Grand jury indicts 6 in polygamist sect

ELDORADO, Texas — Six men from a West Texas polygamist community — including imprisoned sect leader Warren Jeffs — have been indicted by a grand jury on charges including felony sexual assault of a child.

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, who announced the charges against members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) on Tuesday night, would not reveal the identities of the five other men.

He said he hopes to extradite Jeffs, who is in an Arizona jail awaiting separate charges, to Texas "as quickly as possible." But he wouldn't comment on the whereabouts of the other men from the Yearning For Zion Ranch.

Neither attorneys for the FLDS or Willie Jessop, who is leading the Eldorado sect in Jeff's absence, could be reached for comment after the indictments. But outside the courthouse Tuesday afternoon, Jessop said he hoped there would be no criminal charges and said the grand-jury proceedings were "a continued harassment" of the sect.

"Our ladies are upset, they've been in the sun all day," said Jessop, who was subpoenaed to testify Tuesday before the grand jury. The state "has spent millions of dollars on this, and now they've got to justify it."

The state alleges that sect members permitted a culture of sexual abuse and "spiritual" marriages between young girls and older men to flourish inside the polygamist community. This spring, child-welfare investigators got a court order to seize 440 children and roughly 24 women from the ranch and put them under state custody. That action was overturned by the Texas Supreme Court months later.

Of the men indicted Tuesday, five were charged with felony sexual assault of a child and one also was charged with felony bigamy.

A sixth man was charged with a misdemeanor, failing to report child abuse.

Jeffs, 52, was one of the men indicted in connection with felony sexual assault of a child. He once was on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list and has been sentenced for crimes he committed in Utah.

He is awaiting trial in Arizona on charges related to arranging the marriages of underage girls.

The Texas Rangers will lead the effort to round up and arrest the other men, some of whom may not be living in Texas.

Among those who appeared before the grand jury Tuesday were Veda Keate, 19, who has a 2-year-old daughter; LeAnn Jeffs, 17, who has a 1-year-old daughter; and Sarah Barlow Draper, 37, a registered nurse with four children.

Teresa Jeffs, 16, the daughter of Warren Jeffs, also testified. According to a child-advocate report filed earlier this month, Jeffs was married to a 34-year-old man shortly after her 15th birthday.

FLDS leaders have consistently denied there was any abuse at the ranch and vowed not to sanction underage marriages.

Under Texas law, a girl younger than 17 cannot generally consent to sex with an adult. Bigamy is also illegal in Texas, and although FLDS plural marriages were not licensed by the state, the law contains a provision outlawing the act of "purporting to marry" more than one person.

The FLDS, which believes polygamy brings glory in heaven, is a breakaway sect of the mainstream Mormon church, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which officially renounced polygamy more than a century ago.

Material from The Associated Press is included in this report.