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	Judge Allows FLDS Raid Evidence Sect Man Pleads Not Guilty to Charge of Sexual Assault By Michael Kelly Standard-Times October 2, 2009 http://www.gosanangelo.com/news/2009/oct/02/flds-member-pleads-not-guilty-to-sex-assault/ SAN ANGELO, Texas — The rules of engagement are set for the first criminal trial to come out of the historic raid on the Yearning For Zion Ranch 18 months ago — and those rules will include the entire volume of evidence gathered at the ranch during the raid. At the end of a pre-trial hearing Friday for Raymond Merril Jessop, 51st District Judge Barbara Walther issued her long-expected ruling on whether lawyers for the polygamous Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints would be allowed a hearing to challenge the admissibility of evidence gathered in the raid. In April 2008, the state descended in force on the polygamist sect's Schleicher County ranch seeking a girl who had complained in a phone call to a San Angelo women's shelter that she was being abused by her husband. The girl was never found, and the phone call later was proven to be a hoax, but while searching for her authorities saw several pregnant teenage girls. In the end, state officials removed 437 children from the ranch on the concern that they were at risk of abuse. Walther denied the evidence motion, which had been presented in the course of a four-day hearing in May. Defense attorneys argued, in part, that the all evidence gathered at the ranch should be suppressed because authorities had acted on a false report in seeking the search warrant. "The court finds that Defendants' offer of proof of deliberate falsehoods contained within the probable cause affidavits to support the two warrants is unsupported by credible evidence," Walther wrote. That finding paves the way for evidence from the raid — which includes thousands of pages of medical records, genealogical documents, family journals, handwritten files and notebooks, photographs, computers, cameras and digital files — to be used in the trials of all 10 FLDS members who are facing criminal prosecution. At the start of Friday's pre-trial hearing, Jessop, 37, pleaded not guilty to a sexual assault charge, after which his attorney and the state prosecutor began their arguments for rules governing Jessop's trial, scheduled to begin in Oct. 26 in Eldorado. Jessop is charged with having sex with an underage girl. The indictment against Jessop has been amended, prosecutor Eric Nichols said, with the removal of an enhancement that would have raised the offense to a first-degree felony. Nichols said the enhancement was based on a new law in Texas that wasn't in effect at the time the alleged act occurred. The allegation against Jessop is now a second-degree felony punishable by two to 20 years in prison. He was previously facing a penalty of five to 99 years. The court has summoned 300 potential jurors, Walther told the attorneys. The attorneys told Walther that no plea bargain was in the works, and she advised them that the cutoff date for such an agreement will be 5 p.m. Oct. 14. Walther asked Mark Stevens, the San Antonio lawyer representing Jessop, whether he would call his client to testify at the trial. "I couldn't say at this point," Stevens said. Stevens and Nichols settled in limine matters — how some specific evidence will be treated at the trial — most of which the two attorneys ultimately agreed on. The matter left outstanding was whether jurors should be expected to understand some rules of evidence, and Walther reserved judgment on that matter. Walther also heard arguments on motions filed within the past week regarding the state's notice of intent to present additional material in the penalty phase of the trial, should Jessop be convicted. "And we disagree," Stevens fumed after Nichols presented his arguments for allowing introduction of matters such as allegations that Jessop had participated in several illegal marriages, that he violated banking regulations and that he harbored Warren Jeffs while Jeffs was a fugitive. "These are indictable offenses ... (the state) just wants to poison this case, to convict on prejudice." "I take offense at that," Nichols said mildly. "It's a wonderful thing, watching two very skilled lawyers presenting these challenging questions," Walther said. "The court must weigh this at the time of trial, in the context of the evidence." Stevens called on Walther to suppress any mention of FLDS leader and prophet Warren Jeffs, citing the state's notice of intent to bring the matter up. "Raymond should not be tried for his association with Warren Jeffs," Stevens said, citing his client's First Amendment rights. Walther agreed to require the prosecution to approach the bench before bringing Jeffs' name into the trial to allow her to determine relevance, but she agreed with Nichols that the demand to suppress Jeffs altogether in advance of the proceedings was too broad. Stevens concluded the hearing by advising Walther and Nichols that he intended to file a motion Monday challenging the indictment against Jessop.
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