To those who think I am defending FLDS, you are not reading what I am saying. I despise this religion. I am not talking about FLDS. They are incidental. I am talking about the methods which the state used.
There is no sworn affidavit. You can not suspect a crime has been committed by some people and round up hundreds of people and hold them (their children in this case) until you figure out who committed the crime. The purpose of the analogies is to diffuse the emotionally charged nature of this particular event. Again, there are rapes that are committed on and around university campuses. Round up every male student and those living in the town and get their DNA so that when a rape occurs we can find the criminal. There will be other crimes that occur as well, so the DNA will be useful for those investigations.
Going through all the reasons why the FLDS are bad people inflames emothions further against them. Suppose it is true they are all welfare frauds. They should be individually prosecuted and punished. The same standards have to be applied to them as are to all. If this is about child abuse stop trumpeting the accusation of welfare fraud to justify taking their kids away. The country is full of welfare frauds. That crime does not make them lose their kids.
The state’s job in law enforsement is to catch criminals. They have to do that using methods that do not violate the rights of citizens. Right to speedy trial, habaeus corpus, unreasonable search and seizure, right to privacy, self incrimination are in the law.
If a woman claims a child is hers and she wants welfare or food stamps do a DNA test. If DNA says the baby is not hers then try and convict her of welfare fraud, lock her up and put the baby in foster care. Don’t snatch a group of women and children off the streets and do DNA tests on them all, because you suspect someone of a crime. If a fifteen year old comes in with a baby and she can not identify the father, because she claims she had sex with many men, or men unknown to her then child services can make the case that she is incompetent of raising the child and the child taken and put in foster care. It happened to my wife’s niece.
I would like to see an end to the FLDS. If that requires the trial and conviction of every member and crimes can be proven, great. The methods of doing this have to be within the law without the government overstepping its authority. Wait and see if there is not some civil rights case that comes out of this.
I admit I don’t know how to put an end to FLDS, but also know with certainty that what is going on now will not accomplish that end.
So in essence, what you are saying is that all of the children should have been left at the compound under the care and watchful eye of abusers until the state completed their investigation?
Leaving just one child in that compound during the investigation would leave that child vulnerable to attack by an abuser.
Leaving any of the children in that compound while the investigation is going on, would lead to them being hidden, or whisked away, and in even more danger of abuse.
How would the state be able to investigate anything, and “catch criminal” if they aren’t allowed to get near the children?
There is more to the abuse than just the physical aspect. The psychological aspect is just as great of a harm. Families being reassigned to different fathers, different mothers. One day you are calling a man daddy, and the next day you are calling someone ese daddy, and 3 years later, someone else. That is psychological and emotional abuse.
As far as the welfare abuse, that was brought up to demonstrate how the whole FLDS talks out of both sides of their mouth at the same time. As in, the state and government are wrong, but we’ll take their free money.
If they are willing to lie about who is the parent, to receive government money, it isn’t a huge stretch for them to lie about anything else now is it?
The one thing we can agree on is that the FLDS are a very odd bunch, but I still think Texas is doing the right thing protecting ALL of the children.
By the way, there had to be a sworn affidavit or the warrant would never have been issued. Officials were acting on what they believed to be credible evidence, went to a judge, signed an affidavit stating their preliminary evidence, and a judge signed it. If the judge didn’t believe the information that law enforcement was acting on was valid, or strong enough, they never would have issued the warrant.
