ARIZONA
The Arizona Republic
Mark Shaffer
Republic Flagstaff Bureau
Sept. 18, 2005 12:00 AM
The former town marshal of Colorado City, Ariz., and Hildale, Utah, never notified Utah child-welfare authorities of sexual abuse cases he was investigating in the polygamist communities and acknowledged cohabiting with a wife and two "companions," with whom he has had 21 children, according to documents released Friday.
Samuel N. Roundy, 50, Colorado City's town marshal for 10 years before resigning this year, made those admissions during an interview in October with an investigator for the Arizona Peace Officer Standards and Training Board.
Transcripts of the interview were released in conjunction with decertification hearings Thursday and Friday in Phoenix for Roundy and another polygamist Colorado City police officer, Vance Barlow. Neither officer attended the hearings. advertisement
Diana Stabler, an Arizona assistant attorney general, said Roundy and Barlow likely would be stripped of certification as Arizona police officers during the board's next meeting on Oct. 19.
Utah revoked the police certifications of the two in March, citing violation of state bigamy statutes. Roundy said he was never a sworn police officer in Utah.
The anticipated decertification would be the latest in a series of moves to tighten the noose around the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, the largest multiple-marriage sect in the country.