Texas neighbors keep eye on sect
Fear bloodbath if FBI fugitive is hiding in temple
By Miguel Bustillo, Los Angeles Times | May 20, 2006

ELDORADO, Texas -- Jimmy Doyle, the local justice of the peace, circled his Piper Cherokee plane over the fast-sprouting minicity where polygamist prophet Warren Jeffs, one of the FBI's Ten Most Wanted Fugitives, may be hiding.

More than a half-mile below, a monolithic white temple encased in thick limestone towered over the West Texas scrubland.

All around it, young men in pickups and construction cranes were busy building a self-sufficient compound, which authorities believe is intended as a sanctuary for the 1,000 most faithful followers of the breakaway Mormon sect known as the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

''Some call this a religion," said Doyle, 69, as he stared out the cockpit with a look of disgust. ''But it sure looks like a cult to me."

Doyle and other leaders in Eldorado have been keeping a wary eye on their secretive neighbors since church leaders told a real estate broker two years ago that they planned to build a hunting lodge.

The anxiety has heightened this month in this town, with a population of 1,951, 4 miles from the compound, after news that the FBI now considers Jeffs one of its most highly sought suspects. He is wanted on charges that include rape and child molestation.

Jeffs -- who may have been present at the dedication of the white temple last year -- has preached that Zion, the stronghold where his sect will experience salvation, lies in Texas, according to former members of the church. Jeffs has also compared himself to Joseph Smith, the founder of Mormonism who was killed by a mob in Illinois, and predicted a climactic confrontation with the outside world.

Narrating his bird's-eye tour of the compound locals have called the Yearning for Zion Ranch, Doyle pointed to amenities in varying stages of construction. There were three-story dormitories, a commissary, a dairy farm, a chicken coop, orchards of fruit trees, row crops, a rock quarry, a cement plant, a water tank, greenhouses, grain silos -- and clearly, more to come.

The first floor of every building was constructed with solid concrete ''thick enough to withstand a bullet," Doyle noted. Women in antiquated long skirts and bonnets are sometimes seen tending crops. Men inside a tall wooden guard tower stand sentry around the clock, informing outsiders that they are unwelcome.

Ten thousand members strong, the fundamentalist church, which believes that men need a minimum of three wives to be granted complete salvation, openly practiced polygamy for decades with scant interference from police in Utah and Arizona. But the sect is facing serious law enforcement scrutiny in those states amid allegations that it tolerated the sexual abuse of children.

As a result, its leaders and their multitude of spouses are seeking a new beginning in rural Schleicher County, Texas, about 200 miles northwest of San Antonio.

Jeffs has prophesied a final showdown between the devoted and the outside world. Many in Eldorado worry that his supporters will do something rash when he is cornered.

The worst fears, fed by a barrage of media reports, are that Eldorado could become ''the next Waco." Some foresee a bloodbath similar to the one that occurred 13 years ago near Waco when a federal siege on a Branch Davidian compound ended with the deaths of 76 church members, including its leader David Koresh.

''They're up to something big in there, no doubt about that," said Wayne McGiness, the Eldorado postmaster, as he stood on County Road 300 and peered inside the compound through a pair of binoculars. ''I just hope this Jeffs character doesn't try to go out a martyr."

Law enforcement officials downplay the concerns, saying there is no reason to suspect the men inside the compound are armed and dangerous. Thus far, Texas authorities have received no reports of sexual abuse or any of the other alleged crimes that have followed the fundamentalist church.

Under Texas's development policies, government officials have only minimal authority over construction on the compound. The sect's only run-in with the law involved $34,000 in fines imposed by state environmental regulators for failing to properly dispose of raw sewage.

The sect's only run-in with the law involved $34,000 in fines imposed by state environmental regulators for failing to properly dispose of raw sewage.

LAS VEGAS - The leader of a polygamist breakaway sect who was on the FBI’s Most Wanted List has been arrested and faces sexual misconduct charges for allegedly arranging marriages between underage girls and older men, authorities said Tuesday.

Warren Steed Jeffs, 50, was taken into custody after he and two other people were pulled over late Monday by a Nevada Highway Patrol trooper on Interstate 15 just north of Las Vegas, FBI spokesman David Staretz said.

Jeffs leads the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, a group that broke away from the Mormon church a century ago. He is said to have at least 40 wives and nearly 60 children.

He was wanted in Utah and Arizona on suspicion of sexual misconduct for allegedly arranging marriages between underage girls and older men.

He assumed leadership of the sect in 2002 after the death of his 98-year-old father, Rulon Jeffs, who had 65 children by several women. Jeffs took nearly all his father’s widows as his own wives.

Since May, Jeffs has been on the FBI’s Ten Most Wanted list, with a $100,000 reward offered for information leading to his capture.

Wife, brother also in car
The other two people in the vehicle were identified as one of Warren Jeffs’ wives, Naomi Jeffs, and a brother, Isaac Steed Jeffs, both 32, Staretz said. They were being interviewed by the FBI in Las Vegas but were not arrested.

Isaac Jeffs was driving a red Cadillac Escalade that was stopped for having no visible registration, said state Trooper Kevin Honea. An FBI agent was summoned to confirm Jeffs’ identity, Honea said.

Warren Jeffs was in federal custody in Las Vegas awaiting a court hearing on a federal charge of unlawful flight to avoid prosecution, Staretz said.

FBI officials said at a press conference Tuesday that Jeffs was found with $54,000 in cash, numerous gift cards worth an additional $10,000, 15 cell phones, four portable radios, four laptop computers, a global positioining system device, a police scanner, several pairs of sunglasses and three wigs.

‘Beginning of the end’
Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard told KTAR-AM of Phoenix that Jeffs’ arrest is “the beginning of the end of ... the tyrannical rule of a small group of people over the practically 10,000 followers of the FLDS sect.” He predicted that it will inspire more people to come forward with allegations of sexual abuse.

Most of the church’s members live in Hildale, Utah, and nearby Colorado City, Ariz.


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Jeffs was indicted in June 2005 on an Arizona charge of arranging a marriage between a 16-year-old girl and a married man, and unlawful flight to avoid prosecution. He is charged in Utah with two felony counts of rape as an accomplice, for allegedly arranging the marriage of a teenage girl to an older man in Nevada.

The FLDS Church split from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints when the mainstream Mormon Church disavowed plural marriage more than 100 years ago.

Allegations from within church
Jeffs has been called a religious zealot and dangerous extremist by those familiar with his church.

During his four-year rule, the number of underage marriages — some involving girls as young as 13 — escalated into the hundreds, church dissidents said. They said that although the sect has long practiced the custom of arranged marriages, young girls were rarely married off until Warren Jeffs came to power.

People expelled from the community said young men were sent away to avoid competition for brides. Older men were cast out for alleged disobedience, and their wives and children were reassigned by Jeffs to new husbands and fathers, the former members said.

“If this will bring an end to that, that will be a good thing,” said Ward Jeffs, an older half brother of Warren. “We’re excited for the people down there, but we’re very concerned about who might step up and take the leadership role.”

It remained unclear Tuesday what would happen to the leadership of the church while Jeffs was incarcerated.

Federal and state law enforcement agencies will determine whether Jeffs should be extradited first to Utah or Arizona, said Steve Sorenson, a federal prosecutor in Salt Lake City. Utah’s charges are more serious, and the federal unlawful flight charge was for leaving Utah, which could influence the decision, Sorenson said.

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