"Texas Rangers are investigating 20 cases of sexual assault and about 50 bigamy charges involving members of the FLDS Church, the Deseret News has learned.
Texas officials on Monday confirmed the number of open cases but would not say how many suspects were involved."
No one familiar with the facts of this case believe there are 50 "bigamous" FLDS men, as is evidenced by Rod Parker's "surprised" statement.
"Rod Parker, a Salt Lake attorney acting as spokesman for the Fundamentalist LDS Church, was surprised by the sheer number of sexual assault and bigamy cases.
And he insists there aren't enough men practicing plural marriage at the Yearning For Zion ranch outside Eldorado, Texas, to come up with 50 bigamy investigations.
"'I think they would have a problem coming up with 50 bigamy charges without charging the women,' Parker said."
Well, dummy, maybe you'd better wise up. THAT is what they're going to do. Smell the coffee.
"Even so, Parker believes Texas authorities will have a rough go at convicting a bigamy charge."
They're playing PERCENTAGES genius, they're also going back to the original playbook of impressing the press and impressing those who believe what they read in the press. If you charge 50 people with bigamy, it has to be true, right? Right?
You also silence the new cautious potential friends of the FLDS by scaring them into believing they defend those who are indefensible. You also tie up the resources of the FLDS by putting men and women in jail. You threaten to remove even more children by the predicted sequence of events THAT I GAVE YOU FORTY SEVEN DAYS ago. First, terminate the parental rights of the father. That isolates the mother as the only parent. Second, attack the mother's freedom with a criminal charge of some sort. Third, the parentless child is now a perfect target for state legal custody. Badda Bing, Badda Boom. Texas has what it came for. The genocidal destruction of the FLDS and their children. It just took longer.
The FLDS are not going to win this war by waiting for Texas to start being nice to them, they're not going to win this war with one battle. While they wait, Texas opens the war up again on several fronts and drains their attention and resources. In this intervening time between regaining custody of their kids and now, the FLDS should have opened lawsuits all over the west against as many respondents as possible and sued the living daylights out of all of them to tie them up, get their money (if possible) and get evidence into the record and discover evidence. They haven't done that. Now they pay.
I've hinted at it before and now I'm going to say it. They're going to lose my support. Not because I think they have suddenly gone from just to unjust or their cause from right to wrong, but because I cannot play the role of Dudley Do-Right to their perpetual and willing Nell Fenwick. If they're going to tie themselves to the railroad tracks and keep walking past Snidely Whiplash, I can't help. No one else can either. If it is their destiny in their minds to be Holy Martyrs, well then, they can have it. Fight or Die. It's been clearly laid out. It makes no difference to me at this point. If the FLDS Fight, then I will be there with them. If they choose to die, I will not.
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16 comments:
Well, I understand how you feel. But the Christians didn't fight back either in Rome, when they were tossed to the Lions with or without their children. And the Christians are still around today. If the Fundamentalist Mormons are a true religion, they will get through this and prosper. Even if their numbers in Texas are decimated. Some of them will survive.
The Christians in Rome were tossed to the Lions by an absolute monarch who had the power to do so. I daresay a large number of those Christians were not Roman citizens.
To expand a little bit on the above remark, the Apostle Paul, who is in FLDS scriptures in the book of acts, FOUGHT BACK within the legal power granted to him as a Roman Citizen. The FLDS is not.
The IDEA that I would fight while they stand around beatificly looking upwards to the heavens as some sort of appointed guard dog for them doesn't sit well with me at all.
They should get up off their rears and do what is necessary and what is right within the law to defend themselves. I'll be with them the whole way while I draw breath, if I can. If they don't get up off their dead behinds to defend themselves then they can get run over by the train.
Also the idea that they go to the Lions passively is already defeated by the evidence of their own fight to initially regain custody of the children. They've crossed the rubicon. Get on with it. Fight, Or DIE. I really don't have any advice beyond that. Choose one and I'll live with it.
Filing suits against everybody has a few hurdles. The only things it will create in the first 6-12 months is a method for the FLDS to tell their side in the actual complaint filed (it is public information), and the defendants would file motions for summary judgment.
A year from now, or maybe even later, the depositions and discovery could begin.
If successful, a $ettlement would not come for years.
Many cases today are fought on two fronts; in the court and in the public's eyes. It is common for parties to hire public relations firms that solely attend to court cases. This fights the case in the media (public's eyes).
What the strategy is for the actual cases within the courtroom none of us have the answer to. We can produce theories that may be close, but we must also admit we are NOT experienced attorneys that handle these types of cases daily.
Much of what the state's strategy would or could be is obvious. It is apparent many of us are in agreement that we'd hope to see the defense strategy include a battle in the publics eyes, or at least hope there is a strategy for a battle in the courtrooms that ALL or most of the attorneys involved have agreed upon.
We also need to remember that most ALL of us anticipated every suit or criminal case handled at the district courts level in Texas would be full of sound reasons for appeal. I do not recall any guessing there would be closure to cases at the district court level.
With that in mind, we are totally out of the loop on what the defense strategy is to secure process for any appeals needed.
Suggestions on what to anticipate are read and considered (and appreciated) by the "ranch". I am certain the attorneys will answer any questions the "ranch" has that any of OUR suggestions bring up, and I am certain those same attorneys will NOT be charging that "ranch" $250-750 / hour to call all of us to discuss legal strategies.
Don't take any of this as an insult, as we are ALL in the same boat here!
What we are left with is discussion amongst us, possibly persuasion of what some in the media print and our MERE suggestions the "ranch" can consider if they have not done so already.
They're not doing enough. They're being far too passive. The longer it takes, the sooner it should start.
Right now Texas is sitting on evidence that may turn out to help the FLDS. Rozita Swinton's phone records for instance. Who did she call leading up to the hoax tip? Who called her? Who did she email? Who emailed her?
I am extremely uncomfortable with the contact between her and Flora Jessop and the fact that of the four states conspiring against the FLDS, two of the three that received similar calls from her REFUSED to prosecute Rozita Swinton and those same states didn't think the tips she gave were credible. Somehow TEXAS thought they were credible.
All of these questions and more may have terribly mundane and useless answers, but I'm telling you, Texas is acting like there is something worth hiding. At least put them on the defensive, put them in positions to have to recuse themselves, make sure they preserve necessary evidence and so on. Elissa Wall is desperately grasping already at the bishop's record and those trying to bust the FLDS trust are trying already to get ahold of evidence seized in the raid as well.
The FLDS?
They're doing NOTHING.
Not so sir. We are doing all we can. This is a conspiracy to the top of the nation for complete genocide. Only the Lord can deliver us now, and you will live to see it. Our God will deliver us, and no one else. Every knee shall bow, and every tongue confess "Great is our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ."
The LORD delivers all, none can stand unless he ordains it, none can fail if his hand is with them.
Nevertheless, David went out boldly to meet the Philistine. Gideon attacked in faith with 300 men.
What I see is your enemies attacking you on every side and you stay in your camp. Go out, meet them. If the LORD is on your side, you will be saved.
We both want pretty much the same thing here, but...
Rozita's records are subject to discovery in the CRIMNAL cases (or later in federal civil cases), but not the custody suits. They would not alter anything in the custody suits that I have seen.
Remember, walther gave CPS an order for investigation on top of that questionable SW.
Rod Parker notified Texas that they must preserve all evidence for a civil complaint on April 28th. Short of filing an actual complaint, getting past the motions for summary judgment that absolutely will follow, and finally getting to discovery a year+ later, that is close to the limit of what can be done (other than moves for public relations).
Those public moves MIGHT help them on the political end, but they also may create a problem or two for some unknown strategy they have for the actual litigation.
Rozita could be sued for damages. I've mentioned this before. It should be shown that there is plenty of evidence to name her the caller and that Texas is dragging it's feet on prosecuting her when they full well know it is her.
It would also head her off from making any money off a future book deal. It might lead to discovery of interesting connections. You never know until you try.
At first though, the widest possible conception of a conspiracy should be used to name as many people in that suit as possible and on a more immediate basis, embarass Texas for not pursuing Rozita sooner.
There's a lot we don't know, and no one is trying to find out.
Hugh, I'm sympathetic with your feelings, and I know it' frustrating. It's even more frustrating from our perspective when everything you believe in is being trampled by government in every direction. They have a bottomless pit of money and resources to pull from including the media which sways public opinion! However when you are facing a grissly bear in the woods the best thing you can do is PLAY DEAD, and hopefully your friends won't forsake you just because you didn't couragesly stand up and fight with it. My personal feeling is that this is part of a larger fight between good and evil. I'm not trying to say that if your not FLDS then you're not good. I am saying that if you stop the fight for good then which side are you going to fight for, evil? In the fight for "right" there are no neutrals. Don't be swayed from the "good fight". Keep up the good work and we'll win, and thank you for the good that you do!!
It is frustrating to see rights being violated and nothing being done about it. If I had millions of bucks like Fischer, I would be spending that money in the opposite direction, funding lawsuits against him, Rozita, Flora, Voss, Doran, Mankin, Hildebrand, Malonis, Carolyn, and anyone else who had a hand in this wide "destroy the FLDS to save them" conspiracy.
My guess is the FLDS don't have the money to fund the lawsuits. Still if I was them I would liquidate that YFZ ranch and spend it all on lawyers. They'll lose it in the end anyways, if they do nothing.
On top of that, there are at least a dozen viable lawsuits against CPS itself right this minute. 32 children's cases were closed because of no evidence, but that's after they were torn from their parents and forced to undergo countless medical exams and interrogations for two months. Those dozen families could be suing for millions right this very minute, if they got off their butts.
A family in California just sued a CPS worker and won for forcing her to pull her toddler's pants down for the CPS worker. And there are other similar precedents around the country. Imagine what the FLDS parents could get for losing their parental rights for no reason for two whole months. FLDS could be getting some sweet vengeance for all of us now.
So, even after the Grizzly has mauled you, and continues to maul you, what you want is someone to come chase the Grizzly off without doing anything?
Texas civil practice has long had a procedure, now located in the Texas Rules of Civil Procedure, originally known as a "bill of discovery." This a kind of lawsuit designed to discover whether there are grounds to file a lawsuit for damages against individuals who may not be known at the time the bill of discovery is filed.
Generally, one files the bill of discovery, and within that proceeding, can take depositions. That means a person filing, either as an adult or on behalf of one of the children, could depose some of the anti-FLDS propagandists in an attempt to discover if they have knowledge of where Rozita is located, whether they had contacts or conversations with her prior to or just after the hoax call, the nature and substance of those conversations or contacts, whether they know of others who had conversations with her, etc.
The basis for the bill of discovery would be to discover the person or persons responsible for the hoax call which resulted in the children and their parents being forcibly separated without, as the Third Court of Appeals and the Texas Supreme Court noted, any evidence to support that action.
If such person or persons responsible for the hoax (illegal report of child abuse) can be identified, they can be sued.
Now. Within two or three months, at most. Not after the criminal trials have run their course. Not after all the custody cases have been litigated and appealed.
Now.
Doran G. Williams
What you said.
An experienced mind at work!
Should we start a petition that goes to Willie?
When Ben Franklin sued for libel, he sued for one cent, and won.
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