Colorado City area needs 'safe haven'
 
In Our View
The Spectrum
 
EDITORIAL

An idea presented by Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard, mirrored by a proposal spearheaded by the Help the Child Brides organization, might provide another important step toward ending abuses in the Hildale/ Colorado City area.

Goddard, in an interview with The Associated Press, said he favored setting up a "safe haven," perhaps in the form of a Child Protective Services office, in Colorado City. He believes such a presence is necessary to put an end to sexual abuse of teenage girls, who sometimes are taken as spiritual brides by members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

That matches the concept promoted by Help the Child Brides, which favors having law-enforcement and women and children services available to girls who want to leave the polygamist lifestyle for one reason or another.

The concept is fairly straight-forward. If a girl wants to flee, she would have an agency independent of police forces in that area to which she could turn.

Officials working in and for the FLDS church consider such a proposition to be unwarranted. They have said that girls and women can leave whenever they please. For the most part, that's true.

But there is an intimidation factor that has to be considered. How likely is a woman or girl in an abusive situation to call the local police if she knows the police contribute to the problem. One need only look at the recent case of Rodney Holm -- a man who was a sworn police officer when he fathered children with a spiritual wife who was also a minor -- to see an example of how local authorities can be viewed by distrustful girls as supporting the practices.

To be clear, not all residents of the polygamist communities abuse girls. In fact, most are practicing their religion with consenting adults, and what goes on between those adults in the privacy of their own homes should be of no concern to others.

But Goddard and Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff believe some abuses do occur. And, as they've pointed out, the investigations into Hildale and Colorado City are not about religion. They are about abuse and criminal activity.

Arizona should follow through on Goddard's idea. Shurtleff and other law-enforcement agencies in Utah should do the same on this side of the border.

Then, girls might be more likely to leave situations in which they are uncomfortable, and more abusers will be prosecuted.
 
TheSpectrum.com
Originally published Sunday, November 2, 2003
 
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