I have no problem with people who choose to live in polygamous families, as long as the people who are married are of legal age. While I might not agree with the lifestyle, nor do I want to participate in it, if there are no minor children becoming either husbands or wives, I think it is their business. When I was growing up in Draper I knew 2 families or groups of polygamists. One man was married to 3 sisters, and they were a happy, loving family. Eventually they moved, and I don't know what has become of them. Another group had a "compound" of sorts in the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon. I don't remember their names now, but I went to school with the kids. It was no big deal to us back then. The problems come when underage children are involved, and that is wrong in any setting, polygamy or not.

Wow! And who said Utah and Arizona weren't being pro-active and assertive with polygamy. Texas has been very cavelier with their approach to Eldorado citizens. Can't help wondering if the state of Texas is the bumble bee that stung o'l Ferdinand the Bull. It's great to see such measured responses from educated decisive people within polygamy. An end just might be in sight of the days when stereotyping polygamist was the norm, and rendering them the reputation of reprobates and pedophiles. Looks like an end just might be in sight for underage marriages.

And this is the way it should be. But you know the stereotype about Texas, everything has to be bigger there.

What a shame! only mainstream religions have religious freedom...What has happened to America? If Texas Law takes place in Utah then mainstream LDS you might be next...want to lose your children? What a shame America

Why does UT feel it has to play nice with criminals? If they break the law, arrest them. So far as I know, sex with underaged girls is still a crime in every state. Kudos to Texas for doing the right thing.

I feel empathy for these polygamist families in Texas and elsewhere. I think the LDS church ought to be involved in helping these people and their children, not just Texas, Utah or Arizona public officials. Were it not for polygamy having been started by Joseph Smith and broadened by Brigham Young and succeeding church presidents and leaders, these people would not be following this practice.

"Here they are, singling us out. They've got a whole community under house arrest, ripped out of their homes."

When you folks move to Texas and start having sex with 12 year olds, we'll do it to you, too.

why are there polygamous communities? isn't that against the law?

"house arrest"? I thought they were free to leave anytime.

If the 16-year-old comes forward now, she will be the ultimate villain for all these people she has grown up with -- family, friends, peers, leaders. It would have been difficult for her to come forward even if it had been just a handful of people who were rounded up. It would have been difficult even if she was the only one retrieved from the compound. Threats of retribution in an already hellish situation, would send shivers down the spine of even the most resilient and determined.

Given the compound's leader, Merrill Jessop's record (see Carolyn Jessop's account in her NY Times bestselling book, "Escape"), it is highly probable that nearly the entire compound of children (and women) were victims of serious abuse of one kind or another, including:
- awoken at late hours of night for "family prayer" and a tirade
- physical abuse: beatings, bruises
- emotional abuse
- medical neglect
- nutritional neglect.

However, a key principle of freedom is the due process of law. No one should have been taken without significant evidence or testimony. Lumping them all together, given the circumstances, would have been an easy leap.

One of our servers is down, which has slowed access to the site. In order to improve access to our Web site we will not be posting comments for the next couple of hours.

Utah government has always been softies about polygamy - why? I am from Utah and I love Utah, but why do they not take a stand on this issue? I know that most Utahns are against polygamy, but why do we soft step these issues? It is not just their business. Anyone who has looked into recent polygamist backgrounds has discovered that their has been incest, abuse and tyranny. Christ stood up against those who were in the wrong. He didn't act as if it didn't affect anyone. We are giving the wrong impression to the rest of the world by soft stepping this issue. They actually think that we are in league with the polygamists, which isn't true in any way. But it is our own fault for letting it appear this way. "Evil prevails when good men do nothing"

Interesting, if I read the article correctly the Utah Attorney General has said, we will ignore certain laws and enforce others. And he sees no problem with this? Send him to Texas for an education. Go DPS and CPS.

kimmie: the women are free to leave. Only two people were arrested for interferring with the DPS. The children are wards of the state at present. Deal with it.

"Safety Net for Polygamists" indeed. Somebodies fuzzy thinking came up with that one.

This is the first time in the 25 years I have lived in Utah, that I have been ashamed of my adopted state. It was horrifying to hear that Mark Shurtliff was ready to serve warrents on the FLDS community, but then stopped the process, allowing them time to move. How can so many people rationalize Utah's "benign neglect" by calling it building bridges? Innocent CHILDREN are involved.

It has been patently obvious for years, that adolescent girls are routinely married and impregnated by middle-aged men. Utah has abetted the repulsive practices of the FLDS community by labeling it's lack of action with pretty phrases touting religious freedom.

Every person who knew about these abhorrant practices and who had the power to stop even one case of this child abuse, but chose not to do so, is culpable. Shame on Mark Shurtliff and shame on any one of us who doesn't face the facts.

How is what's going on it Texas testing Utah's safety net for polygamists?

We talk like we've built this network of "Trust" with them, but what do we do when we get information from them? Split up their families, make anyone they rat on public enemy #1, arrest them and imprisson them?

Now that's going to enocourage trust and get the polygamist community to be more OPEN with Utah authorities.

To Utah's attorney general,
Why not prosecute polygamy, is it not against the law? If you are not going to uphold the laws then abolish them. Picking and choosing what you want to enforce, and when you want to enforce it is ridiculous.

If it is against the law, it is against the law (so enforce it). If you feel that the law is innapropriate, then find a way to eliminate it. It is that simple.

Just because someone wrote a book about it.. does not mean its true.

Thats like saying... OJ must have been a murderer because he wrote a book.

Or, like saying, just because its printed in the DN or SLTRIB it must be true.

Well... your choice.

But in fact. Just because someone says its so, does not make it so.

Utah and Arizona have been turning a blind eye to sexual abuse of minors for years. Taking a timid approach, trying to gain the trust of people who are commiting crimes as a way of life means assuring them that you won't enforce the law. A few convictions don't automatically protect the thousands of women and children by these abuses.

Perhaps those in Utah who were hoping that over the years they might build a bond with the polygamist communities should consider the children whose lives are being scarred at this very moment. Do they matter?

Tell the parents you are wooing that if they want to avoid a raid like in Texas, don't break the law. Give them legal and parenting seminars. If they don't want to do the time, then they shouldn't do the crime!

We can't afford to sacrifice today's kids in hopes that those who abuse them will have a change in heart because they trust outsiders.

I'm not saying that all polygamists sexually or wphysically abused children. But, for those that do, they should not have special protection as they do now.

Is there anyone out there who knows what percentage of Utah's polygamists are suspected of child abuse and underage marriage? Do the Kingstons and the FLDS represent the majority of polygamists?

I realize that polygamy is outlawed in Utah. For the state legislature to undue that 100-plus year law would be suicide. So the law will stay on the books. The answer, you say, arrest all the polygamists.

How do we legally distinguish a polygamist from an adulterer? If a man is having sex with several women at the same time, is he a polygamist? Do we only target men who call their additional partners their wives?

Are we going to take more money out of public education to pay for all of the additional investigators and attorneys it would take to prosecute all of the polygamists?

Wake up to reality! The AG's approach of using his limited resources to go after the worst offenders was the best solution at hand. Texas is going to find itself having spent a boat load of money with limited, if not disastrous, results.

These folks break the laws against polygamy and flaunt it and they expect the AGs to EARN THEIR TRUST?

Of course they have reason to be brash, Shurtleff has promised not to prosecute polygamists.

We don't want to violate the delicate trusts of lawbreaking polygamist.

We dare not expel or prosecute illegal aliens.

Gentle readers, if you are actually obeying any laws in Utah you are a chump. No one else is.

It is criminally negligent (and idiotic) to ignore illegal polygamy and only deal with (inevitable) abuse and fraud in produces. It is an illegal fraudulent lifestyle to begin with. It is not a matter of if the child victims will suffer but only when and how much.

But fear not!
Shurtleff stands ready to pick up the (inevitable) human wreckage!

Bring us your abused children, your battered wives, your pregnant child brides, your welfare fraud (and don't forget to send the taxpayers the bill for treating your inbred mutants)!

But don't dare expect prosecution of the king-pin polygamy bosses. That's bad for trust!

One wonders just how the AG decides what crimes he will prosecute.

Hey Richard, if they take the money from public education funds or where ever, they will maybe one day free up millions of dollars of public welfare. And I am not a great fan of public education, it was a real waste of my daughters time, they don't know how to deal with the gifted, or don't want to.

People who are either members of or associate with to some degree with the FLDS church who practice polygamy,who are involved in civil crimes involving minor children.For what reason did they raid this compound in Texas. Was it religion?polygamy?or the crime against children? I think people want to confuse this thing and make it into something its not.

Why do they have this "committee" to "build bridges" with polygamists, and not with other lawbreakers--burglars, for instance?

A lot of comments about polygamy being illegal on here.
Isn't homosexuality illegal? Aren't homosexual acts illegal?
My point is why are people centered on the illegality of just polygamy?
In the latest news the men have offered to leave the compound if the authorities will allow the women and children to return home.
Incidently I see many "Poly" husbands and their wives look about the same age.

Wow, The gall of these people never ceases to amaze me, they're indignant because they are being "singled out"? I'm new to the whole subject but it seems to me anyone who justifies the kinds of behaviors these people practice i.e. "bleeding the beast" by taking OUR hard earned taxes to fund their lifestyle, marrying off their own children, etc. all for the sake of some "prophecies" that seem to be way more self serving than divine...then they get MAD because the same gov't that has been feeding them, FINALLY gets sick off all the illegal activities going on, gets enough evidence and stops it????? Yeah I guess I'd be mad too, I mean NOW who's gonna feed 'em????? It's Disgusting.

I have a son that was left over night in a hospital at the age of 2 at the recommendation of the Doctor who also ordered that he not be picked up when he cried. (Looking for a possible concussion.) Our son suffered physiological damage from that one night when we followed the Doctors instructions. I fear for these children.
It is pointed out that the mothers can leave, but not mentioned that if they do, they can't return. No mother is going to leave their kids to cry in fear. Regardless of how you feel about the FLDS, this is wrong. You don't punish the children, and tear their mothers away from them. If you don't have children, you may not understand
- LDS, High Priest, 11 children

Homosexuality is NOT illegal. Sorry, but this isn't the Middle East.
Polygamy is against FEDERAL law. No ifs, ands or buts about it.
Young males are put out of the communities because they are seen as a threat to the older men who wish to keep the male/female ration just right for them to continue marrying off 14 and 15 year old girls to each other.
And the women of these communities do nothing about it because they've been indoctrinated to believe that that's the way it should be.
So you have breaking of federal polygamy laws, child endagerment, child abandonment (Average age of the polygamist "lost boys" is 12 to 14) sexual contact with a child, and so on....
Still say that they're not breaking the law, folks?

Polygamy shouldn't be illegal. C'mon who really cares if a bunch of people want to shack up together? Big deal. If they rape and abuse and commit fraud, then get them for that. That's what Shurtleff has been doing so cut the guy some slack. And wave to your gay neighbor, too.

There is too much of a good ole boys club in Utah and Arizona among the LDS and FLDS.

I have LDS in my family history, and I worked with LDS in an Idaho county courthouse. I saw a much higher incidence of corruption in both cases, including incest, child sexual abuse, disregard for the law in home exemptions and other issues, and employment law violations.

What seemed important was helping your close associates get as much as possible despite the law. This sounds like the FLDS, and perhaps this explains all the LDS sympathy.

"They assured us over and over and over, 'We're not interested in prosecuting polygamy. We're only going to go after crimes in a community,'" said Heidi Mattingly, a polygamous wife in the Kingston clan.

What right does a Utah authority, such as our attorney general, have to say that he will not protect the Utah Constitution or enforce laws duly adopted by the Utah Legislature? I think we should recall Shurtleff. We need an attorney general who will live up to his vows.

It seems to me that the the crimes and polygamy itself seem to go hand in hand, history seems to repeat itself over and over again. Yet people talk as if they were two separate things.

maybe Texas can bring this reality. what about all the labeled sex offenders who have done less than the protected sex offenders in these sects. besides the fact that this is going to hurt all religious freedoms and if Utah and Arizona wont do something it may hurt states rights as the cry of the country will call for justice one way or another. I have an idea lets just repeal Utah a state since Utah could not become a state without ending polygamy in the first place.
the Utah founding fathers would be proud, of the flds that is.