UTAH
The Salt Lake Tribune
By NATE CARLISLE | The Salt Lake Tribune
In a hearing that dealt with polygamy and child sex abuse as much as alleged food stamp fraud, a federal court judge on Wednesday considered whether Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints Bishop Lyle Jeffs should remain in jail until his trial.
U.S. District Judge Ted Stewart is expected to issue a ruling later Wednesday, or perhaps later this week.
Prosecutors want Jeffs, 56, to remain in jail where he has been held since indictments against 11 FLDS members were unsealed Feb. 23. Jeffs’ lawyer, Kathryn Nester, asked Stewart to release her client to a home his family or supporters have in Provo and to be tracked by a GPS ankle monitor.
The hearing was supposed to be about whether Jeffs, if freed, would return to court for future proceedings, and whether he would tamper with witnesses or evidence. In the course of those discussions, the 90-minute hearing veered into whether Jeffs had married three underage girls and how much contact he has with his infamous older brother, FLDS President Warren Jeffs.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Robert Lund contended Lyle Jeffs doesn’t acknowledge court orders or the law. He presented Stewart with an excerpt from a revelation Warren Jeffs sent elected officials in February, saying he was wrongly being incarcerated at a prison in Palestine, Texas, and that laws should be overturned when they contradict religious beliefs. Lyle Jeffs, who at the time of his arrest was the bishop in Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., signed the document.
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