- 2 days ago
Briell Decker is a former plural wife of Warren Jeffs, leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, or FLDS, a polygamist sect widely considered a cult.
Decker married Jeffs at 18 and spent eight years inside the group while it was being investigated by several law enforcement agencies. Decker explains how the FLDS manipulated its members, including through arranged marriages, financial control, isolation, and the use of religious authority to enforce obedience. She also describes her multiple escape attempts and the pressure the church used to keep members from leaving.
Warren Jeffs was arrested in 2006 and, in 2011, was sentenced to life in prison plus 20 years for sexually assaulting underage girls.
Decker now works with people leaving polygamist communities as founder of the Short Creek Dream Center. She appeared in the HBO Max/Discovery+ documentary "Prisoner of the Prophet."
If you are a survivor of sexual assault, you can call the National Sexual Assault Hotline (1-800-656-4673) or visit its website to receive confidential support.
For more:
https://www.shortcreekdreamcenter.org/
https://www.brielldecker.com/
https://www.facebook.com/briell.decker.blanchart/
Decker married Jeffs at 18 and spent eight years inside the group while it was being investigated by several law enforcement agencies. Decker explains how the FLDS manipulated its members, including through arranged marriages, financial control, isolation, and the use of religious authority to enforce obedience. She also describes her multiple escape attempts and the pressure the church used to keep members from leaving.
Warren Jeffs was arrested in 2006 and, in 2011, was sentenced to life in prison plus 20 years for sexually assaulting underage girls.
Decker now works with people leaving polygamist communities as founder of the Short Creek Dream Center. She appeared in the HBO Max/Discovery+ documentary "Prisoner of the Prophet."
If you are a survivor of sexual assault, you can call the National Sexual Assault Hotline (1-800-656-4673) or visit its website to receive confidential support.
For more:
https://www.shortcreekdreamcenter.org/
https://www.brielldecker.com/
https://www.facebook.com/briell.decker.blanchart/
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TechTranscript
00:00My name is Brielle Decker.
00:01I escaped the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.
00:06I was trapped there for eight years.
00:08This is how crime works.
00:11Warren Jeffs, being the prophet of the FLDS, he had full control.
00:17In the public eye, he was one person.
00:19In reality, he was a criminal.
00:22If Warren Jeffs told somebody to do something, even if it was wrong,
00:26they can't really say no.
00:27I tried like 10 times to escape before I succeeded.
00:36I was born and raised in the FLDS faith.
00:39I married Warren Jeffs at 18 years old.
00:41Arranged marriages were established because they had polygamy in the church.
00:45And they said arranged marriages is the way it works because, like,
00:48if you go through the prophet, that's the only way to be pure.
00:52I believed everything I was told by my parents.
00:55I believed everything I was told by Warren Jeffs, even.
00:58Warren Jeffs became the prophet in September of 2002.
01:01He was also the closest one to God on Earth, supposedly.
01:04That's why they call him the prophet.
01:06When I was little, I wasn't really asked what I want to be when I grow up.
01:10It was always like, you're going to be a mother in Zion, stuff like that.
01:13Like, it was just mapped out.
01:15You know, this is how it's going to be.
01:17Warren Jeffs called my father.
01:19He told him I was ready to get married.
01:21And my father was told to take me on a drive.
01:23He didn't know who I was going to marry for sure at that time.
01:26It could have been any guy in the church.
01:28We get up there and Warren Jeffs asked me,
01:32Who do you believe God wants you to marry?
01:33I didn't dare lie to him.
01:34I also didn't dare say no to him in the end when he confirmed that it was him.
01:39Because, like, I felt like I was groomed.
01:42I also felt like I don't feel like I'm in a position to really have a say.
01:48But I also didn't know what I was going into.
01:50It felt like standing on the edge of a cliff now when I look back on it
01:53and being told, which way do you want to jump off?
01:56You know, there was really no way to have an easy path.
02:00The FLDS women did not really have a say in their marriages.
02:04They could refuse, but, like, they were strongly encouraged to say yes
02:09because, like, the punishments, you know, could be pretty steep.
02:13I had a sister who went into his family five years before.
02:16I was afraid. Like, I saw how they treated her.
02:20She wasn't really high status in his family, really.
02:23To reach into his family from where I stood was supposed to be a huge privilege for me.
02:29I did not love Warren Jeffs. Like, I was more in the marriage for God.
02:33Every marriage was separate at the time when I was growing up.
02:36Usually the first wife was the only legal one
02:41because that was the only one that could be legal.
02:44They had different rooms, and they didn't usually combine all that until Warren Jeffs went to Texas.
02:51In Warren Jeffs' house in Texas, they had bunk beds in some of the bigger rooms.
02:56He had a favorite wife, and he was basically a monogamist.
03:02He said God would decide if ever you were worthy to be with him.
03:06He did not have a rotation cycle, so there was a chance you would never see him.
03:10But for me, I didn't really care about that because I wasn't really attracted to him.
03:15When he went to Texas and had a guard tower and a gate around it,
03:18he started to introduce, like, what he was doing as group sessions.
03:23What do you mean by group sessions? You don't have to go into detail, just...
03:26Yeah. Well, he was having orgies. So, yeah.
03:30He was bringing underage brides in the room with, like, adult wives.
03:34So, like, it was a very bad situation.
03:37You know, I didn't know at the time I married him he wanted to make me an accomplice.
03:40He knew.
03:41That part of the story is very hard for me to, like, talk about.
03:51The Book of Mormon is one of the main teachings that define the FLDS.
03:56The FLDS Church is a branch off of the mainstream Latter-day Saints Church.
04:02The F stands for fundamentalist.
04:04In the LDS faith, they interpret the Book of Mormon to have eternal families,
04:08and they baptize people in the temples for eternity and stuff.
04:11In the FLDS, they believe that everything belongs to God.
04:14So they've interpreted the scriptures quite a bit different over the years.
04:18And they say that the children belong to the prophet, you know, to God through the prophet.
04:26So they actually have paperwork that you sign your children over to the church of the FLDS,
04:30which is not legal paperwork, but they don't all know that.
04:33In the early 1900s, the LDS and the FLDS split because of polygamy.
04:41If you are just in a monogamous marriage, you'll never see God again.
04:46You have to have three wives to make it into heaven.
04:48FLDS do not like LDS.
04:50They think they're following the wrong prophet.
04:53So they call them apostates.
04:56LDS don't really like FLDS either for the same reason.
05:00Before Warren Jeffs became the leader, there was 10,000 followers.
05:03I believe that he has at least 5,000 today.
05:08Being the prophet of the FLDS, he had full control.
05:13He had the titles of their houses in this legal trust called the UEP.
05:16So the UEP is United Effort Plan.
05:19It's like the land in Colorado City, in Hilldale.
05:22He had control of who lived in the houses because he had the titles.
05:26He could decide if he wanted to move somebody.
05:29And he had a moving crew that would just show up at your house and say,
05:31you're moving today.
05:32He had control of, you know, the food, you know, how much, you know,
05:36people were able to, like, because he didn't let the ladies, especially his ladies, leave their houses.
05:43So he would have people bring food to us.
05:46So, like, what they brought was what he wanted them to bring, you know?
05:56It's like a pyramid in the FLDS.
05:58They have the prophet.
05:59They have the bishops.
06:00They have the fathers, the mothers, children at the bottom.
06:03And in Warren Jeffs' family, he had a pyramid also,
06:06and it had to do with heritage a lot, according to obedience.
06:10When I entered the family, I was number 65.
06:12I think he only had 49 children altogether.
06:15Family to family, it did vary quite a bit.
06:18In Warren Jeffs' family, we lived off donations, so we didn't really work for money.
06:24It was a hard balance when you forget, like, how hard it is to earn money.
06:29And when you have 79 wives, you can only imagine, you know.
06:32For a time, there was Wendell Nelson and Meryl Jessup, who were the first presidency.
06:37And then the bishops over different areas were, like, his brother Isaac, his brother Lyle.
06:43He had different people over different areas that were bishops, but it varied quite a bit,
06:48because he struggled with, like, trusting and feeling like people were going to overpower him someday
06:54and become the prophet later.
06:56So he would excommunicate bishops and stuff for temporary and sometimes for out of the church.
07:04Like, he would just, like, accuse them of crimes and rotate them quite often.
07:10There were other reasons also why people were rotated, but that was the main reason is because of his insecurities.
07:18Each person had to prove their loyalty to get into, like, the higher positions.
07:23So if they were first presidency, they were, like, pretty loyal to Warren Jeffs and had higher standards.
07:30Being a wife did not give you any power and control except for, like, with the community members.
07:35Like, if you're with, like, in my family, they would respect me more while I was part of the FLDS
07:40because I was married to Warren Jeffs, because, like, I knew more.
07:45I went straight to the source to find out information.
07:48Also, like, another thing was that if you're married to the prophetess, the highest a woman can go in the
07:53church.
07:53I did not get along with everyone there.
07:55That was basically impossible with 79 wives.
07:58But I did have some friends.
08:02People fight, especially in polygamy, like, the wives, they have the jealousy issue.
08:07And, like, it's very hard to keep sweet no matter what, you know.
08:11It's very, very hard when, like, it's not fair, you know, and there's never going to be fair.
08:18People do fight.
08:19They just don't fight like people would without the psychological component.
08:25They reach their breaking point.
08:27And, you know, they have breakdowns.
08:29They end up in hospitals.
08:30You know, they end up the same things.
08:32But, like, there's more pressure, so it's going to happen more often.
08:35But then they're also denied medical resources a lot in these cults.
08:39So it's very hard.
08:48Doctrine and Covenants is the one, section 132, talks about, like, polygamy.
08:54That was the one that they use in the FLDS.
08:58The main duties of the wives were, like, cooking, cleaning, gardening, sewing, teaching school,
09:03interacting with the children, like, in between school.
09:06When I first married Warren Jeffs, he put me on, like, every chore.
09:09Like, every hour, I'd be on, like, gardening for an hour, sewing for an hour.
09:13Like, I was running from job to job.
09:15And I was so exhausted by the end of the day.
09:17I don't really know why he did that.
09:19All the rules were strictly enforced, except for, like, more mild ones.
09:23You had more leeway.
09:25Being late was, like, one of those milder ones, like, to the kitchen, to your responsibilities.
09:31But if you were late because you slept in, you know, it's going to have, it's going to be one
09:36of those ones that stack over time.
09:38So at first, it won't be that big of a deal.
09:40But over, like, ten years, you're going to have more offenses, and there's a chance that the punishments will become
09:47greater by the end of the ten years.
09:49Punishments could be psychological as well as physical punishments.
09:54Psychological means, like, you can't grow beyond your state, like, into heaven.
10:00You will never see God again.
10:02If you are never highly promoted in the church, you're going to, like, get deprived of, like, physical blessings, too.
10:11Like, your house might be more needy, and then you can move out of it when you fix it up
10:16and never have a good house.
10:17So physical punishments happen that way, too.
10:20Challenging the prophet was definite excommunication from the church, lose your family.
10:26It doesn't mean, like, you know, execute them, you know, like, death necessarily.
10:30It could lead to that, but they would never say, like, if you did die in the church, they usually
10:36put it in the name of an accident.
10:38Members were definitely expected to tattle.
10:41If they saw anything, saw somebody out of line, something bothered them, they were encouraged to talk to Warren Jeffs
10:50and tell them about it.
10:51The people inside do realize they are being controlled, but they also are taught that there is, they have a
10:59choice.
11:00They can say no at any time, but they don't know how it is to say no without pressure.
11:05It's not really agency. It's not really freedom.
11:09At eight years old when you're baptized, from that point on, God stops atoning for you.
11:15It's all up to obedience.
11:17If you disobeyed in the FLDS, then you would never make it to the highest degree of glory in the
11:24celestial kingdom, which meant you would never see God again.
11:28You had to make it to the very top.
11:30One of their doctrines is, like, you cannot have relationships with pregnant women.
11:34And so Warren Jeffs would take men's wives away saying, like, you disobeyed the doctrine, you disobeyed God, and go
11:40and have relationships with the same lady, you know, marry her, have relationships with her while she's pregnant.
11:46But he didn't, he was the exception, because he's the prophet.
11:54The FLDS were not encouraged to interact with the outside world.
11:57They had to, like, go to the stores at times and stuff, but usually it was the men, you know,
12:00in Warren Jeffs' family.
12:01When I was a younger child, I did get to go to the stores in Sandy with my mother and
12:06father, but, like, we were encouraged to not interact.
12:10So a smile or just a compliment about your hair or something meant a lot to me at that time,
12:15because when I got in crisis later in life, I felt like, you know, those are the people that care,
12:21the people on the outside.
12:23Even though I was told my whole life they didn't care, but those compliments and those smiles showed me a
12:28different story than what I was being told.
12:31He had a lot of control over which books were recommended to read, which books weren't, you know, and over
12:38the years that's gotten stricter and stricter.
12:40We had to get rid of the televisions when I was, like, nine years old.
12:43And then internet was, we couldn't have internet basically around the time that Warren Jeffs was caught.
12:48I think that was a lot to protect the true stories from getting to the people.
12:54We did have telephones that would just, like, go in and try to delete the internet option.
12:59We also had radio in the cars, but, like, we weren't supposed to turn it on.
13:03You know, like, they did have some of the basic, like, computers and stuff, but, like, they tried not to
13:08get on the internet.
13:14I lived in about 23 houses during the time frame that I was in Warren Jeffs' family.
13:19The main locations at the time was South Dakota, Colorado City, and Texas.
13:25I did live in Texas the most because it was where I was supposed to be, according to him.
13:30Houses in hiding were mainly set up for people that were struggling in the Holy Lands, so, like, the compounds.
13:37So, South Dakota, Colorado City, Texas, they were places for the most obedient people.
13:45The houses in hiding were, like, in between, like, Hilldale and Colorado City and the Holy Lands.
13:50And the main reason, I think, the purpose was so they wouldn't mix with the people in Hilldale and Colorado
13:56City.
13:56But they couldn't stay in Texas because they were struggling.
14:00They didn't want them mixing because then all the information that was happening in Texas and those would get more
14:07out.
14:07When you started to struggle, when he saw the first signs of, like, questioning or anything, he would move you
14:13to another location.
14:14And most of the time, they were told to just pray and work to be able to be sent back
14:20to the Holy Lands.
14:21For most of the people, their experience in these houses, I believe, was, like, cooking and, you know, sewing and
14:28just praying.
14:29But, like, for me, when I got there, it was a different experience because I just read and became openly
14:34rebellious for two years.
14:35Usually there was, like, seven women in a house and then the caretaker and his family.
14:40They weren't allowed to leave the house because they wore the dresses and people could identify them, and also they
14:46could escape.
14:47You know, like, if they're struggling, he's not going to want them going out and about in the storage and
14:52all that kind of stuff.
14:53If it's a caretaker over a woman, it was a man. If it's a caretaker over children, it's usually a
14:59lady.
14:59The man would have his own family there, and they would guard us. Like, we couldn't go outside. We had
15:04cameras on us.
15:06There was really no exit route.
15:08The more you struggled, the more times you tried to escape and didn't successfully escape, the higher security tightens on
15:17you.
15:17Even a child, like, if a child tries to escape and then has to go back legally, they're probably going
15:24to have a harder experience when they get back.
15:26I ended up in the houses in hiding because I requested to go there.
15:30I wrote to Warren Jeffs right after one of those secret group sessions.
15:34I only went into one of those. Like, it was basically the introduction to the whole situation.
15:42And I wrote to him and I told him I don't really want to, you know, I just need more
15:47time.
15:47I didn't confront him on his ideas, but I just told him I needed more time.
15:51And he bought into my story and let me go to a house in hiding to prepare further.
15:56And I became openly rebellious and did not go back until he was caught by the law.
16:07Children are raised in the FLDS to be obedient.
16:10They believe that by the time they're three years old, they should know what obedience is.
16:15They're taught like, you know, what would father like?
16:17What would father do in this situation?
16:19What would the prophet do in this situation?
16:22It's all about like the pyramid, like the girls, you're going to be a mother in Zion.
16:26There were so many different trainings. Like he had one on almost every topic of life.
16:32What to eat, you know, like when to eat.
16:35If you can have naps during the day, like when to go to bed for the women and when to
16:39go to bed for the men.
16:40When I was a child we had at least four hours a day of like sermons.
16:44And we had it in the morning when we woke up with our father for an hour.
16:47We had it at school when we first got there for an hour with Warren Jess.
16:51We had it after lunch, history training for an hour, and then at night before we went to bed.
16:57And then Sundays, of course, were more.
16:59Education was mostly homeschool for people in Salt Lake area, the FLDS school.
17:05But in, I believe in like Colorado City and Hilda, there are a lot of like the other children around,
17:11even my age, that went to public school for a time.
17:14The schools were always controlled by the church to some level.
17:18All the book work they had, it was printed off like old books that they had changed the wording and
17:24stuff to make it more churchy.
17:26It was all controlled by the church.
17:28In the name of God, psychological warfare.
17:32Like I think that was the main thing he used to keep people obedient.
17:36Also like brainwashing from birth.
17:38By the time they're 18 years old, they have really strong, you know, brain cells for like the FLDS lifestyle.
17:43Children did not learn about the outside world very well, especially if they weren't raised around it.
17:51Lost boys is a media term, but it kind of signifies something that is realistic.
17:55It's a patriarchal society.
17:57So the rules were made stricter for the boys.
17:59And also I think a lot of that is because of competition.
18:02They don't have enough girls to go around.
18:04Not everybody can have 79 wives.
18:06You know, that's just crazy.
18:07So they would kick out the boys at young ages for non-compliance.
18:13By the time they were eight years old, they could be kicked out.
18:15And there were eight year olds that were kicked out.
18:17But more often, I think it was more like 12 and a little bit more teenage ages.
18:22They were seen as a threat because of marriage, because of the polygamy.
18:25If they're young and, you know, able-bodied and stuff, that they might be wanted more than the 50-year
18:32-olds, you know, the 60-year-olds.
18:33They're cut off from the family.
18:35They get cut out of the pictures.
18:37It's pretty traumatic.
18:38So it's a miracle I even have any pictures of me when I was younger.
18:42Because, like, I don't have very many, but, like, I had a few secretly sent to me.
18:46But, like, most of the time they burn all that.
18:49You know, like, it's, they don't have record of it.
18:52What usually happens to them after they're kicked out?
18:55So in those days, it was way harder for them.
18:58Because there was no organizations, hardly.
19:01They would go to a local place in St. George that had mattresses.
19:05And they would open up the back door.
19:07And all the boys would sleep on their beds during the night.
19:11Like, their packaged beds, you know, that are displays.
19:17And they would all jump on those displays in the nighttime.
19:20And then they would close up the shop.
19:23And then the next morning, they'd let them out.
19:24And when the activists got more well-known and got more established,
19:28the parents would try to bring them straight up to the organizations.
19:37Warren Jeffs required of his followers that they donate $1,000 per month,
19:43per 18-year-old male in the household.
19:45So it came from the followers, and it was even at the expense of their credit.
19:50A lot of people, when they leave the FLDSC, they have no credit like what I had
19:53because I was his wife.
19:54I didn't work for money.
19:57Women were not and are not, to this day, allowed to work.
20:00I think it's to keep them isolated and keep them without resources.
20:04I think that was a bad thing because, like, some of the wives had lived off donations for so long.
20:09They had no hesitation to ask for money.
20:12And for the community members, it was a lot to donate that much money.
20:16Like, they would go in and say, can I get LASIK today?
20:19And can I get, like, all white feeling caps?
20:21You know, all these different things.
20:22It was very strict.
20:24The $1,000 a month was very strict.
20:26Like, it mattered to them that you donated that.
20:29They had some FLDS businesses also, like machine shops.
20:33So they just worked like a regular job and would try any way they could to get the money.
20:39That was the priority.
20:40Warren Jeff spent it lavishly.
20:43Like, he spent the money on, like, himself pretty much.
20:46And he even denied his family medical care and stuff so he could have more money.
20:51When they caught him, they had evidence of, like, all these pictures.
20:54Like, he was going to strip clubs.
20:56He was getting tons of vehicles and rotating them so that he didn't get caught by the law.
21:02He was trying to, like, trade out his vehicles quite often.
21:04He was very, like, selfish.
21:08Like, he had tons of money and he was just touring the world with it, basically.
21:13Nowadays, he hides his assets in his members' names.
21:16He drained the people of everything and just left it sitting.
21:22He was a sociopath.
21:23He liked taking away hope and taking away, you know, things slowly.
21:28The financial system was part of it to attain his goal, which was to take away their hope antagonizingly and
21:35slowly and painfully.
21:36Make him isolated.
21:38Make him lonely.
21:39You know, like, he wasn't really, he just wasn't a good guy.
21:42You know, he could have done so many good things with it, but he didn't want it.
21:45You would find these people out in the world, like, mainly in the construction field where the boys are, the
21:51eight-year-olds are driving trackers, like, and they're not getting paid.
21:55It's called labor trafficking, but, like, they bid the jobs really low so that, because they're not paying labor and
22:01they're able to get more jobs because of that.
22:03You know, they're out bidding everyone else, like, you can come across them.
22:08Like, the women generally aren't out and about, so it's harder to find them because they dress with the prairie
22:13dresses in the FLDS.
22:15And if they did come to the stores, you would see them, but it's just more rare.
22:21People outside of the community, they don't always know.
22:24They just know they got a good bid, you know, for their project until, like, later after they're on the
22:29job.
22:30Some people don't care. They think they're good workers, they do a good job, you know.
22:34These polygamy families don't have marriages because it's not legal in America to be, like, married to the same guy.
22:41So on their paperwork, it looks like they're single.
22:44And so they get more food stamps, they get more all of this stuff, government help.
22:49This guy was saying that he, that one sister wife will claim the other sister wife's kids and get, like,
22:55daycare support, in-home childcare.
22:58They actually get paid to watch their own kids because they're claiming the other sister wife's kids,
23:04and this one's claiming this sister wife's kids, so then they get paid to watch their own kids.
23:13The main compound was, was Texas yearning for Zion Ranch when I was married to him.
23:18There were, like, selected people who went to Texas, and that's how he started to break up families and children
23:26even leaving without their parents because he was calling them forward.
23:30God called them supposedly to this Holy Land.
23:33If Warren just told somebody to do something, even if it was wrong, they can't really say no.
23:39Like, they would, they could get kicked out of the church at that point and lose their family and their
23:43kids and, you know, everybody.
23:45He sent me to a house in Vegas.
23:47I didn't really choose that.
23:49And eventually I got to where I wrote him a letter and I told him, like, he told us never
23:53to talk about the orgy sessions,
23:54but I wrote him a letter about, like, I don't want to consummate my marriage in front of everyone.
23:59And I never had up until this point, which was a year after.
24:03I told him I wasn't going to pray until I wanted to, so I, to ensure that I didn't, like,
24:08go back to Texas before I wanted to.
24:11I told him, like, I was going to read, though.
24:14I told him I'm not going to pray, but I'm going to read.
24:16That was mainly to stop the punishments from, like, stacking and, like, happening to me over and over.
24:22I never consummate the marriage, so, like, for me, I went to these houses in hiding, became openly rebellious,
24:30and he got caught by the law before I went back to Texas.
24:33In mid to late 2000s, investigations began on Warren Jeffs.
24:38He was on the 10 most wanted list in America for a while before he was caught.
24:43He ran from the law right when he became the prophet.
24:45Elisa Wall's case is the one in Utah.
24:47Her case was about, like, underage marriage that he had performed before he became the leader.
24:55The Utah case fell through on a technicality for a short time, and he would have been released had not
25:00they had gone into Texas compound
25:02and found the records and put him in a Texas prison.
25:08In 2008, Texas authorities raided the yearning for Zion Ranch, and hundreds of children were temporarily removed.
25:16And that's where, like, that story about, like, you know, where I wrote that letter and flagged the authorities.
25:20In Warren Jeffs' version, it helped them find the evidence they needed to go into Texas.
25:25His brother, Seth Jeffs, was caught transporting his letters and put on trial for aiding and abetting a fugitive.
25:33When that letter got caught by the law and flagged the authorities to go into Texas, he was never going
25:39to forgive me.
25:40When Warren Jeffs called me, I knew he was angry, to a point that I had never seen him angry
25:45at me.
25:45He talked to me about, did you write a letter?
25:47And I confessed, you know, I told him, yeah, because he already knew.
25:51Like, he figured out, you know, because they had a trial and stuff, and so he already knew they had
25:55that letter.
25:56I didn't know exactly what it meant.
25:58I didn't realize I had flagged authorities, you know, on his case.
26:02He didn't explain that to me.
26:04I was in survival mode from basically the time that letter was caught.
26:12Warren Jeffs ran from the law.
26:14He required more money of his people.
26:16He also didn't want to be in Hilldale or Short Creek very much because the law enforcement was watching that
26:22area more than the other newer ones that they didn't know where he was.
26:26When the Texas raid happened, I was in South Dakota, and then they were telling me the raid was my
26:31fault.
26:32Warren Jeffs' capture was my fault.
26:33They transported us off of the compound because they were afraid of the raid going into Colorado City and South
26:39Dakota also.
26:40The Texas location played a big role because that's where they got the evidence that put him in prison.
26:45That was, like, the center stake.
26:48That was where Warren Jeffs wanted to be most of the time before they went in and—they call it an
26:54attempted rescue or a raid—but, like, the law officials went in and found the records and prosecuted Warren Jeffs and
27:02put him in prison.
27:02There's been children come forward that were molested by him.
27:06As mothers, realizing all this, there was no—we had not enough power to save them from that.
27:12Because he was the prophet and, you know, he had done so much stuff already.
27:16I had no way of protecting those children.
27:20When I talk about the children, I talk about, like, the underage brides, also the younger kids.
27:26He said one time that one of the boys was going after him that was accusing him of molesting him
27:32in the school back in the day when he was the principal.
27:36He would give out, like, excuses and say, like, you know, they fabricated evidence is another way of, like, saying,
27:42like, it's not real.
27:44He had so much at his fingertips to gaslight people, like, convince them that their true memories are not real.
27:50They had arranged marriages first, then they established underage brides, so, like, they were commanded to have these wives and
27:57have children with them.
27:58So it was just so extreme. That's what makes me believe it is a cult.
28:02I was so devastated. Like, for me, it was, like—it was still, like, really heavy and really sad because, like,
28:08you know, what happened to the children?
28:10Nobody was standing up for them. They're all deciding to just go along with it.
28:14I would say probably the most misunderstood thing in my experience is that anybody who was over the age of
28:2518 is not necessarily an accomplice.
28:29In 2011, Warren Jeffs was convicted for sexual assault and sentenced to life in 20 years.
28:41The drugs came when I was 23 years old.
28:44He started sending nurses and stuff to give me the medicine that the doctors prescribed that I didn't even see
28:51the doctor for.
28:52You know, it was very, very scary because I didn't know if I was even going to wake up.
28:57I didn't know what they were giving me. They told me it was for sleep. It was really for mood
29:00stabilizer and sleep.
29:02But, like, it was Seroquel. They had cult doctors, so they had doctors that were sent to college to become
29:08doctors that were born and raised in the FLDS.
29:11So they had, like, degrees and stuff so they could get medication for people.
29:17Warren Jeffs never went to college, but he, I believe, demanded control over, like, his family's medications
29:25through the doctors telling the doctors if he didn't, if he wasn't able to prescribe medicine for his family, then
29:32he would take away the doctor's family.
29:34I didn't have internet. I couldn't check up symptoms.
29:37When I'm asking for safety and they want to give me medicine for sleep, I'm like, how am I going
29:42to sleep even if I have medicine if I'm not safe?
29:45So that was a big wake-up call for me. I didn't really feel like they were following the protocol
29:53they would follow with most of their patients.
29:56To this day, I still have repercussions from, like, my tongue is, like, you know, damaged from the medications they
30:02gave me.
30:03I've been told now that my caretaker, who's left the church now, he said that Warren Jeffs had me come
30:11cold turkey off all of those drugs two weeks before my escape.
30:15I knew I came cold turkey off, but I thought it was after the escape because I didn't have resources.
30:20Warren Jeffs knew that, but he was willing to do that to try to collect the evidence, I believe, to
30:25put a guardian over me, but God had other plans.
30:28I believe the doctor who had control, most control over my health, lost his family a month after my escape.
30:37After I escaped, my father lost his family a week later, my brother lost, who was my caretaker at the
30:42time, lost his family a month later.
30:44When a person in the FLDS loses their family, there's times when Warren Jeffs will reassign the family to another
30:51man or another person in the FLDS that's more qualified to take care of them.
30:56But when they lose their family, sometimes it's just a repentance mission.
31:00So, like, there's a temporary timeframe when they're not allowed to see their family, and then they maybe can someday
31:05come back and see them.
31:07My father was told he could never come back to the church. My mother has not been reassigned to this
31:12day that I know of.
31:14But my father, he's never been able to be with her since, you know, that—even hardly see her for years
31:22now.
31:27I think he was in prison before I escaped. I tried, like, ten times to escape before I succeeded.
31:34Ten major times. I had little, little things, but, like, every time I got a hold of a phone book
31:40or, you know, try to figure out where to go, they would see me, you know?
31:44So it was very hard to escape. And I believe when I did escape, it wasn't planned very well.
31:50I do have a documentary on HBO Max and Discovery Plus called Prisoner of the Prophet.
31:54And it goes into, like, one of the first attempts that I went off.
31:57The police actually had me and everything, but they wanted to put me in a shelter next to the compound.
32:02You know, like, it was too close to the compound for comfort for me. I felt like it wasn't, like,
32:08gonna work.
32:09And I didn't know how to explain that. It was my first attempt, so I didn't know how to communicate
32:13that.
32:14But that was one of the attempts, and it goes into great detail on that attempt.
32:18But I ended up going to the Utah compound. So that was good for me, because there's a mixture of
32:24people there.
32:24There's XFLDS as well as FLDS. So that's actually ultimately where I did escape from.
32:30I have a few experiences where I was, like, trying to coordinate my escape, and they ended up sending me
32:36back to Texas for a short time.
32:38And there is a picture that was taken in Texas that has, like, all of his wives, you know, has
32:43Warren Jeffs' picture behind him.
32:44I'm in that picture because of one of those times that they just transformed me back to Texas.
32:48You know, I didn't really have a lot of say in that.
32:51And now I have testified against Warren Jeffs' federal prison and been told that my, like, it's been confirmed that,
32:58like, my whole experience was trafficking across state lines.
33:02I escaped on May 23rd of 2012.
33:06It wasn't actually in the building of, like, Warren Jeffs' old house.
33:11Like, it was in my brother's trailer at the park.
33:14I tried to escape that morning and took some main roads and was caught on the roads that FLDS called
33:22and told them that I was running away.
33:23So they ended up bringing me back.
33:25And then later that day, I was in a room.
33:30They had put, like, because I had tried to escape, they put, like, two screws in the window pane.
33:34So it would hit the screws and then the doorknob was turned around so I couldn't unlock it on my
33:40side without the key, which I didn't have a key.
33:44So I found some scissors in the room and I unscrewed one side that was really loose.
33:51The other side, I just pounded on it until it broke off.
33:54And the sister-in-law that was in the house, she came and looked in the window outside and she
34:01said, what are you doing?
34:02You know, she could hear me pounding on it.
34:04She came in and took everything I was using.
34:06I just found other stuff.
34:07She actually called my brother, but, like, he was in a meeting, which I believe was God and myself, but
34:15the true God.
34:17You know, but, like, when I did break off that screw, they had told me to read earlier that day.
34:21So I thought, if I open any drawers, they're going to know I left.
34:25But if I just climb out the window, they may think I laid down to read.
34:30They may not know I have both screws undone.
34:32So I climbed out the window and I ran through back roads this time, through the creek, got to a
34:38house that was specifically XFLDS.
34:41And the family I ran to, by the end of the day, drove me out of town to an activist
34:45who picked me up and brought me to her personal location,
34:49because they were just smaller organizations at that time.
34:51They weren't, like, they didn't have crisis houses.
34:54They had, like, outreaches.
34:55So she took me to her personal home in a neighboring town.
34:58The next day, the police officers, who were also FLDS at the time, I couldn't even call 911 in Short
35:04Creek,
35:04because it would get the FLDS police force.
35:07I ended up finding an organization that had a family in Nashville that would take me in.
35:12And they drove me to Colorado to make sure I wasn't intercepted at the airport, because they were hunting for
35:18me.
35:18You know, like, my FLDS family was hunting for me.
35:20I just felt like, you know, I need more support than what I'm getting,
35:23because, like, they were always concerned that I wasn't eating.
35:27You know, all my mental health was, like, kind of out of hand, because I wasn't as far as I
35:31felt safe.
35:32Prior to going to Tennessee, I called the domestic violence shelter in Tennessee
35:35and asked them if they would take me on my first case if I needed it, and they said they
35:40would.
35:40So I ended up, like, staying there for, like, three months and doing good on some days.
35:46Some days I would do bad.
35:48It took me about six months to have constant clarity.
35:50They transported me to another domestic violence shelter that was Christian-based,
35:53and I stayed there also for three months.
35:56I had my first Christmas ever in my life in a domestic violence shelter in Tennessee.
36:02It was amazing.
36:04But, like, they had a bunch of donations come.
36:07I remember being so overwhelmed that I just kept walking out of the room and coming back in.
36:11It was interesting.
36:12But, like, I ended up going a few places in Nashville.
36:17I ended up in, like, a mental health more type facility because I had a lot of resources in that
36:21area.
36:27It usually takes, they say, about 10 years before you see significant change in the community, in the way people
36:36perceive you.
36:37I've seen, now I've been out 14 years, so I've seen that shift at 10 years about.
36:41My name was Lynette Warner before, and I changed it to Brielle Decker Blanchard and changed my social security number
36:49in America.
36:50When I got out of the church, it took me a while to figure out, like, details.
36:56Banking.
36:57I did go, I learned that in Nashville.
37:00There were some bankers that came into the shelter and gave us some education, and I opened up my first
37:05banking account based on that.
37:07I remember when I met my husband, I saw the ocean for the first time in my life on our
37:11honeymoon in Santa Monica, California.
37:15You know, just stuff like that is so special to me because, like, I didn't think I'd ever get to.
37:19Like, when I saw the Statue of Liberty for the first time in my life, it was so special to
37:23me because, like, you know, I'm a woman in America, you know,
37:26that finally gets to experience freedom, you know, and that's what the Statue of Liberty represents, is freedom.
37:33My middle name is Liberté, which is French for liberty.
37:39When the men leave, they have more skills.
37:41They usually have, like, they've been working for years, and they also get higher paying jobs.
37:47But the women, when they leave, they don't know how to survive out here as well.
37:51It's just, they might know how to sew, you know, and they don't get paid very much.
37:55It's harder to learn how to thrive.
37:57I was changing my social, my, all of that, but they didn't change my SSI in the same month.
38:03They qualified me for SSI, but, like, when they changed my social security number, they were still gonna change my
38:08SSI, but they hadn't yet, so I couldn't pay my rent.
38:11So I called my attorney in Utah, and I was like, what do I do? I don't know how to
38:14pay my rent.
38:15He's like, I don't know how to do that. They're still gonna do it, but I don't know how to
38:18speed it up.
38:18So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna tell you that there was this ex-FLDS man.
38:22He walked into my office and told me that he was kicked out when he was a boy. He was
38:28like a lost boy.
38:29He grew up, he became a pilot, graduated from pilot school, and walked into his office and gave him some
38:34crisis tickets, and he said,
38:36If anybody's in crisis, tell them to fly home, because Short Creek is changing from FLDS to ex-FLDS.
38:43And these crisis tickets were airplane tickets that go on the back of the plane if there's any seats.
38:47So I was like, that sounds crazy. But like, you know, I have to go back to Utah after going
38:52through witness protection.
38:53It was just crazy. So I ended up in Salt Lake with an ex-FLDS lady.
38:56And that is where I found out that I had rights to Warren Jeff's house in Short Creek.
39:01And went after it for the recovery center. Like, it's a mansion. It has like 45 rooms.
39:07And I was awarded the house in 2016 on Thanksgiving Day.
39:10I applied in February of 2016, and then went on a hunt.
39:14I did free tours of the house in media because it was a high-profile house.
39:17I wanted, like, the dream, which was to build a recovery center.
39:22And I found, like, with the help of, like, some Christians that came through on free tours,
39:27I was able to locate a worldwide organization called the Dream Center in Phoenix.
39:34And they agreed to, you know, like, do a lease to own, make sure they could get their licensing in
39:40Hilldale.
39:41That's the first business to get licensing after Warren Jeff's left, you know.
39:46And now they've been open for, like, since 2017.
39:50You know, like, you know, it's been six years more, I think.
39:54So I had a salary position to do, like, media for the first three years.
39:58Today I am a peer support specialist, a case manager, also a residential aide at the Short Creek Dream Center.
40:07The majority are, like, victims of something.
40:10But, like, we do prioritize people from the, like, FLDS or ex-FLDS.
40:16But, and also other polygamy groups.
40:19There's a lot of gaps in this area.
40:21Like, we need senior citizen nonprofit.
40:23The elderly can't always get out right now.
40:25Because ours has stairs. We don't have elevators.
40:28Also daycare in the town that we have is a big gap.
40:31Because, like, if we had a daycare, then we could more adequately help the single moms.
40:43I do not think the church ended when Warren Jeff went to prison.
40:46He is the prophet of the FLDS church until he dies.
40:50So that's how their doctrine is.
40:52God would kill the leader before he'd allow him to lead the people astray.
40:55He's in prison for life in 20 years for a reason.
40:58But he still is leading the FLDS from prison.
41:01I think it would be worse if he hadn't have been arrested.
41:04I believe him being alive in prison has helped a lot more people wake up
41:08than just starting over with a new leader immediately with his execution.
41:12The FLDS is usually linked to Warren Jeffs.
41:18But there are possibilities that they could call themselves FLDS
41:23without being Warren Jeffs their prophet.
41:25Because it's just a branch off the LDS church.
41:28So they have doctrines that they highlight in their, over the pulpit even,
41:32that are dangerous for children, especially like underage brides.
41:38They have doctrines in their, in their faith about racism.
41:42The Mormons, I mean like the LDS, Latter-day Saints people have taken it out.
41:48Like they, after several years, they had a prophet that said,
41:51now is the time to accept everyone.
41:52So they have less racism in the Latter-day Saints faith.
41:57But in the polygamy groups, there's like 23 polygamy groups.
42:00I don't know of one that has changed the original doctrine
42:05to be accept race, like any race into the church.
42:10And it's really hard to, to, to figure out a way to,
42:13to incorporate a new belief once,
42:17because it would be like denouncing their prophets of the past
42:19if they say that doctrine was not true.
42:23So they have to figure out a, a creative way to incorporate like modern day
42:28into their faith.
42:29So it's really complicated to, to change the doctrine.
42:33So when they put underage brides in the FLDS faith,
42:39they can't take it out very easy.
42:41So if they're following FLDS necessarily,
42:43it doesn't mean they're following Warren Jeffs,
42:44because that's just a branch off of the Latter-day Saints.
42:46But if they are following Warren Jeffs,
42:50most likely they have arranged marriages,
42:53also underage brides marriages.
42:56So they're going to need investigated.
42:58The main thing is underage brides in FLDS.
43:02There are other things like,
43:05I know in like the AUB and the Kingston group,
43:07it's been more about like Jesus is our elder brother.
43:11Because in the Mormon faith, Jesus is our elder brother
43:14instead of like an all powerful being in the Joseph Smith teachings.
43:19But in the FLDS, they do have that, but not over the pulpit so much.
43:23So still a problem.
43:25So there are criminal activities, you know, like, you know,
43:28because that could damage all the children.
43:30You know, if you're married, you're too intermarrying.
43:33They can get like handicapped more easily.
43:38And then underage brides is also like, you know,
43:42trapping the children into a cycle where they have children.
43:45You know, it's illegal to do that.
43:47But like, you know, they have children when they get old enough
43:49to realize they're kind of trapped in a cycle.
43:51They have to feed their kids and also like escape somehow with their kids.
43:55You know, like it's a way bigger job when they have children at 13.
43:59You know what I mean?
44:00So it's definitely illegal.
44:04So there are reasons why it's illegal too,
44:07because we want to protect instead of like take away people's freedom
44:13based on what our country's made for, you know, freedom.
44:18You know what I mean?
44:19Freedom of religion, especially, you know, like we have to watch those,
44:24those, those lines, why they're there and, you know, keep it safe.
44:29This country safe.
44:30Polygamy in general in Utah is an infraction now.
44:34Where everywhere else in America, it's a felony.
44:37I don't think it's going to end.
44:38Like, I think it's just going to be more polygamy groups over time.
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