SAMMIE LEES WIFE- I agree with you. This is a huge issue which will not be solved on a discussion board like this - but it will be solved in the courts of Texas. I understand that you don't support the cults or their mistreatment of the children. I get that. The comparison with Jehovah's Witnesses spanking their children at a Kingdom Hall - as opposed to Mormon's breaking the arms and causing multiple fractures in many of their children is a stretch I believe . Not to mention the " sexual " issues of 60 percent of the Mormon girls from the compound being pregnant. So- it's not just a sexual issue , with the arm breaking physical abuse is happening too.
I think with the " fact " of the pregnant girls, and broken bones in multiple children - it is enough " evidence " to cause sufficient concern. And enough to warrant an investigation as well ! To not pursue it intrudes on the rights of the children to have a safe life . I do not think that intrudes on anybodies rights to make sure children live safely.
But what facts are they? We have not been presented with any facts in this case and certainly zero arrests or charges. Zero. There are a lot of things we aren't hearing and a lot of innuendo we are. The fact is that yes, some kids had previous broken bones - some xrays showed that. How many of us had broken bones before the age of 12 that would show up? A lot of us. Are we linking every single accident has now with the word child abuse?
Fact is some girls are pregnant. What we still don't seem to have though is proof of their ages and further still - if they were already confident the girls were all underage, don't you think that the courts would have arrested or at least rounded up all the men inside? That's proof. The facts are that we have previous broken bones and pregnant girls. I realize that you believe that this evidence is enough to warrant an armed raid and forced eviction of children, but I don't believe that it had to be done that way. I'm not certain of the harm being done to all those kids by acting in that way provides a solid and successful means to an end. The allegations were of underage sex. That was the big one. The men then should have been removed - even if on suspicion but they weren't. Now we have morphed into the broken bone issue and that has come after a number of sources questioned why, if the sex abuse was the crime, the little boys were being taken. I saw those interviews as to the reason and sure enough within 2 weeks this charge comes up.
Every community, and this is a community, has some sort of abuse going on. I won't be surprised to hear solid charges of physical abuse at some point. I won't be at all surprised to hear of some girls 16 years old and pregnant. A lot, perhaps not all, but a lot of sexual and physical abuse survivors will tell you that just removing the abuser from the home provided a tremendous safety net and security. Reassurances of safety and support, gaining the trust of the kid, counselling them at the same time and keeping the abuser away - those are all things that most often help and don't create additional stress and turmoil on a little kid being ripped away from sisters and brothers, or family. You take a kid away and they lose touch with their own world and their own relative safety, often they internalize and are scared - if you instead remove the abuser, the child still has the ability to work through the issues but within their own sense of realism and safety.
Other facts are coming out daily - or what we assume to be fact. One is documentation. There have been birth certificates, social insurance numbers and marriage documents provided already for some of the people and the State has rejected all this evidence. Why - well it might be fraudulent. Men and women are leaving the compound to try and travel to where their kids are in order to see them. Is this right?
Barlow has been let go. All charges dropped. No reason why from the State that jumped on him. Now there are questions as I said earlier on the involvement Jessop had in all this - how much of a set up was involved and for what reason?
I don't think it has been handled well at all. It will be interesting to see how it plays since there is zero proof that all families were involved in any wrongdoing. Polygamy has nothing to do with this since a legal marriage happens one time and the other 'wives' as they are called, remain really nothing more than mistresses or baby mama's. If we are going to slam the prison door on those guys or women for entering a plural relationship, the law might be scooping up 25 million women and men who currently have any number of kids between them at the same time without any committment other than boyfriend/girlfriend or baby daddy or baby mama.
I think back to that case - what was it McMartin? - where it ended up costing millions of dollars, ruined reputations, lives destroyed and years of courts only to end in shambles. ...Let's hope this doesn't take 10 years to fix..........sammieswife.
