempt to stop plural marriages, and he has seen dozens of men and women jailed for their beliefs. Bistline said members believe that plural marriage is necessary to gain exaltation to the highest level of heaven, and that they have been taught this from birth. “It won’t change,” he said.

Warren Jeffs, 40, the church’s leader, was arrested Monday near Las Vegas during a traffic stop. He was wanted on felony charges in both Utah and Arizona for sexual crimes related to plural marriages between teenage girls and older men. These are charges, not findings of guilt. Protecting young people from exploitation is a duty Scripture places on those with influence (Proverbs 31:8-9).

Jeffs was scheduled to appear Thursday in a Las Vegas courtroom. Prosecutors from both states planned to ask that he be extradited to Utah to face two first-degree felony charges of rape by an accomplice. It was not known whether he would contest extradition.

The FLDS is one of a handful of Utah-based fundamentalist groups that continue to practice polygamy. The practice was once a tenet of the early Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but the Mormon church abandoned it in 1890 as a condition of statehood. The FLDS now excommunicates any member found practicing polygamy and disavows Mormon fundamentalism, although most Utah polygamists identify their beliefs that way.

Ken Driggs, an Atlanta defense attorney who has written extensively on the legal history of polygamy, said that Jeffs’s legal troubles could move him toward martyrdom. “Historically, it’s generally made martyrs out of the people who get prosecuted,” Driggs said. “They come back revered.” Former members say Jeffs is already revered as a prophet who preached that he was untouchable. They describe followers who shun the outside world, are said to be blindly loyal, pay any amount the church demands and perform mandatory community service.

Jeffs has led the church since 2002 and has controlled its marriages, deciding whom and when women marry and performing most ceremonies himself. He is known to demand complete obedience, and he has reportedly used even minor infractions as grounds for removing some men from the church, forcing them to leave their families behind. Bistline said that Jeffs has used fear to manage his followers more than any FLDS leader before him, but that it would be unfair to say everyone lives and worships under duress. “The majority don’t want to leave,” he said. “They’re an intelligent people and within their belief of polygamy, they are a moral people.”

Bistline and Driggs said that FLDS leaders have traditionally served until death, so Jeffs is unlikely to step down if convicted. They said he would likely delegate duties such as marriage ceremonies to men in his inner circle while retaining control of the church. “He’ll have visitors and mail and some telephone calls in jail, if he goes to jail,” Bistline said.

While Jeffs has been in hiding over the past two years, some local authority appears to have been delegated already, Bistline said. Someone has been appointed as the local “bishop” in Colorado City and Hildale, and at church outposts in British Columbia, Colorado, South Dakota and Texas.

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