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	Settlement Reached in Polygamist Trust Lawsuits KTAR April 5, 2007 http://ktar.com/?nid=6&sid=441265 Salt Lake City — Six young men who claim they were ousted from a polygamist church have reached a settlement agreement with a state-appointed accountant managing the church's assets, lawyers said Thursday. A seventh man who filed a separate lawsuit accusing church leader Warren Jeffs of abuse is part of the settlement. The agreement resolves the lawsuits filed against the United Effort Plan Trust, which holds $110 million in property belonging to members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Members live primarily in the twins towns of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz. The agreement gives each man three acres in Hildale near the community park at the entrance to Maxwell Canyon, settlement papers show. It also establishes the $250,000 Lost Boys Assistance and Education Fund, which will allow other disenfranchised church members to get help. The fund will be built in increments of $10,000 with expenses approved by the UEP Trust board, trust attorney Jeff Shields said Thursday. "This is for housing, education, clothing and food to help people," Shields said. "Not race cars and diamond rings." Shields said the agreement is a good deal for the trust. "We're not cash rich, so to be able to settle this by giving them deeds to land, that's a big deal for us," he said. The UEP Trust has been in state control since 2005, in part because of these lawsuits, which must still be approved by a 3rd District Court judge. In August 2004, six of the men - who became known as the Lost Boys - collectively filed a lawsuit claiming they were tossed from the community, their families and their church by Jeffs. Two months later, the seventh man, a nephew of Jeffs, filed a separate action, claiming he had been sexually assaulted by Jeffs. The Associated Press does not typically identify alleged victims of sexual assault. Jeffs, now 51, disappeared from public life shortly before the lawsuits were filed. That same year, Arizona authorities charged him with multiple felony sex crimes for his alleged role in two underage marriages. With Jeffs on the run, both of the lawsuits defaulted. Rather than collect any money at the time, the seven men chose to let the Utah attorney general take over the trust and try to squeeze Jeffs out of hiding. Jeffs was arrested in late August near Las Vegas. He is now in a southern Utah jail awaiting a trial on two counts of rape as an accomplice for his role in the 2001 marriage between a 14-year-old church girl and her 19-year-old cousin. In 2005, state attorneys said Jeffs and five other FLDS elders were using the trust for personal gain. Judge Denise Lindberg then stripped the men of their duties and put a Salt Lake City accountant in charge. Settlement negotiations have been ongoing ever since, but it's never been about money, said Roger Hoole, an attorney who represents all seven men. From the beginning, the men were trying to solve problems in a community they believe has been destroyed by Jeffs. "If these young men could send a message to their families and the FLDS people, it would simply be to stay in your homes, keep your families together and don't automatically follow the next leaders who will try to exercise control over the people," Hoole said in a statement. The Salt Lake Tribune reported on the settlement agreement on its Web site Thursday.
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