Things aren’t looking so good for our favorite polygamist prophet, Warren Jeffs, 51, the imprisoned leader of the Mormon breakaway sect the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Jeffs was found guilty last week in Utah, where he stood trial on charges as an accomplice to rape for his role in arranging and carrying out the 2001 marriage of a 14-year-old girl to her 19-year-old first cousin.
At last month’s trial, the former child bride, Elissa Wall, now 21, took the stand, testifying that she did not want to marry her cousin, Allen Steed, but that her protestations were ignored. She sobbed at her wedding, she said, and was cajoled into saying “I do.” A month later, she said, Steed forced her to consummate the relationship. Steed, who testified for Jeffs, said he didn’t remember any of that and that, in fact, it was Wall who initiated the couple’s first sexual encounter.
In the end, however, jurors didn’t buy Steed’s account and concluded Jeffs was, indeed, guilty as charged. Jeffs will be sentenced Nov. 20 and could face up to life in prison. Utah officials have also charged Steed with rape, based on his trial testimony; he was warned prior to testifying that whatever he said in court could be used against him in a later proceeding.
This article appears in October 5 • 2007.