Systemic Abuse: Texan Approach to FLDS

I don't think it is that simple, but I agree with you in spirit. It is hardly acceptable that 462 children needed to be put in foster care to resolve a complaint from a 16 year old girl. The only thing I can think of is that maybe the state of Texas really has quite a bit of evidence.

There is also the fiction of that cult and there is the truth.

Civil Liberties cease quickly when your "Liberties" are hurting othere and especially Children. They also cease to exist when you assist in abusing children. Every single adult from that compound is guilty of one or more Felonys. The all need to be prosecuted to the limit of the law for what they did and aided in doing.

Texas was way out of line on this one.

Col. George thre was no probable cause in this case. this was more than an over reaction. It is blanet abuse of power

I doubt they are out of line as I recently heard if comes to light there was inbreeding causing genetic defeat. In the end we as taxpayers will have to bear the burden of medical cost to care and treat these children's when those symptoms come to fruition. This is what abhors me the most they create the problem and the rest of us taxpayer have to foot the bills of their mistakes as King Bush is doing now. Where is his Religious and Moral values??? Didn't he live in Texas .. .oh wait they were funding his campaigns of scorch earth policies....

While I am outraged at children having children, the State of Texas has not handled this well and it doesn't seem to be getting any better. There is a line between protection and coercion. I hope those taken from the compound aren't moving from one prison to another.

Vermont went down this road awhile back in an action against a "cult" up in the Northeast Kingdom, that particular raid did not pan out quite so well since it was later determined that the State was completely unjustified in its activities and actions against the parents. That turned out to be a prejudice against the communal rearing of children -- I have a gut feeling that there are probably quite a few holes in Texas' case that cannot be plugged with all of the somewhat sensationalist media coverage of the event. The big losers here are going to be the kids who were unjustifiably nabbed and then shunted into a foster child system which is generally viewed in the United States as a broken system and the mothers who were not participants. This could and should have been handled differently, instead we have a very tragic circus and farce going on out in Texas.

"Thirty-one of the 53 girls ages 14 through 17 are either mothers or expectant mothers, said Stephanie Goodman, a spokeswoman for the state's Health and Human Services Commission."

"There also is one pregnant 13-year-old, "but most are in the 15 and 16 range at the time they conceived," Azar said. "Some teens have multiple children."

"Under Texas law, children under age 17 generally cannot consent to sex with an adult. A girl can get married with parental permission at 16, but none of the sect's girls is believed to have had a legal marriage under state law."

Excerted from the Houston Chronicle

Is there any state in the union that has a mechanism to deal with large scale systematic sexual (and possibly physical) abuse in a closed community?

Are we suggesting that "religious teachings or practices" can negate state laws specifying minimum ages for marraige and sexual consent?

What legal shield exempts the adult female members of this group of the need to report criminal activity against children?

All I will say for now until this resolves one way or another. We the rest of the innocent taxpayers will have to pay for these children's and their children's medical need from marring to close and causing pain and angiuse from years to come. Has anyone thought about this end results can never be good for the rest of us. I think states should've had some idea in large monogamy one man many wives this was taking place but did nothing to address the problem til it was too late to find a good solution. Frace or not how come the moral religious people aren't out there to tell those monogamy society to change their ways, that is what I like to know. Oh wait but those people give money to those communities politicians so that is how they buy their silences. Only when it gets so extreme that those people come in screaming we have a problem. "Houstion we have a problem". We have someone in the house that claims GOD gave him a mandate to fix the world how come he can't fix TX??? Isn't that where he is from...but again...he could give a **&^ as long as those people give him money right...

"Under Texas law, children under age 17 generally cannot consent to sex with an adult. A girl can get married with parental permission at 16, but none of the sect's girls is believed to have had a legal marriage under state law." Actually, one of the interviews with one of the attorneys representing the FLDS, that law is relatively new -- when the ranch was first acquired by the FLDS the law apparently was 14 years of age.

The whole thing was mismanaged - is this really a surprise? I think it's horrible what has happened to the young women - to all the women. However . . . would you want to have your children ripped away from you in the same manner? How about have some of these geniuses sit down and actually talk to each other - and to people who might actually be able to come up with some valid solutions to the whole mess.

Oh wait . . . it's too late for that!

Texans talking? acting reasonable? Whatever are you thinking Mary?

you know what guys? I'm not from texas, but I can tell you that if someone were raping my daughter at 14, the law would have been the least of their worries. Someone would be bailing me out of jail. These people need to be strung up. No one has the right to abuse another human being. EVER. If you just look at these women you can see that they are a victim of abuse. Tell me what the difference in the way that they are being treated and the way that the Taliban treated it's women? We were all outraged over that!