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POLYGAMY UNDER ATTACK – FROM TOM GREEN TO BRIAN DAVID MITCHELL
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Chapter Two Excerpts
To gain a better understanding of the Mormon
fundamentalist subculture, the following is a brief history of the dominate,
organized polygamist groups:
Chapter Two Excerpts
An Overview of the Mormon Fundamentalist Groups
Corporation of the President of the Fundamentalist Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (FLDS)
Utah Department of Commerce transcript #149512, organized 2-6-91
Population: About 10 thousand
Priesthood leader: currently, Warren Jeffs
The Corp. of the President of the
Fundamentalist Church is colloquially known as FLDS and is the largest of Utah’s
polygamist groups. Members of the FLDS used to be scattered throughout Utah and
Arizona until 2001, when Warren Jeffs instructed the faithful to sell out and
move to Colorado City, Arizona.
The FLDS routinely sends their young men on
two-year work missions. These boys are placed on jobs usually controlled by the
priesthood leaders of the group and their paychecks go to the priesthood. In
exchange the boys are promised a wife and a building lot on priesthood-owned
ground.
According to Rulon Jeffs, when young girls
reach marriageable age they are expected to present themselves to the priesthood
for placement as a wife in a family. All marriages are controlled by the
priesthood, neither the boy nor the girl has a choice. Reluctant girls have been
known to disappear and resurface years later with one or two children. Some
girls, like Flora Jessop, have been held prisoner in their bedrooms for weeks or
months on end until they consent.
Colorado City, Arizona, is located on Highway
389 near the Utah border. Hildale, Utah, on Highway 59 is the sister-city of
Colorado City. Both towns are incorporated and owned lock, stock, and barrel by
the United Effort Plan, a land trust controlled by a priesthood
hierarchy.
The United Effort Plan (UEP) was created with
good intentions but opponents say it has developed into a devilish legal
instrument with which to coerce and control members who have built on UEP
property. Members of the FLDS are invited to build homes on UEP property, at
their own expense. After the dwellings are completed, the UEP believed they
had the power to evict a member from his home without just cause and without
reimbursing him. A prolonged court battle resulted over the UEP’s ownership of
the land and its unfair use of power. (This type of legal instrument and the
power it gives leaders of a group is discussed more fully under Communities of
Apostolic United Brethren, CAUB, the land trust operated by the AUB.)
In 1984 a split occurred in the priesthood
hierarchy over the United Effort Plan, and LeRoy Johnson’s one man, tyrannical
rule.
The split resulted in a long, protracted
lawsuit filed in 1985 when LeRoy Johnson and Rulon Jeffs tried to evict families
from their property, who would not recognize their priesthood authority. The two
factions became known as Ward 1 and Ward 2. Ward 2 was the smaller faction.
The dissidents in Ward 2 moved south across
Arizona Highway 389 and began developing a new settlement named Centennial Park.
Ward 2 organized their own priesthood hierarchy under the leadership of Johnny
Timpson, and is now considered a group separate from the FLDS. They are referred
to as Ward 2 or the Centennial Park group.
In Ward 1, LeRoy died in 1986 leaving Rulon
Jeffs in charge. Rulon died in 2002 leaving his son Warren in charge.
Colorado City, Arizona, and Hildale, Utah, are
legally incorporated entities entitled to all the prestige, privileges, and
government grants as other cities of equal size. They have taken advantage of
government grants in improving their roads, developing their water supply, and
expanding their airport so the priesthood, corporate jet can land.
Learn more in the book. . .
Corporation of the Presiding Elder of
Apostolic United Brethren (AUB)
Utah Department of Commerce transcript # 149512, organized 3-14-75.
Population: Between 5000 and 7000
Registered Agent: Owen A. Allred
Location: Bluffdale, Utah, at the Jordan Narrows near Camp Williams.
The Corp. of the Presiding Elder of Apostolic
United Brethren, colloquially known as Apostolic United Brethren, or AUB, is the
second largest, organized polygamist group in Utah with between 5000 and 7000
members. The membership fluctuates as converts come and go like a revolving
door.
In August 1997, Virginia Hill filed a lawsuit
in the Second Judicial District Court, Juab County, Nephi, Utah, against AUB,
Owen A. Allred and others, accusing them of stealing 1.54 million dollars in
cash.
It is of interest that both the FLDS and AUB
have copied the LDS Church format for their corporations: Corporation of the
President of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The fundamentalist
are great copiers. Owen Allred, in his attempt to supplant the LDS Church, has
structured his organization identical to the LDS Church. After the LDS Church
opened the priesthood doors to the Black race, AUB converted a duplex into a
temple and now give their own version of the Temple Endowment. They are also
performing baptisms for the dead.
In observing new converts to AUB, I believe
that most men who enter the group have their own secret agenda: power, women,
adventure, intellectualism, unification, leadership, etc. Mormon Fundamentalism
provides access to all those passions or desires. Once entrenched in the AUB
society, it is quite common for these men to bear testimony that they
unequivocally believe that the principle of plural marriage is a divine
commandment and that the prophet (Owen Allred) holds the keys to the kingdom of
heaven. If these men are unable to satisfy their secret agendas, they leave.
This is one reason AUB has such a large turnover of converts.
I am convinced that ambitious converts use
testimony to ingratiate themselves with both leadership and the membership. The
more pious and submissive the convert appears, the more he is trusted by
leadership and women. Women in AUB are attracted by power, piety, quixotism, and
affluence.
AUB has the following enclaves
Pinesdale, Montana, is an incorporated city
located just north and west of Hamilton in the beautiful Bitter Root Valley.
Pinesdale boasts about 1000 inhabitants. Marvin Jessop and his brother Morris
are the priesthood leaders who preside over the town’s elected officials.
Pinesdale, like Colorado City and Hildale, has received government grants
towards the improvement of the town. And according to reliable informants inside
Pinesdale, like Colorado City, plural wives are sent into nearby Hamilton to
apply for welfare as single mothers. The informant reported that welfare checks
are often taken directly to the priesthood leaders.
Rocky Ridge, Utah, is an incorporated town in
Juab County located just south of the town of Santaquin on I-15. Rocky Ridge is
an easily recognized cluster of large, multifamily dwellings on the side of the
hill just west of the Freeway. About 300 habitants, counting women and children,
live at Rocky Ridge.
The Granite Ranch, a dairy farm, is another
enclave of AUB, located in the west desert of Snake Valley in Juab County near
the Nevada border. According to AUB’s accountant, about thirty cents of every
tithing dollar is funneled out to the Granite Ranch, amounting to approximately
$300,000 a year. About ten families live and work on the Granite. Glen Allred,
Owen’s favorite son, manages the ranch.
Pleasant Valley, Nevada, is a cluster of
ramshackle, mice-infested trailers on a sagebrush hill about fifteen miles
southwest of the Granite Ranch just inside the Nevada border. In 1997 there were
eight families living at Pleasant Valley.
Motoqua, Utah, is a ragtag rural community of
about ten families sequestered in a large ravine south of St. George, Utah.
Motoqua is located about five miles as the crow flies from the Desert Inn Ranch,
which also played a vital role in the Hill vs. Allred lawsuit.
Ozumba, Mexico, is the Mexican branch of AUB
with a population of about 700. Ozumba has its own temple and is visited by the
AUB council twice a year. Mexican nationalists, adherents to AUB, are smuggled
back and forth across the border on a regular bases.
There are about thirty polygamist families who
live approximately ten miles west of Cedar City, Utah.
AUB Subordinate Corporations
1. Red Cedar Corporation,
Utah Dept. of Commerce #126836. Date of Incorporation: 7-15-87. Registered
agent: Glen Allred.
Red Cedar Corporation is the legal owner of
the Granite Ranch. Owen Allred, Glen Allred, and J. LaMoine Jenson are the
officers of Red Cedar. Until 1994 when fellow investigator Rod Williams and I
discovered the existence of Red Cedar, the AUB membership was led to believe
that the Granite was owned directly by AUB. Members had been asked to pay double
tithes to help make payments on the Granite and to donate free labor. Young men
on work missions were often sent to labor on the ranch. These loyal members were
told they were helping to build the kingdom of God, but in reality it was a
kingdom for Owen and Glen Allred. . . .
Learn
more in the book. . .
LATTERDAY CHURCH OF CHRIST (THE KINGSTON COOP
GROUP)
The Latterday Church of Christ, transcript #175422, incorporated 12-27-77
Population: Approximately 1000
Registered Agent: Merlin B. Kingston.
The Latterday Church is the third largest and
most obscure and fanatically frugal of the Mormon Fundamentalist groups. It is
best known as the Kingston Clan, because the hierarchy consists exclusively of
Kingston progeny. At this writing, Merlin Kingston is the only surviving brother
of Charles Eldon Kingston, the original Kingston who separated from Joseph
Musser in 1935 and started up the economic, quasi-united order that is the
Kingston organization.
When Ortel Kingston died in 1987, Merlin was
pushed aside as leader by Ortel’s son Paul Kingston. Paul is reported to have at
least thirty-two wives and more than 200 children. Besides his duties as
spiritual leader and CEO of the Kingston conglomerate, he finds time to deliver
all his own infant children as well as many others in the group. According to
Paul there are about 1000 members in the Kingston group.
The Kingstons are the most private and
probably the wealthiest of the organized polygamist groups. Unlike the FLDS that
is isolated geographically, the Kingstons blend with mainstream society in Salt
Lake and Davis Counties. It is their compulsion for privacy (interrupted as
secrecy) that isolates them.
The Clan is best known for their extreme
frugality and dozens and dozens of corporations in Utah, Arizona, Colorado, New
Mexico, and Nevada.
Kingston frugality deserves a description.
Thrift among the Kingstons is considered a virtue. What appears to be indigence
to an outsider is actually godliness. The clapboard house, paint peeling,
cardboard over broken windows, junk cars and debris instead of grass and flowers
is not an uncommon domicile for the plural wife of a high-ranking Kingstonite.
What you see as impecuniousness is really the antithesis of conspicuous
consumption, frugality in the extreme. What looks like a hovel and wretched
surroundings is really a monastery of righteousness.
The many dark-haired, humbly dressed children
bearing remarkably noble Kingston genetic characteristics may not know the name
of their father for security sake. The mother makes due with bare necessities,
while the father and husband is a glorified example of thrift, a paragon of the
group. . . .
Their many businesses include restaurant
supply, garbage disposal, pawn shops, family retail stores, and ranching. Merlin
Kingston managed the Wine Cup and Gamble Ranches north and east of Wells,
Nevada. The two ranches, running east to west, stretched fifty miles. For some
reason, probably lack of profit, in 2003 they let the leases expire. . . .
Another Kingston business that has attracted
much attention is coin-operated amusement machines. According to investigative
journalist Lou Kilzer of Denver’s Rocky Mountain News, the Kingstons have
been linked with known organized crime figures in the coin amusement machine
business, primarily "New Jersey mob associate, Carmen Ricci" and "Denver’s
Smaldone La Cosa Nostra syndicate." The principal Kingston amusement
coin-operated machine business is Mountain Coin, managed by Eldon Kingston. In
an interview with the Rocky Mountain News, Eldon denied that they
(the Clan) have ever distributed illegal gaming machines or knowingly done
business with any organized crime figures. However, Lou Kilzer’s February 13,
2000, article is quite convincing.
In 1998 the Kingston Clan grabbed national
headlines when John Daniel Kingston was arrested for belt whipping his
sixteen-year-old daughter for refusing to live as plural wife number fifteen
with her uncle. The uncle, David Ortell Kingston, was arrested for having sex
with her. John Daniel was convicted of child abuse and served twenty-eight weeks
in jail. David Ortell served four years in prison for incest and was given an
unconditional release in June 2003.
According to dissidents from the Kingston
Clan, the Kingstons believe their blood is so pure that incest is justified and
preferred. . . .
Learn more in the book. . .
THE TRUE & LIVING CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF
SAINTS OF THE LAST DAYS
Unincorporated.
Population: Between 300 - 500
|Priesthood leader: James D. Harmston.
The TLC, as it is affectionately called, is
unincorporated. The prophet, seer, and revelator is James D. Harmston, who is
probably the most innovative and ruthless of all the contemporary Mormon
prophets.
The TLC is located at Manti, Utah, a small
rural community in San Pete County in central Utah. (Manti is also the location
of the LDS Manti Temple, one of the first temples built by LDS pioneers.)
The media treated polygamy as a harmless
lifestyle like the Amish until 1997 and 1998. Jim Harmston took advantage of
that misconception and used the media to proselytize and promote his group. He
also developed a sophisticated, comprehensive website that attracted many
converts.
The TLC evolved from a study group of active
Latter-day Saints in San Pete County who were delving into Mormon
Fundamentalism. Harmston emerged as the dominate person in the study group and
as he assumed and exerted his authority, most of the study group fell away.
The LDS faithful are cautioned by Church
authorities to refrain from delving into what is referred to as the "mysteries,"
which is Mormon Fundamentalism. Harmston, who is inclined to be pugnacious,
ignored the admonition and was excommunicated. Soon thereafter, Harmston claimed
to have been visited by the Father and the Son and instructed to rebuild the
kingdom of God. Jim also claims to be the reincarnation of Joseph Smith and, in
that respect, he has attempted to pattern the TLC after the Nauvoo, Illinois,
period of Mormon history.
In February 1998 it was leaked to the media
that Jim Harmston had married a sixteen-year-old girl. Prior to that he had been
photographed numerous times with his eight wives, all older women he had
acquired from other polygamist groups.
The media suddenly became interested in
Harmston’s secret marriage, which marked an end to his courtship with the media.
Until then Harmston had been as talkative as Tom Green. He stopped granting
interviews and shut down his website. Then in April 1998, Kaziah May Hancock and
Cindy Stewart filed a lawsuit against Jim and the TLC.
Harmston was accused of bilking Cindy out of
$10,000, and defrauding Kaziah of $250,000. Kaziah’s life story, described later
in this book, is one of the most tragic to come out of the annals of
contemporary Mormon Fundamentalism. . . .
Learn more in the book. . .
THE RIGHTEOUS BRANCH OF THE CHURCH OF JESUS CHRIST OF LATTER-DAY
SAINTS
Unincorporated
Population: Approximately 100
Priesthood leader: Gerald Peterson, Jr.
The Righteous Branch is located at Paiquin,
Utah, west of Cedar City. The prophet and leader is Gerald Peterson Jr., who
inherited leadership from his father Gerald Peterson Sr. The Petersons claim
that the ghost of Rulon Allred appeared to the elder Gerald and gave him all the
keys of the kingdom and that Father Adam later appeared to Gerald and ratified
Rulon’s ordination. All polygamists believe that Adam is the God of this world.
When they pray to Heavenly Father, they are praying to Adam.
The Righteous Branch, a small offshoot of the
Allred Group (AUB), is relatively unknown and scavenges its members from the
other groups. For example, when the TLC started falling apart during the Kizah
May Hancock lawsuit, members of the Righteous Branch encircled Manti like hungry
wolves trying to con+vert TLC dissidents.
Tom Green got his start in the Righteous
Branch where he was an apostle. . . .
Learn more in the book. . .
CHURCH OF THE FIRSTBORN OF THE FULLNESS OF
TIMES
Incorporated: The Church of the First-born of the Fullness of Times, 9-21-55
Population: About 30 Families
Priesthood leader: Joel LeBaron
In both Mormon and Protestant scriptures,
Jesus Christ is identified as the Firstborn. (Romans 13:29) The Mormons tell us
that those who are saved unto Christ will become members of the Church of the
Firstborn. (D&C 76:53-58) According to the LDS Church, the Church of the
Firstborn is used as a metaphor for the LDS Church. However, dissidents from the
LDS Church have formed splinter groups calling themselves the Church of the
Firstborn.
The first man to implement and organize the
Church of the Firstborn came from the LeBaron family. Ross LeBaron claimed he is
the one who did it, others say Alma or Ben LeBaron came up with the idea. But
Joel LeBaron gets the credit because it was he who developed a following. Joel
founded the community of Los Molinos on the peninsula of Baja, California, in
Old Mexico. On September 21, 1955 Joel filed with the State of Utah, "The Church
of the First-born of the Fullness of Times."
The Church of the Firstborn alleges that Joel
received his authority through Benjamin F. Johnson, companion and bodyguard of
Joseph Smith. Benjamin allegedly passed the priesthood keys to Alma Dayer
LeBaron who allegedly passed them to Joel. The keys, according to the LeBarons,
are the real patriarchal priesthood keys. They claim these keys are higher,
having greater authority than the keys held by the prophet of the LDS Church.
The Church of the Firstborn has been steeped
in violence. Ervil LeBaron, Joel’s younger brother, challenged Joel’s authority.
Ervil pulled away from Joel, taking a few fanatics with him, and started the
Church of the Lamb of God. Ervil ordered the murder of his brother Joel. He then
murdered Rulon C. Allred of the AUB in hopes of luring Verlan M. LeBaron to the
funeral so he too could be murdered. . . .
While Ervil and his sons were hunting down and
killing the opposition, Ross Wesley LeBaron, the oldest of the LeBaron brothers,
was back in Utah quietly doing his own thing.
Ross was an eccentric who claimed to be the
original brains behind the Church of the Firstborn. He lived in a storage unit
with a dirt floor. He believed in flying saucers and was a frequent guest on
local radio talk shows. Everyone considered Ross a little crazy, but harmless.
Ross attracted three young disciples, Fred
Collier, Tom Green, and Robert Black, who took care of his needs in exchange for
tutoring. As insane as he might have been, according to Tom Green, Ross was an
encyclopedia of Mormon knowledge and was very convincing in his defense of the
patriarchal keys.
After Ross died each of these men, Collier,
Green, and Black claimed Ross had passed the keys to him. Each immediately began
traveling through the fundamentalist subculture preaching his particular brand
of Firstborn Mormonism to anyone who would listen. Of the three, Tom became the
most notorious. . . .
Learn
more in the book. . .
Fred Collier
. . .When Tom and Fred Collier were teamed up
as the acolytes of Ross LeBaron, they had a genealogy friend who gave them
access to the LDS Church archives. Tom confided to me that he and Collier’s wife
Bonnie would smuggle microfilm out of the archives to Collier. Bonnie put the
microfilm in her bra and Tom hid microfilm in his shorts. Collier would make
copies of the microfilm, then Tom and Bonnie would smuggle the microfilm back
into the archives. I later confirmed the story during an interview with Collier.
The microfilm consisted of journals, sermons,
and biographies of nineteenth-century Mormon leaders. Tom didn’t feel like it
was stealing. In his mind he was merely rescuing important information that all
of Mormondom was entitled too. . .
Learn
more in the book. . .
INDEPENDENT MORMON FUNDAMENTALISTS
There may be as many as a 1000 families
practicing plural marriage who are not associated with an organized group. These
families are referred to as Independents. According to the Independents, Lorin
Woolley said, "Don’t organize!" He cautioned the polygamists against organizing
in competition with the LDS Church or doing anything that would attract
attention.
Ogden Kraut, a respected independent
fundamentalist, historian, and author confided in a tape recorded interview
shortly before he died that he was convinced there were as many as 100,000
independent polygamists.
Ogden is the author of dozens of pamphlets and
books dealing with Mormon Fundamentalism. Because of his writings he was looked
upon as the unofficial patriarch of the Independents. Ogden was my friend and I
respected his judgement, but in this case, although his intentions are well
meaning, I believe his estimate is grossly exaggerated; there is simply no
evidence to support his hypothesis. . . .
Learn
more in the book. . .
The Christian Polygamists
The Mormons are not the only Christians who
have resurrected plural marriage from the Old Testament. There are dozens,
perhaps hundreds of Christian polygamist families throughout the United States.
The most visible Christian polygamist is Steve Butt, who started Broken Shackles
Ministry, an escape network for abused women.
Steve is a dissident from Jehovah’s Witness,
which he declared was an oppressive religious organization. As he searched the
Bible for a religious cure to the mental and emotional ills suffered by victims
of oppressive cults, he was intrigued by the plural marriages of the ancient
prophets. One thing led to another and he wound up taking as a plural wife an
abused woman he was helping.
Steve felt that the Mormons were giving plural
marriage a bad name by making plural marriage a doctrine and commandment. He
said he had found nothing in the Bible to support the Mormon hypothesis that
plural marriage was a commandment. For Steve, plural marriage was not a
religious tenet but a custom, a social unit or alternative form of marriage
practiced by Abraham and the early Christians. It had nothing to do with heaven
or exaltation, and was strictly an earthly practice. . . .
Learn more in the book. . .
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