UNDERAGE GIRL ALLEGED TO BE WIFE OF FLDS LEADER WARREN JEFFS IS FOUND AND RETURNED TO PARENTS, BUT REFUSES TO SAY WHERE SHE HAS BEEN FOR PAST 15 MONTHS.
 
Press Release
Mohave County, Arizona
Janetta Jessop

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

November 17, 2004

17-year-old Janetta Jessop, reported missing by her sister Suzanne Jessop Johnson on November 11, has been returned to the home of her parents in the polygamist stronghold of Hildale-Colorado City, according to Mohave County (Arizona) investigator Gary Engels. The parents, Frank and Mary Anne Jessop, are loyal followers of self-proclaimed prophet Warren Jeffs, the leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (FLDS). Jeffs is married to some 70 women and girls, and demands absolute, unquestioning obedience from his estimated 10,000 followers.

The FLDS Church is presently based in Hildale-Colorado City, astride the Utah-Arizona border, although Jeffs is in the process of moving his center of operations (along with his most devoted followers) to a 1,671-acre ranch near the small town of Eldorado, Texas. Jeffs has told church members that Hildale-Colorado city has been "desecrated." Recently he started construction of a massive temple on the Eldorado property, to be modeled on the historic LDS temple built by Joseph Smith in Nauvoo, Illinois.

On November 5, 2004, Janetta Jessop phone her sister Suzanne from an undisclosed location. "I could tell right away something was wrong." Suzanne explains. "Her voice was trembling. She was talking really quiet. I asked her right off the bat if she was in trouble and needed help…. She started telling me, ‘I don’t want to be here right now. I don’t want to be here right now…’ She kept repeating it over and over."

During the brief conversation, Janetta made it clear that she wanted Suzanne to rescue her. According to Suzanne, "Janetta told me, ‘I don’t want Father and Mother to know about this, but I’ll call you right back with a place to meet me.’" But that was the last Suzanne heard from her little sister. Janetta never called back.

15 months earlier, immediately after Janetta’s 16th birthday, the girl had abruptly disappeared from her parents’ home. According to Suzanne, "I went up to her room and all her stuff was gone." When Suzanne inquired what had happened to Janetta, she recalls, their mother "just kind of looked at me with this blank stare and says back, ‘Well, I don’t know.’" Suzanne speculates that Janetta had been "taken as a plural wife" by Warren Jeffs, who was 47 at the time. At least two (and possibly three) of Janetta’s older sisters had already been taken as wives by Jeffs.

Mohave County investigator Gary Engels visited the Jessop family home in Colorado City yesterday in order to determine Janetta’s whereabouts. He was accompanied by Suzanne; a Mohave County sheriff’s deputy; a case worker from Arizona Child Protective Services (CPS); and private investigator Sam Brower. When they arrived at the home, Janetta wasn’t there, but after a short wait her mother was seen driving toward the house in a white van. Upon noticing the sheriff deputy’s official vehicle parked on the street, the mother kept driving past the house without stopping. As she drove by, Suzanne recognized Janetta sitting in the passenger’s seat, and the deputy gave chase and quickly pulled the van over. Janetta was then transported to the Children’s Justice Center in St. George, Utah to be interviewed.

During the interview, Janetta refused to answer the most pertinent questions posed by county case workers. Contrary to an article first published in the Deseret News and then sent out on the AP wire, the girl neither confirmed nor denied to authorities that she was one of Warren Jeffs’ spiritual wives. According to investigator Gary Engels, "I spoke at length to Nancy Perkins, the Deseret News reporter, but she totally misrepresented almost everything I told her." Engels emphasizes that when official interviewers asked Janetta if she was married to Jeffs, the girl simply replied, "I’d rather not say." She also declined to tell authorities where she has been living since leaving her parents’ home in August 2003.

"Janetta was afraid of us," Engels explains. "She didn’t want to talk to us. She did admit to calling her sister for help, but she wouldn’t tell us where she made the phone call from. She wouldn’t tell us where she’d been for the past year…. It was obvious she was protecting somebody. Before we were able to talk to Janetta, her parents and other FLDS members had had more than a week to work on her. I have no doubt that she was told exactly what to say. Her mother probably told her something like, ‘If you spill the beans, your father and I are going to jail and Warren will be martyred.’ I have no doubt they told her this stuff."

"Can I positively say she was married to Warren or anybody else?" Engels asks rhetorically. "No, I have no proof. Do I believe she was married to Warren? Yes I do. I base that conclusion on things Janetta told her sister, along with the fact that her family has already married off at least two older sisters to Warren. Plus the way the family is behaving now. When the CPS officer asked Janetta’s mother where Janetta has been for the last year, all she would say is, ‘That’s of no concern to you.’"

Suzanne shares Engels’ view that her sister "had been told what to say and what not to say. The way Janetta was acting, she was obviously protecting somebody…. When I asked her why she had called me last week asking for help, all she would say was, ‘Well, I guess I was just having one of those days.’ I don’t know what they threatened her with, but I do know she’s definitely been chastised to a degree for calling me. I mean, I know they told her she was going to lose her salvation if she said anything—I know that much for sure."

According to Engels, authorities are disappointed that Janetta was too frightened to answer crucial questions, leaving them no choice but to return her to her parents’ home in Colorado City following the conclusion of the official interview. "From what little she would tell us," says Engels, "we simply didn’t have enough to hold her." Engels promised, however, that he would continue to visit the Jessop household over the months and years to come in order to ensure that Janetta is safe.

Suzanne remains disturbed by the veil of secrecy surrounding almost everything about her sister’s lengthy disappearance and alleged plural marriage to Warren Jeffs. "But what can you do?" she asks—then says that she is reassured somewhat by Engels pledge to keep an eye on Janetta. Suzanne also says that she doesn’t regret her decision to notify law officers and the media of her sister’s plight. "Now that people from outside will be checking on her, she should be safe in my father’s house. At least until she’s 18."

"Suzanne has my utmost respect and admiration for coming forward and speaking out," says investigator Gary Engels. "As a consequence, she’s going to be regarded as ‘public enemy number one’ by Warren Jeffs and the FLDS Church. She knew that before she came forward, and she went ahead and did it anyway. That took a lot of courage, and shows how much she loves her sister."

Janetta’s case underscores one of the major challenges faced by those who are trying to bring Warren Jeffs to justice: the pervasive, Mafia-like code of silence that has been instilled in his followers. Thanks to the FLDS omerta, it has once again proved impossible to persuade one of Jeffs’ alleged victims to testify against him.

"The FLDS code of silence is even more effective than the Mafia’s," Engels insists. "With the Mafia, sometimes you can get people to roll over and testify against their higher-ups. With Warren’s people, nobody ever seems to roll over. Not even when they’re kicked out of the church. You’ve got these guys like Truman Barlow and Dan Barlow who were very high in the FLDS organization and then cast out by Warren—yet even when they had their wives and kids and property taken away and given to other men, they’ve still refused to talk. It definitely makes our job a lot harder. But I won’t give up. There is no doubt that Warren has committed some serious crimes and needs to be locked up. I’m going to do my best to help accomplish that."

This press release was written by Jon Krakauer. It is based in part on interviews with Suzanne Jessop Johnson on November 11, 13, and 17; on interviews with Sam Brower on November 11, 13, 16, and 17; and on an interview with investigator Gary Engels of the Mohave County Attorney’s Office on November 17.

FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION PLEASE CONTACT:

SAM BROWER, PHONE (435) 701-1501
 
Jon Krakauer
Press Release November 17, 2004
 
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