Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Episode #4- Naomie Jeffs
383 Plays2 months ago
This week on The Mothers of All Crime we discuss the spiritual mother - Naomie Jeffs (Jessop). Join us as we dive into the two prophets she married and the role she played within the FLDS cult. It is a wild ride from wife of God, to scribe, to ALLEGED accomplice and eventually a forever non member.
Listener discretion is advised.
May contain explicit language and unfounded accusations.
Find us anywhere podcasts are found- Zencastr, Apple Podcast, Castro, Podfriend, Castbox, Overcast, Spotify and Google Podcast
Like, follow, comment and chat with us @ Mothers of All Crime on Instagram and Facebook or email us @ mothersofallcrime@gmail.com
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast and Naomi Jeffs
00:00:02
Speaker
Hello and welcome to the Mothers of All Crime. This is a podcast where we deep dive into mothers involved in infamous crimes and scandals. I'm Monica and this is Crystal. So this week we have a little bit of a spin on what a mother is and we're going to talk about mother Naomi Jeffs from the FLDS.
History and Beliefs of the FLDS Church
00:00:27
Speaker
One of my favorite topics, the FLDS,
00:00:31
Speaker
They're interesting and there's so many off sex that came from the FLDS too, which I'm sure we'll talk about in the future episodes, but this is the original foundation that the Mormon church eventually came from too, the fundamentalist Latter-day Saint.
00:00:52
Speaker
Oh, that's interesting that you phrase it like that because I feel like Mormons try to spin it like the FLDS broke off from them, but you're right. The FLDS stayed true and the Mormon Church did something different. So yeah, and it's one of those like they don't want to admit to that connection because the FLDS does a lot of stuff now that is illegal.
Impact of Polygamy on FLDS
00:01:16
Speaker
And when that split happened, basically the state of Utah made polygamy illegal. And that's kind of when that split happened of the modern day Mormon church became more mainstream and followed the law. And the FLDS went the direction of, no, this is our faith. It's a fundamental part of our faith is living polygamy. And we're going to continue to do that.
00:01:46
Speaker
And they kind of stopped in that time period and just stayed very traditional to what Joseph Smith. Right. Well, I mean, to be fair to the FLDS, they are following the Book of Mormon when it comes to the principle of plural marriage. And the Mormon Church has just removed that doctrine.
00:02:07
Speaker
but they still use the same book and they still revere Joseph Smith as a prophet. So to me, it's always been a little confusing that he's the prophet, but he's still wrong, I guess, about polygamy in the eyes of the modern day Mormon church.
Gender Imbalance and Exile of Young Men
00:02:22
Speaker
But- And when you listen to current and no longer current Mormons, it's interesting their perspective of how they justify it in their minds, which will be kind of fun to
00:02:34
Speaker
in a later episode get into because that's a whole, whole spiral that we'll get into. Yeah. And I mean, I think you could probably look at most religions or most groups of people that have all of these ideals that if they don't age very well, you kind of have to
00:02:53
Speaker
evolve or you have to really stick to your guns and either way it's going to be difficult. It's going to cause some controversy and some problems kind of undermines the whole thing in my opinion. Yeah, no, absolutely. And like you said, so the FOD is one of their foundational beliefs is that of plural marriage and
00:03:14
Speaker
in order to get to the highest level of heaven, you needed at least three wives. And in their communities, in order to get a position of leadership, you needed seven.
Rulon and Warren Jeffs' Leadership
00:03:23
Speaker
So pretty much the more wives you had, the more powerful you are, the more upstanding you were in your community, they basically the more you had, the better off you were in your circumstance. Yes, definitely true. Which
00:03:38
Speaker
right off the bat, presents some issues numbers-wise. Because if every man has multiple wives and the birth rate is roughly 50-50 of male and female babies and they don't marry outside of their faith, that there are not going to be enough girls for all the boys that are being born. Absolutely. And one thing that the FLDS is amazing at is construction.
00:04:07
Speaker
And they are hard workers and they actually have a lot of contracts with very large companies to do work for them because they have this, like you said, and crazy amount of extra young men, boys that are sent off to these job sites so that you don't take up the young girls and the girls who are eligible to have babies for the older men.
00:04:33
Speaker
so they just send them out or they're banished from the community which we'll get into later because that kind of started once Warren Jeffs took over. Yeah I mean it definitely was happening to some extent prior to that but I think that we're gonna see as we talk about the FLDS that it was always an extreme group.
Naomi Jeffs' Role in the Community
00:04:54
Speaker
They were fundamental in their beliefs and they were always quite insular and quite extreme but under the rule of Warren Jeffs it got
00:05:03
Speaker
way stricter, way tighter, and everything kind of spiraled a bit. And there was definitely a lot of boys being cast out in numbers that they hadn't seen before in the FLDS. So there have been so many leaders, but the one we'll start with is Rulon Jeffs. He was the prophet from 86 to 2002. And he himself had a number of wives and one of them
00:05:33
Speaker
was Naomi Jeffs, who is our mother this week. Yes. She was 18 when she became his 17th wife, when he was 33. Yeah, and so she herself had six moms. Right. Her father was Frederick Jessup. She was the 14th child, I think, or was it her mother's 14th child?
00:06:00
Speaker
I thought she was the 14th child, but it's honestly hard to keep track because she had so many siblings. Oh, yeah. Her biological mother had 16 kids, not counting the other five moms. So if you can imagine what the chaos of that household is, these homes are massive because you have children taking care of other children because mom has another child. So there's that
00:06:29
Speaker
multilayer, the minute that these girls are born, they are taught how to clean, how to cook, and how to be a mom. Definitely true. She does talk extensively about raising her younger sibling. So I think that, I mean, I guess she had tons of younger siblings, but just from her mom alone, there was just so many, so many babies to take care of as a very young teenager. Yeah. And you see pictures of like little kids, like
00:07:00
Speaker
entry school kids walking around with like infants and just very naturally which in like modern society and communities the idea of giving your infant to like a little kid is like not unheard of but like you look at these communities and if you had been taught that from day one on how to take care of something you're gonna be comfortable with it so it's a weird kind of concept that you have to kind of keep in the back of your head in the community like this that that's normal to them
00:07:30
Speaker
Yeah, it definitely rises out of necessity because even if you have five mothers, six mothers, there's still not enough people to take care of all the kids. So you have to recruit the older children to be parenting, which I'm sure that they were capable of doing, but I think that it's not, you're not going to have a childhood if you're also parenting. Right. Exactly. So Naomi was really parenting from a very, very young age.
00:07:59
Speaker
Yeah, I'm trying to stepped into that motherly role. But when she got married at 18, she was the 17th wife of the prophet. And he was 83 years old, with serious health issues. And he wasn't able to have any more children because of those health issues. Right. So for a girl raising a community that your pretty much purpose is to be a wife and a mother, that's devastating.
00:08:28
Speaker
Yeah, you can't have biological children of your own. But she kind of went the avenue of okay, well, she became a teacher and a midwife assistant and a grandmother to his existing grandchildren. Like, she took that role on as well as she could, I think. Yeah, I mean, she acquired 65 spiritual children. When she married him, she was called mother by his kids and grandmother by his grandchildren. Because in the in the FLDS, that's just how
00:08:58
Speaker
It works. So she was a motherly role in a lot of senses. But yeah, she didn't have biological kids. And she thought that that was because her husband was 83, which I think is a fair assumption for her to make initially.
Warren Jeffs' Rise to Power
00:09:14
Speaker
She mentioned that she had wanted to go to nursing school. And it seems like as soon as she mentioned those plans to her parents, she was married off to the prophet.
00:09:26
Speaker
And it was interesting when her testimony of it is her family was very on board with it. And they were like, yeah, you could totally go, but you just have to get approval from the profit. And I think that's kind of that dynamic of where things split. And there's a lot of men who are no longer in the FLDS that were raised there during Roulin's time and the time before.
00:09:54
Speaker
who are like, oh yeah, like we allowed our kids to get educated with certain categories of things. They had a lot more control over their families. But I think when you have girls wanting to go off out of the community to get educated for things, it's a lot more of a concern. Because again, then you're losing a wife, you're losing a mother, you're losing 10 plus babies to come into your community.
00:10:23
Speaker
So when I heard that she wanted to do that, it was, nope, we got to get her married. Because once she's married, she's stuck. It's kind of their mindset for it.
00:10:32
Speaker
Definitely agree with that. I've read several memoirs of people who have left the FLDS and it seems to be a common theme that as girls are reaching an age and a time in their lives where they're seeking some independence that they're immediately married off and forcibly impregnated if that's possible and it makes sense on the cult's end because it keeps them very locked in. It makes it way less likely that they're going to leave
00:10:58
Speaker
soon or ever because if you got someone married at 18 and they don't have an education and they've never worked and they have 10 babies in 12 years, when they look at their lives when they're 30 and they have all of these children and they don't have their own financial resources, it's going to be nearly impossible to
Exile and Extremism under Warren Jeffs
00:11:19
Speaker
leave. There are people who have done it, but it's very, very hard. Yeah.
00:11:25
Speaker
And it's that conditional grooming and mental understanding of the outside world is dangerous there and you're going to get hurt and you'll never be able to do it. So it's like, why would you, you ended up having to make that decision of is what I'm living worse than everything I've been told and having to make that under idea of I would rather go to hell than the place that I'm living. Cause that's what happens if you leave the community, you are condemned to hell.
00:11:53
Speaker
There are so many strict guidelines and moving targets that you need to follow to go to heaven at all, let alone the stage that you're trying to get to, the level that you're trying to get to. It's so easy to be, to fall short of the mark. So I think, I mean, there's just so much pressure on everyone in the FLDS to conform because the living profit decides so much of your life.
00:12:22
Speaker
So you're just kind of waiting for instruction. Yeah, absolutely. And so during her marriage to Rulon, he ended up having a pretty horrible stroke, which kind of debilitated him from performing as he should as a leader. And one of his sons, Warren, kind of stepped into that role. And Warren was the principal at the time of Alter Academy.
00:12:51
Speaker
definitely one of more of the favorite children of Luan, but he definitely was not the eldest. He definitely was not the one in the highest power. He wasn't someone who had a ton of control already, but when Luan got sick, Warren kind of stepped in and started giving commandments and passing on revelations that his father had and making rules of
00:13:17
Speaker
who could talk to his father at certain times, including when his own wives and siblings and children could come visit him. And that was kind of a start of like more in taking power.
00:13:32
Speaker
Warren, I think, just saw an opportunity. And it
Legal Troubles and Arrest of Warren Jeffs
00:13:36
Speaker
looked probably initially like he was very concerned about his father and just wanted to advocate for him and take care of him. But I think it quickly escalated to Warren speaking for Rulon all the time. Yeah. And really on the pulpit. My perspective for it is this is when he started also like putting out his own words under the
00:14:02
Speaker
like facade of it being his father. And because his father couldn't come out and challenge him on it. There was no one to say, I didn't say that. I didn't want that. Warren just could come up and say, Father had a revelation from God that this, this and this has to happen. But his father was incapable of saying, I didn't do that. Like, so I think he started, yes, doing some of what his father was saying, but I also think he started slipping in things.
00:14:32
Speaker
that eventually set him up for the power he was about to take. I think that's a good way to phrase it. Basically, Warren's whole life, he was just seeing how much he could get away with and pushing, pushing, pushing, pushing a little bit more. And he definitely did that with his dad. And then by the end, he's just speaking what he wants to say and just putting his dad's name to it. And then if you question what Warren says, you're questioning his father, who's the prophet, so then you're questioning God.
00:15:02
Speaker
and you can't ask. And you never question the prophet. No, we can't question the prophet. He speaks for God on earth. And this went on for a little while and Warren interestingly started marrying Rubon to a bunch of young girls, like 16 year old girls that over and over and like, Rowan kind of was like
00:15:29
Speaker
In that stance, I'm like, why am I getting married to all these women? I don't understand. It even got to the point that Rulon himself was like, I'm not doing this anymore. What are you doing? Because it was all more in the direction of getting these girls, quote, like, off the market in a way. Yes, he definitely did that. And Rulon, even in his post-stroke adult state, was questioning it and refusing to marry more.
00:15:57
Speaker
because he doesn't need so many teenage brides in his 80s when he's incapacitated. Right. And then he ended up passing in 2002 with 65 lives. Which, if you remember, when Naomi married him, she was the 17th wife. Right. So that number jumped very drastically in a relatively quick time period.
00:16:25
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, Warren wasn't messing around. He'd get married to multiple people in the same day. Mm hmm. 65 wives. Crazy. It was so interesting when you like listen to testimonies of Luan and like how he handled before Warren came involved, how he handled the community and like, people generally liked him. It seemed that he really prioritized the needs of his community and took the time to get to know people and
00:16:54
Speaker
There's families that were very much like, he was referred to as like Uncle Rulan and he cared about the people very much. Underage marriage, they happened, but they were a lot more rare. Like the average age when he was doing it was 18 to 24.
Warren Jeffs' Control from Prison
00:17:11
Speaker
Every once in a while, like a 16 year old would be thrown in there, but it wasn't the norm until Warren started kind of implementing and the underage just jumped at that point.
00:17:23
Speaker
That's true. But also Rulon's daughters were married in their 20s. Right. Yeah. And like the one thing that a lot of families particularly a lot of wives thought was really cute for Rulon was he had these there's a saying in the community of keeping sweet for the women.
00:17:44
Speaker
And he used to have shoes that on one foot on the like sole of shoe said keep and the other one said sweet. And so when you would sit there, it was like, you could see the shoes like sitting up on his chair with like his grandkids around him, there's pictures of it. And it does seem kind of cute and sweet. And like, if you kind of think about what keep sweet means in the long run. Yeah. Yeah, that's what I was just thinking. It's that like, I think it was more of just like, uh,
00:18:14
Speaker
He truly embraced where he was wrong, and he wanted the best for his community. Don't get me wrong, he had plenty of issues, but I think the people seemed to be very happy. The families could run their families how they wanted to. And there was very much, this is my family, here's your wives, great. But no one, families weren't being broken up. You kind of have somewhat control of your own household, your own finances. You could have independent companies
00:18:45
Speaker
there was a lot more of that family dynamic under Rulan. Agreed. Agreed. And so when he died, women basically get reassigned to a new husband because that's your job. Your job is to be a wife and a mother. And they were all kind of like, all right, where do they go next? And at this point, that's when Naomi kind of stepped in and was like,
00:19:14
Speaker
I, she started being like, okay, she sees Warren as the next prophet. She claims that she had a revelation and she saw him and Mulan and actually stood up in church and gave testimony that she believes Warren is the next prophet.
00:19:35
Speaker
That's true. She had a very compelling firsthand account where she saw Rulon's face on Warren's face and they were one person, they were one prophet. And she had this incredible revelation and gave her testimony of it. Which is crazy to think about because in this community, women are second class.
00:20:01
Speaker
They don't go up and provide testimony. They don't go preach. That was almost unheard of at this point, having a woman go up and say something like that. So I think that was also kind of that strange start of, why is Mother Mai only talking right now? Because he couldn't reinforce Warren's claim of him becoming the next prophet. Yes.
00:20:29
Speaker
And Warren spent a lot of time after his father died saying that, you know, nobody better come after father's wives and everybody better, you know, hands off the widows, like, and then all of a sudden he's marrying them. You want to marry seven of them? Yeah. And like a secret ceremony. So he Warren officially became prophet in September of 2002 and
00:20:58
Speaker
he secretly married seven of his quote mothers and seven of his father's wives in secret and then went to church in october of 2002 and asked his wives to stand up and that's how he told the congregation that oh look i married seven of my moms and that's i think when a lot of the older men in the community who had been around for a while were like this is weird like
00:21:26
Speaker
It's one thing to like reassign the wives to like a brother of their husband or another member of leadership, but to marry your own mom, they were like, it's weird. Like, this was the level one of being like, mmm, ick, nope. Yeah. I mean, I think it gave a lot of people the ick for sure. But again, if Warren is the prophet,
00:21:52
Speaker
then he is not ever making decisions that he shouldn't, and everything he says is righteous and holy and everything he does is exactly what he's supposed to be doing. So it's hard to question it, really. He didn't get a lot of pushback. Yeah. And those who did pushback, again, were the men of leadership or men of prestige in their community. And all of a sudden, if someone spoke out, they were being kicked out of the communities.
Life in FLDS Post-Imprisonment
00:22:23
Speaker
and roulon, not roulon, excuse me, Warren would get revelations of the crimes and sins of these men and in church would read out a list of names and be like you are not to say goodbye to your families, you are not to say goodbye to your children, you are to get up right now and leave and never come back and just exile men from the community that he felt threatened by or who challenged him in any way.
00:22:50
Speaker
he was stripping men of their wives, their kids, their power, their homes, their businesses, their assets, everything, because it really all belongs to the church. So Warren had the absolute, right. Everything, Warren had the power to take away everything and he did. And so many men were taken from their families. And it's very hard for me to like feel a lot of sympathy for them, but I kind of do in this situation. I think there was a lot of people who were,
00:23:20
Speaker
blindsided and deeply rocked by this situation. And I think looking back, it's clear that Warren was threatened by having other men in positions of power and was trying to get rid of as many as possible. Absolutely. And as time kind of went, things just started changing. And
00:23:48
Speaker
Some of the men that did leave actually ended up going to a local police department and making some complaints because they were concerned about the community, which is strange to think about because they had been taught their whole lives that the police departments are dangerous. They're not to be trusted. They are going to persecute you. And like they managed to find it in themselves. They're like, I'm willing to go to this place.
00:24:17
Speaker
that is apparently horrible and these people are going to hurt me because I'm concerned about my family, my friends, my children. And Warren got the subpoena and basically was like, eh, I'm not going to that. Right. Well, I mean, the laws of this country don't really apply to Warren Jeffs, if you ask him, because he is under the much higher authority
00:24:43
Speaker
of God. So he didn't really recognize outside authority like that. Yeah. However, he's worn a smart and I do have to give that to him. Sure. That he is smart enough that he realizes that because the police are now looking at him, he needs to be careful and he kind of started to become paranoid at this point. So he left the property
00:25:13
Speaker
to go find Zion, which is a place that they believe is going to, the holiest of people will be there and will be lifted up and saved while the earth is cleansed and they will come back and be able to continue to live under the true way of God.
00:25:37
Speaker
Yes. So they pick this land in Texas, which Warren was inspired. He felt, you know, this is the place, but it also happens to be the state that at the time had the youngest consent laws in America and also where it was legal to get married at the age of 14. So, I mean, it was a really convenient coincidence for him that that was all in one place.
00:26:03
Speaker
Oh, yeah. So they start and some people that's why he did it. I think so to consent there. Definitely. I think so. Oh, yeah. And so he they went and they purchased that land for $700,000. Which was a shocking number for me the first time I heard it just because you think of that you look at pictures of this community and they live such a
00:26:30
Speaker
like simple life. And there's so many mouths to feed. And they're very self sustaining, which is one thing, but then you kind of forget how many large corporations that they're involved with and construction work, and they turn over everything to the church, every penny they make goes back to the church.
00:26:55
Speaker
So when you start thinking about the number of people that there are and the work, you're like, OK, I guess that number isn't as big as I originally thought it was when you look at the work in the population. I mean, financially, the way that that Warren was running the FLDS anyway was
00:27:17
Speaker
extremely profitable for him. Like he came into a lot of money because all of the tides were going to him, all of the businesses were going to him, and he had so much access to free labor that I don't think it was a big amount of money to him at all. They weren't really giving back to their members and their community. Oh yeah, absolutely. So during this time when he was pretty much on the run, he was out with Naomi and his brother
00:27:47
Speaker
Lyle. Naomi at this point had became his scribe and her job basically was to document every word, action, movement that Warren did. And as a group, the Mormons are very meticulous about their records and their history and other people's history. It's very impressive. And the FODS is no different if anything more intense because they're doing
00:28:16
Speaker
warrant every waking moment, which ends up to kind of circle and bite him in the butt later, but. Yeah. I mean, I guess if you think that everything you're doing is directed by God and is for a higher purpose and is unquestionable, then of course you want to document it for history.
00:28:43
Speaker
But when it comes to using this stuff as evidence, it was very helpful for that as well. And Naomi did a great job and she really documented every waking second of his life. Oh, yeah, she did an amazing job for her. And so once they picked this property, they started constructing different homes for Warren and his family, homes for
00:29:13
Speaker
the selected people who were worthy to come as well as the temple. And the people that were coming here, it was very hush hush. Nobody really knew where it was. You had to be selected by the prophet to come and people would just disappear in the middle of the night. And like mothers would go to sleep and wake up and their children would just be gone.
00:29:41
Speaker
because they had been selected by Zion and would be brought and reassigned to a new family with a worthy caretaker or a worthy mother and that mother was no longer their mother. Which is crazy to think about because families just got ripped apart. I think it probably brought up a lot of conflicting feelings for those moms because
00:30:06
Speaker
on one end, they're actually happy that their children are being picked for Zion because the people who make it to Zion are the only ones that are going to go to heaven. So it's an honor for your child to be chosen, but it's obviously a slap in the face to be left behind and to lose your kid. So yeah, I think people had a lot of mixed emotions. Yeah. And so
00:30:32
Speaker
Because of that, the property ended up being predominantly women and children and more. So he was bopping around the country basically while they were people were pulling 22 hour days to build this property up for him. And he was off like with Naomi and his brother being a tourist. He was wearing plain English clothes. He was going to Disney, New Orleans.
00:31:02
Speaker
strip clubs like he was living it up. Driving sports cars wearing red he was doing breaking all his own rules because as time goes by Warren is creating stricter and stricter rules for the community that he does not have to follow himself. But the community didn't know that either. That's true. They were told that Warren was out
00:31:29
Speaker
cleansing areas and looking for like holiness and all these things different and basically also told he was on the run they he was avoiding law enforcement because they were trying to persecute him like they did Joseph Smith exactly and but he would come back and I think that's important
00:31:53
Speaker
for him as a leader to maintain his control, he would come back to the community, see some people, because he's the only one who could perform marriages, so he'd come back, he'd get married himself, he'd marry off some people either in Texas or in Nevada, because Nevada also had a very young age of consent law. It was 14, but you had to have parental consent in that.
00:32:22
Speaker
And there were people who warned would meet in Nevada in like motel rooms, and he would perform marriages in these motel rooms where these 14 year olds, 15 year olds, and their parents would show up, the weddings would happen, and then they would be gone. And that would, because it was legal, because their parent were present, but they, the consent becomes gray when
00:32:51
Speaker
If you don't consent to your child being married, there were serious consequences for you. And basically, your family would be ripped apart. Consent under dress. Right. And one of those marriages in a motel room was a 14-year-old, Elise Wall, who was married to her 19-year-old cousin, Alan.
00:33:18
Speaker
And she made it, she hated her
Challenges and Future of FLDS
00:33:20
Speaker
cousin. It was very well known. And she, after, like in this motel room, was begging her mother not to let it happen. And there's a conversation that she gave basically saying that her mother came over and just squeezed her hand so tight. And in that moment, she realized that if she didn't do it, she was doing it for her family.
00:33:46
Speaker
and to save her family and less about her life. And she would go to Warren asking for help regularly. And he would just tell her to be submissive to her husband. It was her duty as a wife to bear children and pretty much encouraged Alan to take what he deserved in a graceful way of putting it.
00:34:17
Speaker
Yes. That was in 2005. Right. Well, Warren thought all of their marital problems could be solved by making some babies. And that was his counsel that he gave to them, basically giving her cousin permission to rape her because that's his wife. Mm hmm. And she actually ended up escaping from the community later on. And she testified
00:34:47
Speaker
in his trial. But in January 2006, Utah actually charged him with first degree felony of rape as an accomplice. And that's truly when he kind of like went into hiding and went on a run because he knew this was real now. This wasn't just a lawsuit coming through or a disgruntled person who left. This is serious. And this is again, working smart enough to know, okay, there's now consequences.
00:35:17
Speaker
Because he knew he was guilty. That's her question. He knew. He knew he was guilty. And we know that because he told people that he was with that if he was caught, he would never get out of prison.
00:35:29
Speaker
So I mean, I am sure that he spun it like, well, I know he did tell people that it was because he wouldn't be able to get a fair trial and he would get the same outcome as Joseph Smith, essentially, who was assassinated. But I mean, I think he just knew that in a court of law, he was going to be guilty, guilty, guilty, and he didn't want to go to jail. Yeah. And I think there was also a fear
00:35:56
Speaker
And this isn't anywhere. There's just me speculating. He knew what he had done already. And I don't think he knew. So the victim at the time was just Jane Doe in all the paperwork. And he had had so many historical issues that nobody knew about at the time with himself as a predator towards these small children. I don't think he knew
00:36:25
Speaker
what they were coming after him for. Oh, because you have this case where it was just Jane Doe and a marriage, but he didn't know was it someone that he personally assaulted as a child? Was it someone that he married and then then assaulted? Like he had, I don't think any clue how much they knew. He just knew they knew something. And that's where the fear truly was. How terrible.
00:36:54
Speaker
There's just so many crimes I've committed. I don't even know which one this is about. Right. Because now, years later, we know there's multiple people from when he was the principal at Altar Academy that one of his own wives was one of his students that he kind of groomed to caring about him. But there's testimonies and memoirs and interviews of girls and boys who were
00:37:25
Speaker
very young, who he was actually assaulted in bathrooms and his office, his own daughter. Yeah, his own siblings, his own kids, his siblings. And I don't think he knew what they knew. And going back at look at Zion, all of the majority of the people there were children without their mothers, or their biological mothers.
00:37:53
Speaker
Right. Which kind of increased his victim pool, really. So whenever he'd go back, he had access to all of these people with no countermeasures. Right. So as he's on his run, May 2006, he officially became one of the most wanted people in them. He made the list, which is crazy to think about compared to who else is on that list. I know.
00:38:23
Speaker
He was truly on the lamb, though. On the run. Oh, yeah. And he had hundreds of thousands of dollars to support him on the run. So it wasn't hard for him to kind of get around. Yeah, I think it was pretty nice vacation all in all. And I know that the tithes in the temple were still going all to him and people were
00:38:50
Speaker
collecting money for him and sending him letters of support. It was looked at as a spiritual mission that he was on and a complete necessity that he avoided this unjust persecution from the law. He had a lot of support. Oh, yeah. And people started to get squeezed. So like you said, everything was already going to
00:39:15
Speaker
the profit before this. But then people started being like, squeeze of well, you can come up with more. And they were doing everything in their power to get every last penny they could to send to him to help him because they thought they were going to they were protecting him. They had no idea he was out living it up. Spending it previously and doing whatever he wanted.
00:39:42
Speaker
Um, and he was on the run for a pretty decent amount of time, all things considered. And while he was on the run, he'd pop back to the YFC rants every once in a while. And during one of those trips in July, 2006, he took a new wife. He took Mary Ann Jessup, Naomi's little sister.
00:40:06
Speaker
Mm hmm. She who she raised Marianne. She was 16 years older than her. She was basically this girl's mother because like we talked about before, there's so many kids that the older siblings end up being mother figures to their younger siblings. And Marianne was 12 years old when she got married to Warren. Yes, and Naomi was present.
00:40:33
Speaker
She was. And, um, I mean, I don't, I don't know. I think that this is where Naomi starts to lose me. Um, cause she was giving her 12 year old sister, you know, advice on how to be a good heavenly wife to their shared husband. And yeah, I know. I mean, even in preaching evil,
00:41:03
Speaker
on Peacock that I just watched, Naomi is present day, basically, still talking about how her sister really wanted to marry Warren. It's like she was 12. What are you talking about? And when one of her examples were like, Oh, yeah, she would write in like all the night, all the time, like marrying and jazz then. But come on, like if you're a little girl and you're told that this man is basically God, or the
00:41:34
Speaker
Of course you're going to idolize him. It makes total sense. But just because you idolize him doesn't mean you want to get married. And at 12 years old, she's a baby. I know. It's so crazy that 14 is not even young enough for him. Right. I mean, at that point, 14 is so old. I think.
00:41:58
Speaker
he had done so many younger ones in secret, which we now know he did. I think he was just slowly working backwards to condition people to have it not be as shocking. Because the 12 year old, there are plenty of people that were like, Oh, I was very uncomfortable with it. But you know, God said it was to be so right. And at that point, they had been conditioned to
00:42:26
Speaker
he just went younger and younger and younger. So like, yeah, they felt icky about it, but they were like, all right, well, I guess like, I think he just was going to slowly keep working backwards. Yeah. I mean, he's a button pusher. He's a nudger. Like he just, Warren just kept going a little bit more extreme, a little bit at a time. And he was just continuously getting away with it. So why not keep going?
00:42:58
Speaker
Right. Um, and so after he got married, he went back in the run and about a month later they were pulled over, um, a little bit outside of Las Vegas and he was arrested along with Naomi and his brother, Wile, because he was finally, they finally put two to two together on who he was when he got pulled over and
00:43:26
Speaker
Naomi at the time was begging for them to release Jeffs and let her be take the fall because, you know, he's a husband and he's a father and he needs to be there for everybody because he's been so present lately. Right. Well, he's the prophet. They need him. And Naomi's just her. And she was, you know, complicit and was involved.
00:43:54
Speaker
in a lot of these crimes. So probably they should have all just stayed arrested. Which is wild because they let her and Lyle go two days later. No charges, completely free. And still no charges have been filed against Naomi. And that's so shocking to me because I wonder if it's just that like they wanted the bigger fish, which I totally agree with.
00:44:22
Speaker
But the fact that she never to this day had any charges is shocking because like we talked about, she was described. She was sent for anything, the weddings, the like heavenly sessions, which we'll talk about, the criminal acts, money. Like she was there for all of it. She noted everything yet was never held responsible.
00:44:53
Speaker
Well, I guess she was just there documenting it, is what her version of events are. But I don't know that I agree with that. Yeah. So Warren was taken in. He was arraigned. He was held in purgatory correctional facility, which I think is a little ironic. Yeah, I do like that a lot. And he, I think, had the first time in his life
00:45:21
Speaker
was in a circumstance that he had no control in where like he got put in protective custody because everybody knew who he was, but also people were mean to him. Like, oh, my baby. Like, I know. So sad. And he spiraled. He got to a point where he was actually telling people that he made it a lump. He wasn't the prophet.
00:45:50
Speaker
And he attempted suicide in his jail cell. Yeah, he did. The videos of him talking to his family are absolutely chilling. And the one where he's telling, I think it's Nephi, one of his brothers, he's telling him, I'm not the prophet. I'm a terrible person and I'm not the prophet. And this has all been fake. And you can just see his brother's
00:46:18
Speaker
brain exploding, essentially, as he's trying to process this. And he's just adamantly, no, you are, you are the prophet. You are the prophet. Why are you saying that? This is a test. Yeah. And that's how conditioned he had everybody. Yeah. Which is kind of where I fall with Naomi is like, I don't know that I want to blame her or Nephi because I feel like they're victims of the circumstance as well and that they've been brainwashed. But at the same time,
00:46:48
Speaker
Warren was also indoctrinated into the same cult. And so maybe these are all just these terrible reactions that happen to people who are born in these closed communities in these like insane systems. And then maybe Warren is also a victim of the FLDS. I know he made it worse and he obviously added a lot of trauma and problems, but if he had been given an opportunity to have a normal life, maybe things
00:47:17
Speaker
would have been a lot different for him as well. Yeah, I mean, I think with some people I can get on board with that but with Naomi like even it just took her longer but she eventually did start to go was that what I was taught? Did other profits that she had lived through
00:47:39
Speaker
say the same thing. So I think it was that to a degree, absolutely right. It's brainwashing and conditioning. But there were so many people that stood up and were like, hold on, this is so different than what we had always been taught and always had lived. Why is it now what God wants? And she could have also done that same thing of, I'm sorry,
00:48:07
Speaker
It's never been a time where a 12 year old is considered a bride and not said something, but instead she stood by and supported his actions. So I don't know because I have like, I have a couple of trains of thought on this, but I think that Warren was warped by his upbringing. And I think maybe inherently there was some things not right with him.
00:48:34
Speaker
Um, but I think that his upbringing warped him. I don't actually think he really believed in like his father being the prophet or God in general or the religion. I don't think he really believed in any of that, but he grew up in this system where everyone believed it so adamantly that if you are a manipulative person, it's so easy to use that to your advantage. And I think like being brought up in a system like that,
00:49:01
Speaker
let someone like Warren, who is intelligent and is manipulative and is questioning his own faith and reality, it just gave him a perfect opportunity to lie and manipulate everybody with his own version of this thing that he doesn't believe anyway. If it's all made up, it's very easy to twist it. And if you know what people believe, all you have to do is just manipulate it a little.
00:49:28
Speaker
No, there's no question he was a smart man. So that's very possible. But what I thought was so interesting for him is I do think he believed in some of it. And because I get hard to live and be brought up in a community like that, that you don't have some belief in it. I don't know, because I feel like you have to believe in it. And he seems like he hates himself.
00:49:58
Speaker
And again,
Reflection on Naomi Jeffs and FLDS Legacy
00:50:00
Speaker
like that whole thing that he attempted suicide is in their community. They didn't believe that he did it. They believed that it was a lie or rumor and like, because suicide is worse than murder in that community. You don't do that. And there's something called the blood atonement.
00:50:21
Speaker
And I don't know if, I know some sects of polygamous groups believe in this and used to practice, but I don't know if the FLDS at this point still have that in their doctrine. The blood atonement basically is just, you can justly spill blood to atone for someone's sins. And that is acceptable. So you could kill someone in the name of God and their sins.
00:50:51
Speaker
you can't kill yourself. And it's interesting that he chose to try to commit suicide to get out of the repercussions of his actions. Yeah, because I don't really think that he felt. I think, so I don't know, my thought, which I could be totally wrong, I think Warren the whole time knew that he was not the prophet.
00:51:18
Speaker
I don't know if he believed that anyone else was the prophet or that it was possible to be the prophet, but I think that he knew 100% that he was not the prophet. And I think he also knew that none of the teachings were that important to him because he was willing to change all of them to his own end. So I think at that point in prison, attempting suicide, he's so far away from his life as a prophet, but I don't even think he thinks any of those rules really apply to him.
00:51:48
Speaker
And I don't think that he thinks that there's this horrible spiritual damnation coming for him either. I think he wanted an out. I don't think he wanted to be in prison. And he was not going to stand by his convictions because they weren't real anyway. And that's what he's telling everyone is that I'm not the prophet. I'm not the prophet. This was all bullshit. And then he's trying to take, he's trying to take an exit out. And his only real option at that point, because he was not able to break out of jail was to try to kill himself, which he also wasn't ultimately able to do.
00:52:18
Speaker
So he just doesn't have any options. Yeah. Yeah. And he pretty much cut everybody off for like two months and until his trial started. But then once his trial started, all of a sudden he was the prophet again. And you're right. That was a test. Support me, pray for me. And he started implementing all these other rules to get him out of prison.
00:52:46
Speaker
He pretty much told the community that if they were righteous enough, he would be released back to them. Because they have no concept of the legal system. They don't understand how it works. Because if you're never taught, how do you know? Well, they were taught that if they prayed hard enough that he would come home. So that was their understanding of how it worked. And
00:53:11
Speaker
To this day, even after all of this, Warren still controls the FLDS. He is still in charge. But with his trial, he would have visitors, like you said, and Naomi was one of the people that would visit him. And he ended up being found guilty in Utah for his charges.
00:53:39
Speaker
sentence to present, he was held there. And while he was in jail, there was a raid on the ranch from a caller claiming to be Sarah Barlow, who was an underage girl, married, pregnant, already had a baby. And the Texas Rangers game wardens and Midland Police Department showed up and over five days raided the entire community.
00:54:11
Speaker
Yes, and they found a lot of children. They did find some very, very young mothers who were assigned in marriage to old men, but they did not find Sarah, Jessup, Barlow, or whatever her name was because she was a crazy person that lived in Colorado that was not there. So she made it up, but they did find a lot of people that fit the description and were
00:54:40
Speaker
doing the same stuff that just that person specifically did not exist. But children were seized and taken into state custody en masse and it created a lot of public backlash.
00:54:57
Speaker
Rebecca Japs, who was actually Rulon's 19th wife, she was also the sister of the girl that Warren was convicted in of Utah. She had been brought in by the Texas Rangers as kind of a
00:55:18
Speaker
asset to help them understand the community, because they wanted to be as respectful as possible, because they understood that this was a whole new place for them. But at the end of the day, they do have to execute the warrant, they do have to go through the property and like, they tried their best and particularly with so many kids. And one thing that Rebecca told them about was some more as Rulon's wife, she had a lot of insight about how the higher
00:55:46
Speaker
families worked and like the secrets and the intricate stuff and she made it very clear to them somewhere on that property there's going to be a vault. In that vault is going to be records and documentation of everything you need. She and she didn't know exactly what was in it but she knew that it existed and it was somewhere there and from her time as being the prophet's wife and
00:56:14
Speaker
they ended up finding that vault in the temple and it took them, once they found it, it took them hours to get inside of it because they had to pretty much break through this massive vault to find eventually all of the evidence that was going to be used in the Texas trial. And you have that
00:56:40
Speaker
Again, those records, Mormons are great record keepers, and Naomi took great notes. She really did. And they found a lot of that, for sure, in Zion, but they also found a bed in the temple, which they thought was pretty odd. It was so creepy. I know. Super creepy. And for people who haven't seen it, you have to look it up.
00:57:09
Speaker
It is, so the temple itself is all white. It is a beautiful structure. I got to give them credit for building this over two years. This place is massive. And in this room, it was a all white, empty room. It was kind of like a semicircle shape with a bed in the middle with like neons next to it. And the bed was waist high.
00:57:38
Speaker
with railings on the side of it. So creepy. Oh, yeah. And you have Rangers giving testimony. They're like, you walked in and they're like, you just felt that it was something was wrong. They're like, it was just creepy. And having people in those positions be like, you just felt the creepy like that's saying something like something was wrong.
00:58:08
Speaker
um and along in that bullet there were audio recordings that they also found of things that happened in that temple which are chilling so before we get into that though i think it's important to note that utah actually overturned Warren's conviction right on some jury instruction which was shocking for
00:58:37
Speaker
the, not the FLDS community, but like the general community. Right. Because that's such a rare thing for that body to overturn something like that. Um, but there was a deal that happened in 2010 that, all right, well then Texas will take them and they extradited him to San Antonio, Texas to stand trial on one count of sexual assault of a child.
00:59:06
Speaker
and one count of aggravated sexual assault of a child from the records that they found and talking to the girls and mothers and children from the range. Yeah, and they played audio recordings of his literal rape of a child for a jury in Texas and he was convicted and he's serving life in prison.
00:59:36
Speaker
And that has not been overturned yet. Hopefully it won't be. Right. Yeah. So that 17 minutes, no, excuse me, 14 minute recording was of his quote unquote wife, Mary Ann. Um, Naomi's performing a heavenly session in the temple room and heavenly sessions, depending on who you ask are different
01:00:06
Speaker
However, we're going to go with the majority's opinion, where it was pretty much acts of group sex of seven plus women, mainly his wives, that were in a room together and would perform sexual acts to Warren and to each other to help him come back because he would be
01:00:35
Speaker
atoning for the people's sins. And if they worked together, they could bring him back from the break of death. And he would give blessings to people during these moments, which pretty much from reading between the lines is when he decided to focus on you as an individual, you were getting a blessing.
01:01:04
Speaker
versus him looking at as a group. Right. And this was the recording that was played this 12 year old. And interestingly enough, Warren represented himself in this trial, which was stupid, but very narcissistic of him. I still can't believe he did that. Because like, part of me is like, good, you're stupid enough to think that you're going to get your
01:01:34
Speaker
capable of getting away with this because he deserved to be in prison. Right. But the other part of me is like, knowing the justices and like if he had a legitimate lawyer that we know he could have paid for a really good attorney, that recording would have been thrown out. And he probably actually wouldn't even be in jail. I don't really understand why he did that.
01:02:04
Speaker
I was trying to think about why, because he had attorneys for the previous trial, and I just, I feel like, I mean, he did a really bad job. There was one point where he just stood silently. Right. Yeah. I am at peace. I remember the words he muttered for his closing statement. Right.
01:02:29
Speaker
I think he was just so cocky that he wanted these attorneys to argue that he didn't do anything wrong or argue about the S law. And they were like, no, we can't do that. And he was like, fine, I'll do it myself. Like, I don't think he realized that because he got away with one. I think he was like, oh, I'll just get away with the next one. I think that had that mentality. Yeah. Straight up delusional.
01:03:00
Speaker
Yeah. So his current release date is 2038, which would make him 83 years old when he gets released, if he gets released. And also to mention the second victim for those crimes was Rita Keat, who was another underage wife of his who had a baby. And that's how they probed through a DNA test that the baby was his, which confirms that he had
01:03:28
Speaker
Relations with her while she was underage because she there was a baby. It's pretty easy to prove when you have a living Yeah, it's just a DNA test and it's a strict liability crime with statutory rape it doesn't matter if She really wanted to marry you and she really wanted to have sex with you if she's a minor if she's not old enough to consent then that's it and then that's a strict liability rape and you're gonna have a felony and
01:03:58
Speaker
I mean, to me, it's crazy that because he had a lot of his wives on birth control. And I think it's it would have been which is also against what they believe in. Yes, this murder of a child. Right, definitely. He also would not allow his wives to go to a hospital if there was complications in birth. And he lost at least one child during delivery during a very long, high risk home birth that was failed.
01:04:28
Speaker
the midwives were screaming, begging and crying for him to let her go to a hospital or be seen by a doctor and he refused. And that's also should be illegal. But I mean, the rules of the flag brings outside people in. Oh, yeah, absolutely. Right. But a lot of people are on antidepressants as well, which was also not really kosher for their beliefs. But under Warren, it was a huge boom in the amount of
01:04:57
Speaker
women that were prescribed antidepressants because it kept them more compliant. Well, and that's what's so interesting is he picked and choose when he wanted rules to apply. So like you said, a lot of the medical stuff. And then there's the media aspect. Like until this kind of, all this kind of blew up, they were that quiet people that people knew existed, but they didn't look into it all.
01:05:27
Speaker
So you have these, if you listen to recordings of the women, because once those kids got taken in Texas, they took to the media and more were begging for people to support them to bring their kids home and stuff like that. And they all have this sweet, quiet, passive voices, crying and Rebecca,
01:05:55
Speaker
kind of came out with a statement. And she was funny about it. I think it was kind of comical where she's like, Oh, it's an act. And she turned on that voice. And she was like, this is how we're talked to speak and behave and compliance. And then she turned it back off. And she was like, one of the women doing that testimony who claims that no underage marriages are happening. She's like, was the midwife for an underage girl?
01:06:22
Speaker
while I was there. She's like, so she's like, no. And it's interesting. You listen, there's so many documentaries, yes, these women, they can turn on and off that voice. So again, it's something they're taught. And they turned it on when the media went on because they want that projection. Hey, you have to do whatever you can to get these kids back. Okay, turn it on. Poor little prairie life who
01:06:51
Speaker
children were stolen from her. Anyone's going to feel bad if you don't know the context. Interviews and documentaries that featured Naomi Jeffs, and she talks in that voice sometimes, not all the time, but sometimes. And I feel like I was kind of lulled into a false sense of security by it because she sounds so innocent.
01:07:19
Speaker
But I do think that she knew, at least at the end, she knew that Warren was full of shit and that they were doing really serious, very harmful things. But I don't know if she was just too deep in it and couldn't see a way out or she was enjoying the ride and being a favorite wife, which is a huge position of power that was otherwise unachievable.
01:07:47
Speaker
And if she was bucking to Warren, she would have lost that immediately and he would have replaced her immediately. But I think now she has a lot of. It's hard for her to take any kind of accountability without admitting to criminal stuff also, because she did do illegal things and she did aid in a bed. Him in rape and financial crimes and fleeing from the law.
01:08:16
Speaker
And all of those things probably should have got her because her brain is fugitive. Oh, absolutely. I mean, you could go on there where she just doesn't, she was caught between like a rock and a hard place from her position of if she got removed from being the scribe, she was in Cape. She didn't have any children. She didn't have any other position. She would be pretty much banished from if she like made him angry, she'd be gone.
01:08:46
Speaker
And it was nothing she would have anymore. And I think that kind of came forward while he was in prison. He ended up getting angry with her because she refused to do something and sent her to our house of hiding. And she was alone, completely isolated in the middle of Colorado. She didn't even know where she actually was, told to atone for her sins.
01:09:16
Speaker
And she was there for, I think was it two years? I think it was two years. Just waiting to be told she could come back when pretty much Warren wasn't mad at her anymore. And this was an option that she was very aware of. So what would you rather be the favorite life that everyone was jealous of and be with your husband all the time and
01:09:44
Speaker
be by his side and support the profit or a loan and a house for God knows how long. Yeah. I mean, it's an easy choice really, but I, I do think that I don't know when they were on the run, it's hard to say that she had no other options because she could have at any point. Here he is.
01:10:15
Speaker
FBI is most one. Well, that's where that brain like washing comes into play. Yeah, that's true. She was taught to do whatever, don't question the prophet, protect him at all costs. And that's what she was doing until I think he got arrested and everything kind of started tumbling down.
01:10:41
Speaker
when she started to kind of look at things. But I think you're right where she still can't take accountability for it, because they also think she's probably one of the smarter wise, which is why she ended up in her position, that she knows if she starts admitting to certain stuff, that's when those criminal charges are going to come up. And I think she's holding on to, I was a victim and brainwashed to avoid said charges.
01:11:08
Speaker
Because even today, she believes that Warren is innocent on the charges for Marianne. She says it's her belief that nothing sexual ever happened. And Rita, it was an unjust and unfair ruling because she was mature for her age. She wanted to have a baby and she was a wife. So it's fine. Oh my God.
01:11:36
Speaker
doesn't matter how old she was. So wild. But it's also, she was just raised in this very, I don't know, in a world where those things make sense. And it's crazy looking at her now and knowing that she's becoming a nurse and is living in this secular society. And it's just, it's so wild that she's
01:12:07
Speaker
I feel like she's underestimated and that's why she's not being held accountable. And she's just looked at as, I don't know, a little idiot, a little wife that didn't know better. And she was just told what to do and she had no options and warns the real evil one, which he is. He definitely is.
01:12:34
Speaker
Yeah, they're both evil. I think he's just the mastermind. And that's where they wanted to disassemble what he had made and the culture he had made. So they were like, all right, we have to focus on one. Right. But it surprises me that after they finished with that trial that they didn't go after Naomi. Because to this day, Warren is in charge and he is in full control of that community.
01:13:03
Speaker
Oh yeah. I do want to talk about that a little bit. Insane. So like you mentioned, Naomi is out. But part of that is because he like banished her. Yeah. He told her they're divorced. She's a rebel member, which basically means you're like unbaptized from the community. And then they're divorced and you're not married to me anymore. Goodbye. Yeah. Dumped her. Wild.
01:13:32
Speaker
But then he was doing that to a lot of people. Yeah, he was. And I'm curious what your thoughts are about like the new rules that he implemented since he has been in prison. So in my opinion, he kind of is like recreating his prison life for his followers. So everything from everything needs to be homemade, every part of what you're wearing.
01:14:02
Speaker
You can no longer eat sugar. You can't eat certain types of food. Certain colors aren't allowed to be born. You are no longer allowed to have marital relations with your spouse, which I think is a huge one because this community doesn't allow like outside members. You can't join the MDF.
01:14:32
Speaker
And now you can't have any babies in theory. So I think what are the rules? So many rules. So he's just being a dick, but they don't know that. Yeah. And he would make, he makes phone calls that they've developed like a speaker system. So when he calls from jail, it's,
01:15:02
Speaker
broadcasted to like multiple homes in the community. They're required to have a picture of him in every single room in the house. They have to pray every hour for him to be released and brought forth because the only way for him to be released is if they are righteous enough and that's why he is in jail is because they're not doing good enough.
01:15:30
Speaker
It's wild to me that people follow this with him being locked up. I'm very interested in what happens after he dies. Oh, yeah. That's, I don't know. I think there's enough of his brothers that right now that are vocalizing his orders. I have a feeling that someone's doing exactly what he did. Just probably on the outside now. Um,
01:15:58
Speaker
But my favorite, well not my favorite, the grossest I think maybe, that is still happening is these heavenly sessions are still happening. In his honor, they get recorded, smuggled into the jail and shown to him during their video call, like the in jail video call. That is so fucked up. What? Oh my God. It's wild to me. Wild.
01:16:29
Speaker
That's really wild. He's a disgusting pervert, honestly. Disgusting. And I don't believe Naomi's little innocent act in regards to that stuff. I think she was very, very involved in the sexual stuff that he was doing when he was on the outside. And she would probably still be involved now if he didn't divorce her and excommunicate her.
01:16:54
Speaker
Yeah, I think she absolutely was a lot more involved than people think she was. I think she had, I think she was smart and I think she probably helped guide him in certain cases to avoid detection and things like that. And if she was able to maintain being a favorite wife with him in jail, she never would have left. But once she went back to the community,
01:17:23
Speaker
She was shunned by the rest of the family, all the other mothers, the children, like people didn't want to be around her because I think both they blamed her for their profit being in jail, but also like she probably came back feeling very righteous in a way. I was the favorite and I know all this stuff and I was with him and expected like a warm welcome and didn't get that.
01:17:53
Speaker
Definitely not. I wish I could give her a truth serum and talk to her about what happened back then and her thoughts on it now, because she's still so, she's a closed book. She's not telling a lot. Yeah. There's so many things that during the preaching evil documentary, she was asked, she's like, I'm not going to comment on that because she knows if she does, she opens it to her being found guilty of something.
01:18:23
Speaker
Yeah. Well, I think she was at the very least involved and complicit in the sexual abuse of her 12 year old sister and that she should go to prison for. But I mean, that's a little good. I don't know. I wasn't there. I wasn't scribed. Right. And also, I have a theory that I think she was present for the wedding of the 14 year old to the 19 year old as well. Because
01:18:51
Speaker
she was described. She documented everything. She went everywhere and women in that community aren't seen. Like she could have, she was probably present taking notes about what happened and no one even put it together that she was there because you are to be seen and not heard. So if Warren's there performing a wedding, there's arguments because you don't want to get married, yada yada, she's just sitting in a corner. There's no way in my mind that she wasn't present for that.
01:19:21
Speaker
She definitely knew and she also definitely knew that Elisa hated her cousin and did not want to marry him. I think she was aware of everything and present for many things. So my question for you. Yeah. Oh, for sure. Is what do you think the community is going to do now? So reality is he's up for parole at 83, but the chance of getting out is
01:19:51
Speaker
a big question mark. He could be let out, don't get me wrong, but also him making that far as slam. What do you think the community is going to do as he's still in jail, kind of to grow and build because they have all these restrictions. They're working so hard to get them out. Do you think that someone's going to take over? Do you think that they'll die out? What are your thoughts? So I think
01:20:18
Speaker
those are pretty much the two options is that they will either die out or someone else will take over. And I think what you said before about Warren's brothers, some of them might usurp power. And I think if one of them, especially if Warren dies, that would actually probably be the best thing that could happen for the FLDS, because I think one of his brothers, best and worst,
01:20:41
Speaker
because one of his brothers would probably take over and they would probably be able to change the rules into a way that makes them a functional society again. Because if you can't get new members, then your existing members are going to age and eventually die and the group will burn out. So I think unless a new prophet comes in and changes a lot of rules and dynamics, I think they'll die out. And I think a lot of people have left and joined other faiths.
01:21:11
Speaker
other sex of Mormonism or have left and renounced it completely. And I think that will continue to happen. But I think the people who are there now are pretty diehard. Oh, absolutely. And I totally agree. I think the people that are still there, either they are just so conditioned, or they haven't had as much like trauma from like a family being ripped apart or
01:21:37
Speaker
knowing someone that something bad happened to, like maybe those ones live in a little bit more of a bubble. It's the older people, the ones that don't feel the confidence to be able to leave on their own. But one thing about them dying out is since he has been incarcerated, he did make that rule that you can't have marital relations. But what he also started doing is implementing seed spreaders, where he has a like
01:22:07
Speaker
select group of men, his brothers and a couple other people of power, that are allowed to more or less breed with wives, not only their wives, but other men's wives in order to get them pregnant and continue growing the population. And there's rumors of people smuggling out Warren Jeff's sperm in order to impregnate his wives
01:22:38
Speaker
And if they've come out as pregnant, it's because again, he is the true prophet and he is God, therefore it will be continued. So it's interesting that if that is true, ew. My mind immediately goes to in breathing and how that is already wreaking havoc on this group and will only worsen.
01:23:08
Speaker
And I mean, if we go enough generations, they'll probably sterilize themselves because there's going to be so much inbreeding. And especially if it's not documented the way that it had been previously, which I'm not really sure how their record keeping looks these days, but they may not be writing the true fathers if these are, if this is like a mission that's being performed by certain men, but these women are actually
01:23:37
Speaker
married to someone else, depending on whose name is recorded as the child's father, I think that's going to cause a lot of confusion and a lot of accidental inbreeding. And I think that's going to be a huge topic. And you have smaller groups that we'll talk about in future episodes, like the Kingston clan, that in order to
01:24:05
Speaker
keep that from happening and causing issues, they do blood tests to see who you're allowed to marry in your own family to prevent sterilization and be birth defects and stuff like that. I'll be curious if the FODS does doing that same thing. They probably are already looking. They probably have the same concern and are looking into solutions for it. And there are blood tests that you can do.
01:24:35
Speaker
But it would just show how much of your DNA is going to overlap. It's not going to say that no problems will arise with that. So it's still going to be right. It's still a lot of risks. And in these groups where medication and hospitals and testing and all of these things are kind of not the norm for them, I think it makes it even scarier about what the potential outcomes could be.
01:25:06
Speaker
I mean, I would prefer if they just all died at a ripe old age and stopped having new members come in at all. But I think they're gonna have very small generations and eventually we'll peter out or one of his brothers will realize he's the prophet. I wonder if he'll, ooh, what if one of the brothers tries to claim
01:25:34
Speaker
prophet while Warren's in jail. He was not the true prophet. That would be an interesting one. I mean, I could see it happening. It's just going to be kind of a tough sell. Because it's like, what have we been doing all this time, then, if he wasn't the prophet? That's what makes it so difficult to question anything. Because if you question anything, question everything, and then you realize that it's all been pointless.
01:26:03
Speaker
it could threaten the entire thing. That's a good point. Yeah, they might not have a choice. I don't think he's ever going to get out. I know he's eligible in 38, but I don't think he's actually going to get released. I think he'll either die in prison or they'll keep him there on some kind of, you know, agility for parole. But also him,
01:26:32
Speaker
living till 83 in that system is very slim. So I'm not sure. Well, I like this rendition of a mother. It's a little bit of a different avenue that we've taken in the past. Yeah, although if you think about it, she has more kids than anybody else we've talked about. She has like 100 something. And in this religion, if your husband has children, they are your children.
01:26:58
Speaker
It doesn't matter because you have so many wives and all of the children are your mutual children. And the children refer to you as mother. Yeah. Mother Sarah. Mother Naomi. Mother Naomi, who was married to two prophets and became her own... Well, what is it called when you marry your husband's son? Like, so she married her son. She married her son.
01:27:27
Speaker
Because Warren is one of her children as well. So she married her son. So she became her own sister? Mother-in-law? I don't even know. Your own mother-in-law, right? Yeah. I think so. Because she is her own mother-in-law. So not only is she a mother, she's a mother-in-law. She is her own mother-in-law.
01:27:55
Speaker
Can you imagine having to explain that to her mainstream husband if she ever does get married again? No, I'm trying to look at her family tree and it's so complicated. There's so many arrows, there's so many giant sections of things and it's incomprehensible. Her family is crazy.
01:28:16
Speaker
And this is very hard to explain to outside people. I mean, I have been indoctrinated through a lot of FLDS survivor memoirs over the years. I've probably read all of them. And I love any kind of documentary about polygamy. I just find it really, really interesting. But the FLDS is a special favorite for sure.
01:28:38
Speaker
And I think the reason we did this one first, too, is to understand the FLDS kind of gives you that background on where the rest of them came from. Because there's so many off-sex now that each of them have similar beliefs, but very different. But they're all connected at some point to the FLDS. Yes. And I think the FLDS is
01:29:05
Speaker
a comparison point that a lot of other groups use. Oh, we're not as bad as the FLDS. So I think it's, it isn't right to understand a little bit of the dynamics within this community. Oh, I totally agree. Well, any final thoughts for Ms. Mother Naomi? I don't think so, but it'll be interesting to see, you know, her nursing career and what she does in the future.
01:29:35
Speaker
Yeah, we'll have to keep an eye on what is next and if Warren ever does get out. Oh my goodness. He's got 10 years to go. I hope he doesn't, but I guess we'll see. Lovely chatting with you. All right, well, lovely chatting and I will talk to you soon. All right, bye.