Polygamist Judge fights for his job
 
By Carli Saracino
Salt Lake Community College Globe
 
A Hildale judge, Walter Steed, is fighting to stay on the bench after it was revealed that he currently has three wives.

Steed was found by Utah's Judicial Conduct Commission to be a polygamist and the case to remove him as a judge is now being brought before the state's Supreme Court.

Steed and his attorney, Rodney Parker, are arguing that the judge's private behavior does not influence his ability to rule in court.

"As long as I can do my job, why should I [be removed]?" Steed asked the Chicago Sun-Times.

Steed has been a judge for over 25 years, ruling mostly on cases involving domestic violence and drunken driving charges.

Those seeking to have Steed removed argue that the offense has more to do with the legality of his personal lifestyle, because bigamy is a felony in the state of Utah.

"Judges are expected to live to a different standard," Colin Winchester told the Times. Winchester is the Commission's executive.

Despite the crime's status as a felony, punishable by up to five years in prison, the Utah attorney general and Washington County officials have declined to press charges.

The cold-shoulder is a not uncommon attitude toward polygamy in Hildale and nearby Colorado City, Arizona. The area is largely populated by members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who continue to practice polygamy although it was abolished by the LDS Church over 100 years ago.

Warren Jeffs, considered a prophet by the religion, is a fugitive from the law, also facing polygamy charges.

The arrest of Tom Green sparked national attention when Green was found to have five wives. Green was also convicted of failing to pay child support for any of his 29 children. Steed has a total of 32 kids from the three wives.

In 1965, Steed married the first wife in a state-recognized civil ceremony. Ten years later, Steed married his sister-in-law in a religious ceremony. In 1985, again in a religious ceremony, Steed took his wives' other sister in matrimony.

Bigamy, by definition of Utah law, constitutes taking another spouse, cohabitating with another individual or purporting marriage to another while still married.

Plural marraige is a constitutional right, Steed maintains, and should be legal, especially as his religion dictates its necessity.

"If that's a law that has to be lived to receive the highest degree of glory in the celestial kingdom, then it ought to be legal," Steed told KSL.
 
slccglobelink.com
Originally published Friday, November 11, 2005
 
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