Hearings, More Moms are Adults, & Guardian Alternatives

FLDS Hearings: Update from courtroom E
http://ac360.blogs.cnn.com/2008/05/20/flds-hearings-update-from-courtroom-e/

Excerpt

From a pool reporter inside the courtroom
2 cases so far:

Case #12 ½ year old girl

Case #215 year old boy
The father in this case is believed to be in charge of YFZ ranch while Warren Jeffs was in jail.


FLDS hearings: Texas' case weakens as moms turn out adults
http://www.sltrib.com/news/ci_9330822

Excerpt

SAN ANGELO, Texas - An underpinning of the state's case for taking hundreds of FLDS children into custody continued to weaken Tuesday as officials acknowledged four more women whose ages were disputed are adults - including one who is 27.

Still to come: The state was prepared to admit one additional mother was an adult, but her hearing was postponed. Four women had been deemed adults before Tuesday; other women's hearings have yet to come up in court.

The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services has maintained a "pervasive pattern" of underage marriages justified removing all children from the YFZ Ranch and their parents, members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

It specifically claimed that 31 girls between the ages of 14 and 17 were pregnant, mothers or both - a tally that originally included 26 women whose ages were in dispute.

One case that supports the state's claim was postponed Tuesday: that of 17-year-old Suzanne Johnson, who is eight months pregnant and has a 16-month-old child.

But now, 17 women are left in the disputed-age group, and one attorney expressed outrage Tuesday about the state's tactics in dealing with the mothers.

I dunno, I don't get it. If the women turned out to be over 18 but still has a child who definitely was born when she was under 18, isn't that the same difference? They were still a child bride upon "marriage" and still was a victim of statutory rape, right?


Relatives outside sect seek custody in Texas case
http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5iIdMpRHjN4hpNKBhfYyAsR4DDo4QD90PU9G00

Excerpt

On Tuesday, two men excommunicated by the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, which runs the ranch where about 460 children now in foster care once lived, offered to serve as guardians for their children if the state deems their mothers unfit.