Lawyer defends officers in FLDS towns
 
By Jennifer Dobner
The Associated Press
YAHOO news
 
ST. GEORGE, Utah - There is no evidence that officers in two polygamous towns on the Arizona-Utah border are more loyal to a jailed religious leader than the law and should be stripped of their badges, an attorney said.

Peter Stirba sent a letter defending the town marshals ahead of a Monday hearing of the Utah Peace Officer Standards and Training Council and Arizona's Peace Officer Standards and Training Board. The certification agencies were to determine whether officers in neighboring Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., should be relieved of their duty.

"The officers of Hildale acknowledge that they have room to improve and that they can benefit from more training," Peter Stirba said in the letter, dated Friday.

"However, they also hope that the ... council and the public at large understand that they do support the law of the land and that they do take their oaths of office seriously and sincerely," Stirba said.

Hildale and Colorado City are twin towns populated by members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, which practices polygamy and arranged marriages. Church leader Warren Jeffs is in jail awaiting trial on charges of rape as an accomplice. He is accused of arranging the spiritual marriage of a 14-year-old girl to an older cousin.

The roughly 10,000 church members consider Jeffs a prophet of God and think of themselves as "fundamentalist Mormons," although the mainstream church disavows any connection.

The officers are accused of misconduct for what authorities describe as ignoring court orders related to $100 million in property held in a church trust and refusing to cooperate in depositions conducted by trust attorneys.

Authorities have a fall 2005 letter written to Jeffs by Fred Barlow, who oversees officers in the two towns, describing him as "Uncle Warren" and expressing allegiance as a "servant" to a man who was on the run from criminal charges at the time.

No evidence has emerged that officers ignored criminal acts in the polygamist enclave.

Stirba said that cooperation has improved and that the officers had been placed in situations requiring sophisticated legal knowledge.
 
news.yahoo.com
Originally published March 19, 2007
 
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