FBI: Fugitive Warren Jeffs Believed Seen Fishing
 
The Associated Press
KUTV Channel 2 News
 
Federal agents are investigating a report that fugitive polygamous leader Warren Jeffs was at Strawberry Reservoir on Sunday - fishing.

"They got away before we had a chance to find them," FBI Special Agent Brent Robbins said Monday.

Agents are taking the tip seriously because it matches the description of Jeffs and a group of "bodyguard types" last week at a Cabela's outdoor store in Lehi, where they bought fishing gear.

Jeffs was seen on Sunday in a wheelchair, the same prop he used at Cabela's to divert attention from his slim physique, Robbins said.

"He's tall - 6-foot-4 - and at 150 pounds, that's like a walking toothpick. He figures if he's in a wheelchair, that will disguise his obvious physical characteristics," Robbins said.

Sources also tell 2News that a crew truck the group was seen driving at Cabela's is registered to a Mr. Jared B. Jeffs. The address was listed as Barlow Street in Hildale Utah.

Jeffs, who rules in absentia over a polygamist sect that dominates the border towns of Colorado City, Ariz., and Hildale, Utah, has been a fugitive since his June indictment in Arizona on charges of arranging a marriage between a 16-year-old girl and a man who was already married.

The FBI added a charge of unlawful flight against Jeffs and joined the search for him.

Robbins said security tapes at Cabela's showed "an image that depicts a reasonable likeness to Warren Jeffs," confirming an employee's account on Friday.

Jeffs' group was seen leaving Cabela's with a white GMC Yukon and a Ford pickup. Store employees jotted down the license plates. The FBI traced the registrations but isn't revealing what it learned. It was "one of those connect-the-dot things," Robbins said.

On Sunday morning, other witnesses reported seeing Jeffs in the wheelchair with the group of apparent loyalists at Strawberry Reservoir, about 55 miles southeast of Salt Lake City.

They were gone by the time FBI agents arrived.

"We think it's a very credible tip," Robbins said.

So why is a fugitive risking capture by shopping and going fishing at one of Utah's most popular fishing holes?

After being on the run so long, fugitives "need to go out and relax too," Robbins said. "We've had crazier things. We don't underestimate anything. We'll cover it all."

Robbins pointed out that Joseph Edward Duncan III, the convicted sex offender charged in a triple murder last May in Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, was captured at a local Denny's restaurant with the girl he is accused of abducting.

The FBI is discounting yet another reported sighting of Jeffs early Friday at a grocery store. Robbins said the report had Jeffs with a group of women, but he's known to travel only with men.

Associated Press and 2News
 
KUTV.com
Originally broadcast October 24, 2005
 
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