- 14 minutes ago
- #prisoner
- #realityinsighthub
Prisoner of the Prophet (2023) Season 1 Episode 2 - Blood Atonement
#Prisoner of the Prophet
#RealityInsightHub
🎞 Please subscribe to our official channel to watch the full movie for free, as soon as possible. ❤️Reality Insight Hub❤️
👉 Official Channel: />👉 THANK YOU ⭐❤️❤️❤️⭐
#Prisoner of the Prophet
#RealityInsightHub
🎞 Please subscribe to our official channel to watch the full movie for free, as soon as possible. ❤️Reality Insight Hub❤️
👉 Official Channel: />👉 THANK YOU ⭐❤️❤️❤️⭐
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00I went into that marriage not knowing what I was even signing up for and it probably would have
00:15been worse if I knew. It probably would have been worse. She's married off to this dude that she
00:22believes she has to marry. He's right off the bat perverted and she's resisting so he punishes her
00:29for it. I mean and then it just gets worse and worse and worse. I didn't know if I would be able to
00:35survive. Like I didn't know if I'd be able to get out. The prevailing wisdom in both Utah and Arizona
00:42was don't touch it. It's going to take you down politically. That was part of the problem. No one
00:48wanted to talk about polygamy. Mark and I were able to change that narrative by initiating a variety of
00:57investigations. The charges started with the abuse of young children. That was what the
01:03common denominator was between Utah and Arizona. Finding complaining witnesses was very difficult
01:10because nobody would leave the community. We knew we had lots of stories about child bride marriages
01:16that Warren Jeffs was not just marrying but forcing many girls to marry older men. But we didn't have a
01:22willing witness come forward and you can't prosecute a case or investigate one without one. And then
01:27Alyssa Wall came forward and said I had been forced to marry this older man by Warren Jeffs. And he said
01:34if I didn't I'd burn in hell. And so we elected to charge him with rape of a child as an accomplice
01:42and he took off. He is the fugitive leader of a polygamist church. He was wanted for marrying
01:49underage girls. He went on the lam in order to avoid having to answer consequences for criminal
01:55prosecutors. Even though the police were after him he was definitely in control. I felt trapped and that
02:02to escape that was almost like I'd have to give up everything I ever knew. They were going to kill me
02:08like they really were going to kill me.
02:38If you've always had freedom it's hard to realize what being trapped physically can do to your mind.
03:05This cult that I was raised in there's mental illness, domestic violence, isolation.
03:13Warren Jeffs created this solid prison. I'm sorry I have a cute sweet training and I smile too much. I hate it.
03:26Oh yeah this is a really serious topic. It's really it's I'm trying really hard to like yeah it's really it's really sad.
03:49After being married to Warren Jeffs and all the trauma that he put me through it changed me.
03:59Because he's running from the law it was really really intense.
04:05You have to understand this how tight-knit this community was. He always had access to cash. He always had access to communication.
04:14And he did an exceptional job of basically being on the run but being in control.
04:20He did travel a lot. And he would spend most of his time going from compound to compound.
04:28He had great information that he was provided all the time by his loyal followers. And he was virtually untouchable.
04:36He did tell us though he was going like all over the world to the worst places and that God commanded him to like curse them.
04:44We couldn't find him. I mean he had multiple safe houses. He had multiple vehicles. He had an army of guards watching him and moving around.
04:55You know he had all the money he needed in the world.
05:00Warren had a lot of control over people not knowing what he was accused of doing.
05:06And to the extent that they did hear things about him they thought they were lies.
05:12They thought it was people persecuting God's prophet.
05:16And so they had no reason to believe that Warren did anything wrong.
05:22He was always acting in God's name and according to God's will.
05:27So when he was on the run he was overwhelmingly paranoid.
05:32He lived by fear himself so much.
05:37And Warren just he didn't trust me.
05:40One time when I was in Texas he did take me on a walk. Just me and him.
05:45He asked me have you ever thought about having kids before?
05:48That's to me now it's like code of saying do you want sex?
05:53I didn't really want it. So I said no.
05:57I don't want to be part of Warren just orgies.
06:02I don't want a part of being a part of anything of it.
06:05Like none of that goes for me.
06:06When I told him that I didn't want kids with him.
06:10He was angry at me.
06:12So because I turned down his invitation for sex.
06:18He was going to punish me. He did send me away.
06:28They sent me to a house in hiding in South Dakota.
06:33When Warren just first set up the elite groups he also set up houses in hiding.
06:41You'd go there to qualify to be among the holy elite people.
06:46Going to a house in hiding was a punishment.
06:50He wanted us to go there and just like work, pray and read and think about what we did.
06:57And you know atone for it and just focus solely on getting that phone call back to the elite group.
07:04The FLDS playbook in breaking people down is to isolate them.
07:19Warren Jeffs maintained compounds in South Dakota, Colorado and British Columbia and then ultimately in Texas.
07:26The yearning for Zion Ranch.
07:28And what he was able to do was totally control and manipulate families.
07:33He could have the father in one place and the mother could be moved to another place and the children to yet another place.
07:41And they would be trafficked from place to place based on his whims.
07:46And so in this way he could control everyone.
07:51I'm going to see this place that was used for pain and sorrow and trapping people.
08:13When it comes to Brielle having left the group, certainly she must have experienced what we call complex PTSD.
08:23And it's seen in people who've had extended trauma, like long term trauma.
08:28So we see it in cult members for sure, our former cult members.
08:34So it's a very courageous thing to go back.
08:38It's part of like facing my fears.
08:41Conquering some of my history.
08:46Knowing that I'm going back to the compound, it almost feels like an achievement.
08:56My biggest concern is I have to watch my triggers.
08:59Like when I go into like places that could be triggering, I have to like be more cautious.
09:07I have to make sure I have good people around me and I'm safe and that's just a really big deal for me.
09:19I'm going to one of Warren Jeff's compounds to meet with Andrew, Seth and Patrick, men that become apostates.
09:26An apostate is somebody who leaves a fundamentalist Mormon faith.
09:30And to me they are like really good people and really good friends of mine.
09:37This is a property in the southern end of South Dakota by Custer that Warren Jeff's bought in 2003.
09:44And Brielle's told me she was here for two years and lived here on the ranch.
09:49Seeing the guard tower brings back memories.
09:53It is a symbol of confinement.
09:56Warren Jeff's was serious about keeping people trapped in and forcing them to do what he wanted them to do.
10:07And this is what it is and look how there is just so much rotten food and stuff and crap everywhere.
10:18Look there are even cobwebs on the old guy.
10:20I knew Brielle as a little child in school.
10:26Her father is my first cousin.
10:28Brielle would be my second cousin.
10:30We're all related, yeah.
10:33I really agree with her telling her story and want to help support her everywhere I can.
10:39There we go, a little brighter.
10:43So how does it feel coming back here?
10:47With the support system, I'm fine.
10:49With good people around me.
10:51Right, right.
10:52So yeah, that.
10:53Warren Jeff's would break them apart.
11:02He would isolate people so that he could work on them psychologically and emotionally.
11:09And when they were in this isolated situation, they had no one to support them, no one to help them,
11:16other than whoever Jeff's had selected that would be their handler, the person that would supervise them at the compound.
11:31A caretaker is really like a prison guard.
11:33It would always be a male caretaker watching over the women.
11:37And to tattle every, like whenever you even think about stepping out of line.
11:42They decide what room you stay in.
11:44They also like lived in the house.
11:47So they had control over what we eat.
11:49They listened to your footsteps.
11:52They also have security cameras that they're watching.
11:56They're armed.
11:57And they're going to do whatever Warren just tells them to do.
12:03This whole compound to me is a village.
12:06Yeah.
12:07There's a lot of houses, all the water lines that they put in, the roads.
12:11It's a whole complete village.
12:13I think there was close to 150 to 200 people on this property at the time that I was here.
12:22Wow.
12:23Yeah.
12:24That's a lot of workers.
12:25They're bringing them from other places.
12:27I don't know always where.
12:29We had to work every single day.
12:32Like all the kids, everybody.
12:34You saw them being driven to the point of being slaves and feeling like they're in a concentration
12:41camp because they didn't get enough sleep, didn't have enough food.
12:45It was just like isolation to the max.
12:48It's like a prison, but it's supposed to be like a work in progress to where we want to be.
12:54It was like a repentance house.
12:57So they had these Bose speakers everywhere throughout the house and they were always playing Warren Jeffs' sermons.
13:05Yeah, that was, for me it was constant psychological abuse.
13:09First principles of the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
13:15First, faith in the Lord Jesus Christ.
13:19Second, repentance.
13:21Third, obedience to covenants of baptism and other covenants.
13:28And fourth, the result of the first three, keeping the Spirit of God.
13:36When you hear Warren Jeffs speak, like on the recorded tapes and when he would give sermons or lectures, you will recognize that he uses a very slow, monotone voice.
13:49And that's an example of what I might call trance talk.
13:53By talking in that very slow way to people, right, you're basically shutting them down.
13:58You're in a sense kind of putting them to sleep.
14:01Of course, they don't dare go to sleep, so they go into a sort of trance mode.
14:06When you're in that state of mind, it shuts down your critical thinking.
14:11What cult leaders do is they use coercive persuasion, which can be seen in three stages.
14:18First, break people down.
14:20Second, manipulate them, change them how you want them.
14:24And then the third phase, lock them in.
14:27And you do that largely through control of information, control of socialization, and control of the environment.
14:36Jeffs had all these tools.
14:40When you can control people to that extent, you are controlling everything that goes into the mind.
14:48And that is how you can control the mind itself.
14:53He really was not living like he was requiring me to live.
14:58And I'm realizing through my own self-teaching and awareness that Warren Jeffs is a false prophet.
15:08Why didn't you just leave?
15:10Why didn't I just leave?
15:12With a gate and a guard tower.
15:14The caretaker is watching me all the time. They have cameras.
15:17There was a ton of security there.
15:19Like everything is like set up to trap you in physically.
15:23And then that plays into the mental.
15:28I was really scared of caretakers.
15:31I had a lot of bad experiences with them.
15:35And their biggest threat is the Hotel Warren Jeffs?
15:39Their biggest threat was they would kill me.
15:49Warren Jeffs was able to evade law enforcement capture.
15:54We checked places where he performed marriages in Nevada.
15:57We knew about the Texas compound.
15:59People were keeping eyes on him there, but no one had seen him.
16:02So because this is now multi-state and perhaps even cross-border in Canada,
16:07we went to the FBI and asked for their assistance.
16:10There's a new name on the FBI's 10 most wanted list this morning.
16:20It is Warren Jeffs.
16:22The list includes Osama bin Laden, murderers and violent robbers.
16:27Warren Jeffs is the newest member.
16:29He's wanted in Arizona and in Utah.
16:31Somebody who is adept at staying undercover.
16:34He's obviously proven to be very good at it.
16:37And he used the fact that he was on the run as additional power.
16:43Basically saying the almighty is protecting me.
16:46The United States government with all of their majesty and all their power can't touch me.
16:51And for a long time it looked like he was right.
16:53He was sending us a Mary chase all across the country.
16:57Even as a federal fugitive, authorities say Jeffs runs a $200 million empire.
17:04He had this national, even international organization that provided money, technology, transportation, information to him wherever he went.
17:17He is a leader of thousands of people in this country and yet finding him seems very difficult.
17:23And even the local sheriff here told us they were within five minutes of catching Warren here with the FBI.
17:44And he said that he jumped on a foiler and headed out into the trees with somebody on a foiler and him.
17:50We found five different pieces of property around here that are owned by the church.
17:56Where Warren could run from here to the house here, to one over here.
18:02But they had approximately 72 from what we've researched.
18:07But they weren't all compounds.
18:08They had houses of refuge that were just like on a five acre parcel or an acre of land somewhere across the United States.
18:14These little dills right here were hung on all of the doors so nobody could see into the room.
18:33And you see how normally a door swings against the wall.
18:36But this way you can stand in here and nobody can peek in because you got these dills here.
18:43He was being a pervert and he probably had kids in here doing whatever he's doing to them.
18:49I get pissed that we've been conned so bad.
18:54You know, we were taught if you're not part of this religion, you were evil.
18:59And what I found is I've gone out and it's just a big bunch of bullshit.
19:03I was really confused why he did so much pastel until an FBI agent told me they did a study on pedophilers.
19:11And they found that most pedophilers love the pastel colors.
19:16Don't know why, but they prefer pastel colors.
19:19You've got the dresses and the carpet and the beds and the chairs and things.
19:24The pastel colors are really weird.
19:25Typically, every wall in the house would have one of these pictures hung on it of Warren Jeffs.
19:33So it was just a common thing on every darn wall.
19:36That's Warren, Roland Jeffs is Warren's dad.
19:39I'd say there's upwards of four or five hundred of these pictures here just on the property.
19:43Our family was definitely destroyed by the Jeffs, and I believe it's my responsibility to do my part in bringing these men accountable to the abuse that they're doing to the children, to the families.
19:59Yeah, a lot of anger when people say that.
20:02There's some real...
20:03A lot of ladies, they don't even want to see this picture.
20:07Turn that picture around, get rid of it, get out of my sight.
20:13My biggest fear is getting on the other side and being face to face with people that are still in the FLDS church.
20:22And them putting me on the spot saying, how come you didn't do more?
20:29It's a great...
20:32A lot of people who've ever come to an elite compound would dream of this holy wonderful place, they don't really know what it's like.
20:56what it's like living in these houses in hiding it was all about working everybody had a role
21:26i didn't know if warren just was gonna get caught i didn't know when he was gonna get caught so i was
21:35like okay i'm just here existing and i just need to stay busy at this point i was like i just need to
21:43like survive these bags were a survival bag so they could grab this bag and run if they had to
21:56basically the end of the world's coming or if the law was after you but warren was always telling us
22:01that you had to be ready to go at a moment's notice because if the destructions came and you're asked
22:06to go or anything like that this here looks like it's a baptismal outfit we were told if you didn't
22:15wear your long underwear in the last days um there were indians that were going to come around indian
22:21spirits they'd check you they'd open your shirt and check your long underwear on it wasn't on then
22:26they were going to slit your throat from air lobe to ear lobe they pushed that as a one of warren's edict
22:32so you had to have long underwear in the last days that should be destroyed by the destroying angels
22:42south dakota was a lot different from what i could see there was approximately 200 people that lived
22:47there at one time and they were basically creating their own community that were just self-sufficient
22:55they called it a refuge it's supposed to be a refuge a place for the end of the world that you can go and
23:02survive at a small west texas town is on edge this morning wondering at the meaning of a possible
23:08doomsday cult threat on the 175th anniversary of the founding of the mormon church jeffs is promising
23:15something big the fear tactics that warren was using on the people saying the end of the world's coming
23:20he harbored on that all the time warren jeffs and others have this fascination with apocalyptic
23:26ideation or believing the world's going to come to an end or there's going to be some kind of upheaval
23:31and sometimes groups that become more and more sequestered become more and more apocalyptic and more
23:38into those ideas because they see it as a safety valve so this is a map that we found here on the
23:45ranch about the coming events the year 2000 was supposed to be the end of the world and so roland
23:51and warren were hyping on that this is how it was going to roll out china here was going to attack from
23:57the west and then russia is going to come in and attack from the east the english nation clipped of its
24:03power china's going to go into india and afghanistan and then after the wars are over and all the
24:09destructions happen which god will contribute to which is like natural disasters san diego would be
24:14destroyed by earthquake and a big tidal wave the earthquakes and the hurricanes and all that stuff
24:21and the netherlands are going to be left to sodom and gomorrah completely destruction by flooding
24:27they're gonna have famine and slaughtered by wild animals so i guess there's gonna be a bunch of
24:30wild animals in san diego running around eating up people so that's what they said there the world
24:35was gonna end and we had to be ready to be lifted up off the earth there's so much stuff in here
24:44they wanted it to be self-sustaining and they did go to great lengths to make that possible by
24:50planting their own gardens canning a lot of vegetables and fruits but there were certain things
24:56that they still did get shipped in so when you say shipped in was that like from from flds from the
25:13flds people sacrificing everything that they had down there to to maintain this place up here yeah
25:21a lot of the abundance here reminds me of warren's greed and his selfishness taking it from people
25:32that were less fortunate
25:39it's just stuff that people gave like this right here you know that they thought if they didn't turn
25:43it in they were going to be destroyed is what warren jeff's told them all the time
25:50and at the end of the day it wasn't self-sufficient they were living off the money of the people
25:54then uh they were just taking those monies and just blowing or living lavishly and blowing on whatever
25:59they wanted it overwhelms me just walking through here and you're like wow they left a lot behind it makes
26:07me feel like like people worked their lives to make something that was a waste all of these resources
26:17and warren just literally just took it from the people
26:21and left them with nothing and left them starving it makes you really sick inside
26:41putting warren jeff's on the 10 most wanted list made him a national figure for law enforcement
26:55not just national but even international so warren is driving down interstate 15 in las vegas when
27:02a nevada highway patrol trooper happens to come up behind the escalade and the trooper's testimony has
27:08been that he couldn't read the temporary tag in the back windshield at the escalade so he pulled the
27:15vehicle over the devata high patrol trooper he ran information on warren jeff's realized he's the most
27:25wanted list we got him one of the fbi's most wanted was nabbed in las vegas polygamist leader warren
27:36jeffs was arrested during a routine traffic stop it was just a sharp-eyed highway patrolman that was
27:43able to to figure put the pieces together realized what he was seeing and and then decided that he had
27:50to make an arrest he had wigs and he had lots of cash and everything in that suburban that he needed
27:58he was extradited back to utah to stand charges here warren jeff's was like so many cult leaders that i've
28:05dealt with and testified against in court i mean this was a guy who said one thing to his faithful
28:13followers and did another are you uh warren jeffs when he was arrested he was driving a red cadillac
28:22escalade the color red is evil unless i want a red cadillac escalade to run around it
28:28when warren jeffs was on the run he was living a lifestyle that was totally corrupt he would indulge
28:36himself with strippers with going out to clubs let's just say warren jeffs wasn't keeping sweet
28:43which is what he required of his people meanwhile these people are fasting and praying and tithing
28:50and sacrificing their lives for warren jeffs so how did that feel when you found out that he was
29:01caught i was sorry but i didn't dare tell anyone when you looked at the other ladies did they look
29:06like they were totally like in panic they were in panic mode yeah when he went to jail he wanted to be
29:13on the phone like all the time right it was his way of controlling the church from the from the jailhouse
29:18i knew warren would still lead the people from jail i made the decision now is the time that i had to
29:26escape the first time i escaped was in south dakota as far as i knew we were far away from civilization
29:43and have very many options so i got up really early that morning
29:48and i had my hair all ready and everything and then the ride came to take us to go off the property
29:55and we were going on a phone run is what they called it where they would drive off the property
29:59because we couldn't use our phones on the property and they were afraid of being tracked
30:04we went to dollar general and the caretaker got out with his wife and went in
30:10and i said i need to go use the bathroom i knew i had to leave at that moment so i walked in there and
30:18went around the whole store and just walked straight out went out the back and ran
30:23to escape someone like warren jeffs you have to have the perfect scenario and i ran and ran and i
30:37don't really know how far i ran and then i was picked up by the police the police they took me to their
30:46office and they talked to me like all they asked me questions tried to get me to talk
30:50you know we had a call of a suspicious person walking through some yards
30:58it was cold out and there was snow coming down and you were walking down the mickelson trail in a
31:03prairie dress so i knew right away where you were from
31:07i i didn't share anything with you guys i had been threatened and i didn't know how to tell you guys
31:14that i didn't know how to prove it i was always taught to be afraid of police i was scared like i i
31:23just hoped that that um i could just like you know figure out my own stuff i didn't really want them
31:31to help me and i remember being way too scared to talk to them they're hearing all the time that
31:40you cannot trust police law enforcement they're all against us they're all here to hurt us and stop us
31:47from worshiping god in our own way so i was like i got to figure this out on my own but i didn't really
31:56have to i just didn't know how to say what i needed to say so i actually went back
32:08yeah when i found out you left and went back i was disappointed we tried to watch and figure out
32:13what was going on but due to the location one way in one way out we were we were being watched more
32:19than we were watching them i'm sure no matter what i seemed to do it felt like that it was futile like
32:30there wasn't an exit route for me i did feel like i was fighting alone so for someone like rielle who
32:39was born in the group it makes it even more difficult to think about leaving everybody you know and your
32:45entire family is part of that system remember you probably don't have any assets that are your own
32:53especially if you're a woman you you probably have no assets no credit history and so you have nowhere
32:59to go and that is why so many people stay in the flds or at least stayed as long as they did because they
33:07had no means to go anywhere i had no idea how mad it would make war and jess and how
33:16the danger in doing that would what it would bring and what it would cause me why are they doing all
33:23they're doing for you even enduring your weaknesses building you up even when you're disobedient
33:31it's because they love you and all they want you to do is obey our problem
33:41tried your pictures these are warrants ladies right
33:49this is the stuff that we found on the property we got boxes and boxes of this
34:00one of these girls were underage one of this one right here is my cousin and she had a baby at 14.
34:10this one and the 12 year old this 12 year old
34:14the guy was a sicko i'm telling you just a pedophilia sicko
34:18what is warren jeff creating what is his purpose you know like he's establishing pedophilia
34:25he's trying to make it okay
34:35warren jeffs was in court tuesday to learn if he will go to trial for allegedly forcing a 14
34:40year old girl to marry an older man
34:45prosecutors have charged jeffs with rape as an accomplice because they say he arranged the marriage
34:50mr jeffs would you please stand as the verdict is read jurors deliberated for about 16 hours over
34:57three days before returning with a guilty verdict for warren jeffs we prosecuted warren jeffs in the
35:04state of utah for rape as an accomplice he was found guilty uh and sentenced to 10 years in prison
35:11the utah supreme court overturned jeff's 2007 rape as an accomplice conviction citing faulty jury
35:25instruction jeff's attorneys say jeffs should remain in utah until prosecutors decide on a retrial
35:33warren jeff's had some absolutely extraordinary legal lines that were protecting him he had the
35:40tithing of his followers and if they're 10 000 followers and they're tithing 10 to 20 percent
35:45that's a lot of money utah's attorney general acknowledged to fox 13 that prosecuting jeff's a
35:51second time may not get another conviction we aren't left with a lot based on this decision
35:56well the utah supreme court overturned warren jeff's conviction based on technicality jury
36:02instruction issue so he was due to be released in a number of dates i immediately called greg abbott
36:09who was the attorney general of texas at the time they had not yet filed criminal charges they were
36:15building their case so i encouraged them and now is the time if you're going to do it and said hey i
36:21know you're interested in warren he's about to be released here he was on the run for over a year
36:26can you come and pick him up
36:32and they picked him up here and took him to jail in texas warren jeffs was held in jail
36:39but he keeps running the flds because he has visitors he has his attorney he has members of
36:46the organization that visit and convey his orders his desires his dictates to the rest of the flds
36:56he had lots of visitors that would come in and and take directions from him and and report those
37:03directions back to the community so if someone disputes his authority or upsets him in any way
37:10he can yank them out of one compound put them in isolation in another and basically break them
37:17all of warren's power is based on people's beliefs to all
37:27who qualify
37:30of course i am so it's by inference and it's by the indoctrination of knowing what the cult leader
37:37would want you to do that gets people to act in these ways that we find it very difficult to
37:42understand you are the prophet
37:49we love you we love you he's still the prophet he's still the head of the flds with absolute control
38:00over all of its members
38:07picture of him in jail when he's smiling at you like that that's creepy and can you imagine some
38:14young kid on the other side that he's doing that too hello everybody wonderful to see you we love you
38:23i love all of you like he wanted to be on the phone like all the time right it was his way of
38:29controlling the church from the jail house yeah he would call random times in the daytime lord god
38:39of heaven he was not only gathering information from me and what i was willing to say it was
38:45everybody in the house they're all telling him about me because i tried to escape in warren jeff's web
38:53of power he had information on everyone he had a spying program within the community that would report
39:02to him kind of telling on each other's fathers didn't dare talk in front of the sons because the
39:08sons would turn them in mothers and daughters were against each other and basically they informed on each
39:14other and the information would flow to jeff's the lord showed me that david fisher and family should be
39:23sent back to short creek and he moved from the land and he showed me that lindsay barlow and family
39:29should move to where david fisher's family is after i tried to escape i was a really big target
39:38i started to realize i'm not safe like i'm not how can i be safe in this house in hiding
39:48were you ever able to meet warren jeff's in the jail house or
39:52no i was one of the only ones that never went and saw him in the most of his wives did see him in the
39:56jailhouse he required everybody to write to him five pages every single week
40:10the prison has actually asked people to stop sending him letters and pictures and stuff like that
40:16because he walks around and masturbates all day to the pictures
40:30this is not a test
40:37this is a revelation
40:39after warren jeff's arrest he started implementing
40:42crazier eddie's from from the jailhouse just a minute
40:50the lord's still dictating
40:55he told the men that they were no longer married
41:02he unmarried everybody told him no more than a three second handshake
41:08this is classic warren jeff's playbook
41:11he would basically take the family and pit them against each other
41:17you know it to me it's immoral everything about it is wrong
41:22he broke up the family units the men's were put in group homes the women were put in group homes the
41:28children were scattered there wasn't hardly a mother that was raising their own children
41:34and he started to implement the seed bearer program
41:48we were hearing rumors and stories of young women being forced to
41:53do things against their heart and against their will
41:55we were hearing rumors and stories of young women were put in group homes the women who would be able
42:01to have sex
42:04and there was like a designated pool of men
42:07that could have sex with the women they would plant the seed
42:11so the only children being born would be born to these seed bearers
42:26so they would have the husband and wife he would bring his wife in
42:32lay her on a bed
42:33and she had to be velcroed down on this bed that they had all set up
42:47and the men had to wear all white clothes which is a llama like a gown and a white hood over their face
42:56and the only thing those ladies saw was the sex organ okay the penis they would hold a sheet up between
43:06her while one of those 15 guys would have sex with her get her pregnant
43:11and then when the baby come then they would take the baby and they would give the baby to
43:29somebody else not either parent so it's being raised and they called it as one of god's children
43:36this is an example of like what he did to families when he tore them apart really invasive control
43:46that he had on on people's very personal intimate lives of orchestrating sexual intimate relationships
43:54of getting these young girls married and starting to have children i mean that really goes to the top
44:00of the charts in my opinion of the kinds of abuses that i've seen happen in cults
44:06we had to wrap our mind around the dynamics of the abuse and i tell people i says i knew the
44:12rabbit hole went really deep i just didn't realize how much darker it can keep going
44:29the south dakota compound is really hard for me to think about because so much happened there
44:35like i remember just like sobbing and sobbing and sobbing and nobody cared i had so much abuse so
44:42much trauma there was no hope there warren jeffs feared that if i escaped i would tell people what i
44:50know about the underage brides warren jeffs remained in county jail awaiting the trial
45:00but he himself had the power and could send his loyal followers and give me drugs i believe it's
45:07because he didn't want me telling people what i knew about him
45:14they had my caretaker give me prescription drugs
45:21so they're just passing me this bottle and telling me it's for sleep
45:25standing around saying you have to take this
45:27i didn't actually see the doctor there was no like initial interview to like diagnose me or decide
45:35that i needed it it was just a commandment from prison for warren jeffs
45:40they were giving me 800 milligrams of serequil which is so much
45:56they're telling me it's serequil but i have no idea what serequil is so it didn't matter if they were
46:03lying or not because like none of it made any sense to me that i had no internet i couldn't google my
46:09my symptoms i i couldn't do anything that drug is usually for extreme bipolar patients it's more than
46:17just sleeping it's like mood changer yeah it's it's really strong i'm 23 i'm locked up in a compound in
46:29south dakota and i am being drugged i couldn't hardly walk i was on so much medication
46:38many days just staying in bed because there was no way to get down there giving people drugs
46:45in order to control them as a cult leader is nothing new the fact that warren jeffs would dole out some
46:53type of sedative or tranquilizer it's just another example of how to control the people how to control
47:03and keep them passive keep them compliant keep them docile warren jeffs drugged me
47:17they were hoping that i wouldn't be believed as much
47:23i've heard a lot of people especially women talk about how they were hidden away stashed away over the
47:30years i've come to interpret this as basically warren hiding evidence all these girls and women
47:35knew the things warren was doing or at least could help law enforcement build a case against warren and
47:41and his top men and i really think warren was keeping these women and girls just because he didn't want
47:48law enforcement to get access to them
47:59i felt so trapped that i didn't know if i would ever
48:07ever ever like it was like almost hopeless like is this even worth fighting
48:22i've come this far you know like i had been already about a year when i realized that like
48:31this is not ending and there's no place for you here in this religion
48:39i just got to the breaking point where like there was like no way out
48:45i was cornered pretty much i did think about ending my life
48:55there is a pattern of suicide you can see that as being something that the leader has caused
49:03through the incredible stress that the leader has made his followers endure
49:09in my mind it's murder the leader has murdered his followers by controlling them to death
49:24i went to the laundry room that was on the same floor
49:28and just looked in the cupboard for anything really and i found bleach
49:39i didn't know what would happen to me either i i knew it was a bad thing it says on the bottle
49:47it's like bad for you but i didn't know if it was really going to kill me or if it was just going to
49:51like when i threw up all night and was still alive in the morning i'm like okay well that's what happens
50:00i was hoping i would be on the ambulance in the morning or something where there would be people
50:05from the outside world but that didn't happen
50:19so one day dcfs hotline in texas gets a phone call from someone claiming to be a 16 year old girl named
50:25sarah barlow and sarah barlow claims she is being held against her will on the yearning for zion ranch
50:32and that she's supposed to marry a man and she doesn't want to do it the residents of the ranch
50:40say we don't know what you're talking about there's no one here by those names
50:45but they allow the sheriff and the dcfs worker to come onto the ranch and kind of look around the
50:51sheriff and the people with him saw some pregnant teenagers and just generally were suspicious of
50:59kind of the evasive answers they got about who was there and what was going on and they used this
51:06as a pretext to get warrants and start this massive raid of the ranch state police in texas are combing
51:15the rural compound of a polygamous sect tonight where officials suspect hundreds of young people were
51:21abused warrants built a temple down in texas and inside the temple he had a lot of ability to keep
51:30secret what he was doing they kept all the records there and they were in a place where they didn't
51:36think anybody else would find records officials say they finished taking all 416 children from the ranch
51:44court documents said a number of the teenage girls were pregnant when you touch someone the fire of
51:52the spirit of god is felt by that person by that child by the thing you're handling heavenly father's
52:00spirit is working through you now from now on
52:09texas is now trying jeffs for two counts of sexual assault of a child
52:21in the case that stems from two young followers he took as brides in what his church calls spiritual
52:28marriages jeffs is accused of sexually assaulting two girls and could go to prison for life warren
52:35jeffs knew that i saw a child ride and that he was having marital relationships with them like it
52:42wasn't a question anymore and authorities were very frustrated how can i make a case against this man
52:51who is revered as a prophet as the only prophet living on earth to speak for god who will testify
52:59against him who will become a government witness i can't exaggerate the courage that it would take
53:08for anybody to leave this community um very few people did and the ones that did bore very severe scars
53:16for having left like if he let a loose end out that would hurt him and because of that he wanted me dead
53:35in the fles they have a doctrine in the end of the purity book and it talks about blood atonement
53:50blood atonement is about judgment it's about punishment it is about having to die for your sins
53:57so you can be accepted into heaven it's not something that you can legally practice
54:03so it's like they make it staged as an accident so i was told to kill myself because that was like
54:11warren's way of practicing blood atonement in the mormon lore you have this idea of blood atonement
54:21which a number of the offshoot groups have put that into practice you can see where someone like jeff's
54:28having that kind of power that he had over people could easily implant an idea in someone that should
54:36anything go awry or should you get to the point where you're just a completely lost soul well then
54:43it would be fine to just commit suicide because that's what your dear leader would want you to do
54:49blood atonement is an example of the absolute obedience of the people and the complete lack of
55:00morals or ethics that the leadership that warren jeff's had and for someone to oppose that
55:08and to imagine that it's wrong to think that it's it's something they shouldn't do is a very difficult
55:15choice to make
55:26they moved me into a house in hiding close to a reservoir
55:35caretaker said is if you kill yourself we'll tell everybody it's an accident
55:39but if you don't kill yourself i'm going to kill you and tell everybody you did it yourself
55:48and so i was like should i just go to the reservoir and he said yeah
55:54they literally put the weight of the world on me all the people that were loyal to warren
56:01in south dakota and texas the people that he put there to drug me the people that he put there to
56:11threaten me they're afraid that if i left and i escaped i know too much about warren jeffs
56:20the idea was that i would drown myself and then he could tell me it was an accident i guess
56:24i actually went to the reservoir
56:38i chose a place that was deep and i went all the way in the reservoir up to my neck
56:44i just stood there
56:55i was praying like what should i do what should i do
56:58i remember just i don't know every little thing mattered then
57:07i don't want to go to the other side this way
57:14this isn't the way i want to go
57:28so i decided to just climb out
57:38after i made the decision that i was not going to kill myself no matter what
57:41i went back to the house the caretakers they did tell warren jeff and he's mad at me anyway
57:51but i thought i wasn't going to give up
57:57they were going to kill me like they really were going to kill me
58:02i had to leave i had to escape
58:11so
58:27so
Be the first to comment