Polygamists: Authorities Prepare For the Worst in Texas

The court ruled that they used more than "legal avenues".

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They perhaps made mistakes. That does not address the possibility of real abuse, which they claim to have seen real evidence of (nobody posting here has seen everything the law agents have seen).

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"They" have lost quite a bit of credibility. They have been "mistaken" and caught exaggerating several times.

This search for abuse (including the search for the ever shrinking number of pregnant underage girls) to justify this wrong-headed invasion is very reminiscent of the search for WMDs.

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this just a "look at what moral crusading people we are" posturing on behalf of law enforcement.... these people could give a rat's ass less about the well being of any man women or child in this compound.... they're waving their peckers of righteousness.... that's all....

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Everybody's got a pecker in this pissing contest.

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edgarblythe wrote:

You may call me bigoted or anything you like.

I didn't call you bigoted. I called a demand of yours bigoted. There's a difference between arguing against a person and arguing against a statement.

Quote:

I wrote as a concerned citizen, not a legal opinion. When the law says they have good evidence of abuse, I want to see it played out, until all legal avenues have been exhausted. I want to rest easy that the children have been protected if they need it.

But that's not what the law said in this case. The law, as spoken by the court, said the police claimed to have good evidence when in fact they didn't. What do you want to see happen when the police doesn't have good evidence, and greatly oversells whatever bad evidence it has?

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wandeljw wrote:

Did edgar actually make an "unjust and bigoted demand"? The child abuse allegations have not been conclusively resolved yet. Neither "unjust" "bigoted" nor "demand" applies to what edgar said.

It is true that not all of the allegations have been conclusively resolved yet. Another question that hasn't been conclusively resolved yet is whether you are a child molester. Or I. Or Edgar. Or e_brown. There are countless questions of criminal law that haven't been resolved yet. And the way the rule of law works, the presumptive answer to all these questions is that the accused are innocent until proven guilty.

Contrast this with what Edgar said: "Until it is shown conclusively that the allegations of child abuse are wrong, I will not feel any justice has been served here." My reading of this sentence is that he presumes the fundamentalist Mormons guilty of child abuse until they prove themselves innocent of it. I believe this reading is correct: Edgar has since disagreed with parts of my post, but my reading of his original statement was not among them.

Presuming people guilty until proven innocent negates one of the most fundamental principles in the rule of law, not to mention 2000 years of good jurisprudence built on it. So my answer to your question, WandelJW, is yes. Yes, Edgar has made a bigoted and unjust demand.

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wandeljw wrote:

She points out that the appeals court incorrectly reasoned that "it is not sexual assault to have consensual intercourse with a minor spouse to whom one is legally married" and that Texas law "allows minor to marry -- as young as age 16 with parental consent and younger than 16 if pursuant to court order." Polygamy is illegal. Polygamists are therefore not legally married. Consequently, it would still be still be statutory rape.

As the court's decision mentions elsewhere, the marital status of the minors is unclear. So for all the state of Texas knows, it isn't clear which, if any, sex partners of underage girls had other wives. And for all the state of Texas knows, men could have avoided the charge of polygamy by legally divorcing their wives once they reached the age of consent. The police didn't provide evidence that they didn't. All they provided were broad-brush assertions based on the fundamentalist Mormon belief system.

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Quote:

As the court's decision mentions elsewhere, the marital status of the minors is unclear. So for all the state of Texas knows, it isn't clear which, if any, sex partners of underage girls had other wives. And for all the state of Texas knows, men could have avoided the charge of polygamy by legally divorcing their wives once they reached the age of consent. The police didn't provide evidence that they didn't. All they provided were broad-brush assertions based on the fundamentalist Mormon belief system.

There is no dispute on what has taken place. The individuals consider themselves to married, documents were signed, a ceremony was held, but no licence was obtained from any government agency. The state says that they are not married, the citizens say that they are, this is the dispute.

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hawkeye10 wrote:

Quote:
As the court's decision mentions elsewhere, the marital status of the minors is unclear. So for all the state of Texas knows, it isn't clear which, if any, sex partners of underage girls had other wives. And for all the state of Texas knows, men could have avoided the charge of polygamy by legally divorcing their wives once they reached the age of consent. The police didn't provide evidence that they didn't. All they provided were broad-brush assertions based on the fundamentalist Mormon belief system.

There is no dispute on what has taken place. The individuals consider themselves to married, documents were signed, a ceremony was held, but no licence was obtained from any government agency. The state says that they are not married, the citizens say that they are, this is the dispute.

I'm not sure what you're saying when you claim there is NO dispute over the dispute.

For instance, I live in the same community as my neighbors. If my neighbor's teenage daughter, legally married or otherwise, becomes pregnant, does the State then have the legal authority to step in and take emergency custody of my infant child? of every single child in my community? Wouldn't we all be appalled if State authorities suddenly appeared, rounded up all of the children in our community, herded them into buses, and shipped them to distant housing facilities all over the State?

THAT is the issue (dispute) in the Texas case, and the Texas Court of Appeals ruled that the State does NOT have the legal authority to take emergency custody of ALL the children in the entire community based on a generalized fear that some children in the community might be in physical danger someday in the distant future.

In the United States of America, all residents (even Texas residents) have a constitutionally-secured right to DUE PROCESS pursuant to the Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Accordingly, if the State has grounds to believe that a parent is abusing his/her child, and the individual child at issue is NOT in imminent physical danger, then the parent is procedurally entitled to NOTICE of the grounds/evidence that the State is relying on to substantiate the allegation of abuse and an OPPORTUNITY to be heard in a court of law and to REQUIRE the State to PROVE its allegation by clear and convincing evidence BEFORE the State has any legal authority to take any action whatsoever. Additionally, even when the STATE proves an allegation of abuse by clear and convincing evidence, removal of a child from parental custody is the LAST resort--not the FIRST resort.

By removing ALL the children from the entire community en masse before any allegation concerning any particular child was litigated on an individualized basis, the parents of those children were deprived of DUE PROCESS.

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By removing ALL the children from the entire community en masse before any allegation concerning any particular child was litigated on an individualized basis, the parents of those children were deprived of DUE PROCESS.

This I have to agree with. But, the heart of the dispute may not be resolved in the ongoing process. They may have to start over.

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Let's say an 18-year-old mother of a newborn infant claims that her sexual relations with the infant's father was consensual, that she is happy with her lifestyle and living in a religious community that hold views that the rest of us may not like, and she proclaims that having and mothering child is a blessing of the highest calling. Just because the State alleges that the young mother might raise her child to hold the same views,
does that constitute grounds to remove her newborn infant from her care, custody, and control and to place that child into the State's foster care system?

I don't belong to her church, but I also believe that having a child was one of the most wonderful things that I ever did with my life--but I'm not being "persecuted" or threatened by the State because of my belief.

Where do we draw the line? I find the views of racists (e.g., white supremists) and homophobes to be morally repugnant. I believe their children are in "danger" of being raised to hold those same morally repugnant views. Should the State step in and remove their children from their homes too in order to remove the danger that those children will become the racists and homophobes of the future?

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Because there has to be a line drawn, the 18 year old mother should be able to make her own decisions. (I have not written here out of a desire to punish polygamy. I couldn't care less what consenting adults do). But, underage girls are a different matter to me. I would like to be certain they are not being abused.

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http://blogs.chron.com/nickanderson/archives/and052508color.jpg

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edgarblythe wrote:

Because there has to be a line drawn, the 18 year old mother should be able to make her own decisions. (I have not written here out of a desire to punish polygamy. I couldn't care less what consenting adults do). But, underage girls are a different matter to me. I would like to be certain they are not being abused.

I understand. Any person who is guilty of rape ought to be prosecuted. Any parent who allows their child to be raped ought to be prosecuted.

But, does the State have legal authority to take these people's children away from them NOW because of a generalized fear that these people might raise their children to be FUTURE perpetrators and victims of crime? Mere conjecture is not proof by clear and convincing evidence. Based on mere conjecture concerning the possibility of future harm, the State is attempting to use its vast power to deprive parents of their children and to deprive children of their parents.

"The Department's lead investigator was of the opinion that due to the 'pervasive belief system' of the FLDS, the male children are groomed to be perpetrators of sexual abuse and the girls are raised to be victims of sexual abuse." Thus, the State is alleging that it has the authority to remove ALL of these children from their parents' care, custody, and control, in order to protect them from possible harm that might happen sometime in the future due to their parents' "pervasive belief system." However, the State failed to establish that all of these people shared the alleged "pervasive belief system." The Court of Appeals noted, "The Department's witnesses conceded that there are differences of opinion among the FLDS community as to what is an appropriate age to marry, how many spouses to have, and when to start having children--much as there are differences of opinion regarding the details of religious doctrine among other religious groups."

This is a WITCH HUNT, pure and simple, and these people are being persecuted.

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I'm thrilled to see you, Debra. Even though you deny me the pleasure of arguing with you by expressing my thoughts exactly.

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Hi Thomas! Nice to see you too. Smile

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Debra Law wrote:

Let's say an 18-year-old mother of a newborn infant claims that her sexual relations with the infant's father was consensual, that she is happy with her lifestyle and living in a religious community that hold views that the rest of us may not like, and she proclaims that having and mothering child is a blessing of the highest calling. Just because the State alleges that the young mother might raise her child to hold the same views,
does that constitute grounds to remove her newborn infant from her care, custody, and control and to place that child into the State's foster care system?

I don't belong to her church, but I also believe that having a child was one of the most wonderful things that I ever did with my life--but I'm not being "persecuted" or threatened by the State because of my belief.

Where do we draw the line? I find the views of racists (e.g., white supremists) and homophobes to be morally repugnant. I believe their children are in "danger" of being raised to hold those same morally repugnant views. Should the State step in and remove their children from their homes too in order to remove the danger that those children will become the racists and homophobes of the future?

Huh?

Isn't 18 above the legal age of consent and majority in the US?

Who is talking about 18 year olds?

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Debra,

Is "clear and convincing evidence" the appropriate standard for child protection cases? Specifically, wouldn't the Texas Family Code have a less strict standard for the state to step in when children may be in danger?

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dlowan wrote:

Debra Law wrote:
Let's say an 18-year-old mother of a newborn infant claims that her sexual relations with the infant's father was consensual, that she is happy with her lifestyle and living in a religious community that hold views that the rest of us may not like, and she proclaims that having and mothering child is a blessing of the highest calling. Just because the State alleges that the young mother might raise her child to hold the same views,
does that constitute grounds to remove her newborn infant from her care, custody, and control and to place that child into the State's foster care system?

I don't belong to her church, but I also believe that having a child was one of the most wonderful things that I ever did with my life--but I'm not being "persecuted" or threatened by the State because of my belief.

Where do we draw the line? I find the views of racists (e.g., white supremists) and homophobes to be morally repugnant. I believe their children are in "danger" of being raised to hold those same morally repugnant views. Should the State step in and remove their children from their homes too in order to remove the danger that those children will become the racists and homophobes of the future?

Huh?

Isn't 18 above the legal age of consent and majority in the US?

Who is talking about 18 year olds?

I was talking about the young woman's newborn baby, as an example. Does the State have the legal authority to take her infant into emergency State custody based on a generalized fear of what the future may hold for this infant if raised in a FLDS community that embraces a polygamous lifestyle?

Based on accounts discussed on the Larry King Live Show, the State took a 23-year-old pregnant mother and her two children, aged 2 and 3, into State custody. They held the 23-year-old pregnant mother as a "minor" until she gave birth, and then they took her baby from her. After the State got her newborn baby, then the State acknowledged that she was not a minor and released HER from custody, but not her kids. Why was it necessary for the State to take her children away from her?

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Polygamists: Authorities Prepare For the Worst in Texas

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