Posted on 04/16/2008 1:39:51 PM PDT by MissouriConservative
Several women from the polygamist retreat raided more than a week ago defended their lifestyle Wednesday in an exclusive interview with FOX News, calling it "a wonderful pure life," and saying government officials deceived them when they raided the ranch where they live.
***SNIP***
"I want the world to know that our children have been torn from us and that they need us," said Sally, a mother of nine.
"They told us that they were going to put us on a bus and take us to where it was a bigger, better place to be — where our family could be together," she added.
***SNIP***
On Monday, officials began separating women and some of their offspring without warning, members of the sect said.
***SNIP***
Texas Children's Protective Services spokeswoman Marleigh Meisner said officials decided that children are more truthful in interviews about possible abuse if their parents are not around.
"I can tell you we believe the children who are victims of abuse or neglect, and particularly victims at the hands of their own parents, certainly are going to feel safer to tell their story when they don't have a parent there that's coaching them with how to respond," Meisner said.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
While what you are talking about is a real concern if the people asking the questions don't do their jobs properly, I'm pretty sure the solution isn't to just ignore accusations of abuse and never question children without their parents present.
Record the sessions, and allow the parents to make the argument that their children were coerced.
“I have an 18-year-old daughter that has been taken and isolated, and they’re trying to interrogate her and trying to get her to say that she is the victim,” Amy told FOX News. “And she’s been isolated and interrogated through the whole night and then several days and the abuse is absolutely terrible.”
Sounds like grilling a suspect instead of interviewing a “victim”.
So why isn't this adult child demanding to speak with a lawyer or be released? It's not like she's been prevented from talking from anyone else. If she has been, how does this woman know this is happening?
This is a close knit cult. These are the people from that group that have volunteered to talk to the press. It's possible that they are just defending themselves against the evil government that is out to get them. It's also possible that they are lying to gain sympathy.
Her claims that her adult daughter not only had been held in isolation for days, but has been questioned without sleep, and suffered abusive interrogation is incredulous. Even if you accept her claims as true, how would she know how her daughter has been questioned since she's been isolated from her?
You might want to look up the definition of one of the words you used.
And it is enclosed, by several rings of obstacles.
Eww.
I can't really believe what I'm reading, the impulse to protect the prerogatives of degenerate men. This whole thing plays into a sick fantasy of domination. You don't see the parallels with Sharia?
Most of the boys are run off when they get old enough to fancy girls. There’s another post today about the “lost boys.”
Male: 14 – parental consent and/or permission of judge required. Below age of consent parties need parental consent and permission of judge, no younger than 14 for males and 13 for females.
Female: 14 – parental consent and/or permission of judge required. Below age of consent parties need parental consent and permission of judge. No younger than 14 for males and 13 for females.
Wrong! The minimum age to marry was raised to 16 a few years ago just after this group moved to Texas.
All you have is proof that these women chose to stay with their kids. Bear in mind the children are not allowed to return to the ranch so if the mothers wish to stay with their kids they cannot return to the ranch, either. That they made the choice to stay with their kids is being spun to make it look like they want to leave the ranch when that isn't completely true.
If the shoe fits.
It's a compound.
Well in Texas it says....
is the age with parental consent in Texas?
Where are you finding your information? Citations, please. You may be citing marriage law, but since these are not legal marriages, the marriage laws do not apply; the age of consent laws, do. And the marriage laws can only apply where there is no abuse and where the child consents.
The age of consent laws in Texas are very different, and they are damning. They paint an an entirely different picture:
The age of consent in Texas is 17 {Texas Penal Code Section 21.11}. However , "...It is an affirmative defense to prosecution under this section that the actor...was not more than three years older than the victim and of the opposite sex...(and) did not use duress, force, or a threat against the victim at the time of the offence" and is not a registered sex offender {Section 21.11(b)}.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ages_of_consent_in_North_America#Texas
You wrote:
: 14 – parental consent and/or permission of judge required. Below age of consent parties need parental consent and permission of judge, no younger than 14 for males and 13 for females.
: 14 – parental consent and/or permission of judge required. Below age of consent parties need parental consent and permission of judge. No younger than 14 for males and 13 for females
Again, please cite your sources, since plural marriages are not legal, the marriage laws do not and cannot apply to these children.
No parent can give their permission for their child to be abused illegally, regardless of age.
...they just weren’t quite all there.
Like the Charlie Manson harem girls...remember them?
Well that fits one of the definitions of "abuse" doensn't it!
I think many FReepers are concerned about the abuses of WACO, McMartin preschool, and of parental rights in general.
I share those concerns.
I feel VERY badly for the children in this case.
I do believe, though, that this case does not match Waco or McMartin. Or Nazi Germany, for heaven’s sakes.
There is more than enough reason to pull these kids away for investigation. The fact that it is 400 and not 4 or what have you, just makes it logistically more difficult. And, it makes the scope of the abuse so much greater.
In answer to the rhetorical questions, who I like it if CPS came and took the 4 I have left at home.
NO! I think we’d all lose our minds.
But: I don’t subscribe to a written, verifiable, public position of whoring my daughters off to child predators. Nor is there any physical evidence that I have ever done so.
If I DID, I hope CPS would come get them. I would be a terribly abusive mother in that case.
Or since what you are saying is true, and since this woman says she knows this is happening, other people would also have to know it is happening, and wouldn't have had any trouble contacting a lawyer or complaining to someone smart enough to put a stop to it before they got sued as well as all their witness testimony tossed out.
How is it that so many people are gullible enough to think such statements are credible?
I can’t fathom the cruelty of this either. ACK!
Some of these children don't know who their mothers are. Some children were already taken from their mothers by the leaders of the FDLS so "aunts" could raise them.
...and there is no apology here Mamzelle. I believe that this sect/cult should be investigated and that any crimes should be prosecuted to the max.
But, with all due respect, the fact that there are a number of pregnant teenage girls does not mean that laws (at least of this day and time) have necessarily been broken. If you are going to arrest large numbers of people because teenage girls are pregnant, you better be prepared to shut down the entire inner cities, large swaths of the suburbs, and large tracts of rural America tomorrow.
There are hundreds of thousands of them all around us...which is sadly and tragically a sign of the decline in our moral values and the laws that used to support them, and public policy that used to seek avidly to deter such conditions. Today public welfare laws and public sex education leans much further towards encouraging it. Which is a societal tragedy itself.
Having said all of that, I am just very concerned that the authorities may have acted prematurley and opened the door for lawsuits and legal appeals to what they have done. If that occurs, it will end up adding more money to these people's coffers and make it harder to do investigations in the future. And that would be much worse for the girls in there.
To date the girl has not been found, and it has been shown that the man she was alluding to was apparently in Arizona the whole time.
I hope they find the girl and show that her story was accurate...but I do not hope that over the rights of these other people even if I vehmenently disagree with their theology and religion. The authorities need to do excellent investigative work and have very strong cases in matters like these.
Then when are the other thousands of ranches in Texas with horse fencing and barb wire fences being raided? Because, OH MY GOD!!! They must be COMPOUNDS if they have horse fencing and barb wire around them!
It's amazing how many of the inner circle think their stuff is invisible to the outside world.
Let me clue you in, it's not!
‘You might want to look up the definition of one of the words you used.’
Pederast? Help me out.
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