FLDS mother wants jury to decide custody

Texas child welfare authorities are seeking permanent conservatorship of a 14-year-old girl allegedly married to Fundamentalist LDS Church leader Warren Jeffs.

The girl's mother wants a jury to ultimately decide who gets custody of all of her children. Barbara Jessop's attorney, Valerie J. Malara, filed a demand notice in an Eldorado, Texas, court, seeking a jury trial to decide custody over her three children.

The demand was filed in advance of a permanency hearing scheduled Thursday in San Angelo, Texas, where child welfare authorities were to update a judge on the girl's status in foster care.

The girl, believed to have been married at age 12 to Jeffs, was ordered back into foster care in August after a judge ruled Jessop failed to protect her from abuse. In a Child Protective Services status report filed in the case and obtained by the Deseret News on Monday, child welfare workers sought "permanent managing conservatorship" over the girl. In the immediate future, CPS is asking to keep the girl in foster care.

"We are still hopeful for reunification in this case, if it can be achieved," agency spokesman Patrick Crimmins said Monday.

Malara did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Permanent managing conservatorship would give CPS widespread authority over the girl under Texas law, including the right to decide care, education, medical care, legal rights, the right to consent to a marriage and even direct the "moral and religious training of the child."

The CPS report said Jessop "has not demonstrated herself as a safe and responsible caregiver."

A psychological evaluation in September described her as "moderately guarded and suspicious" and recommended more therapy sessions.

Jessop wants her daughter back, but the report said "Mrs. Jessop has no plan for how she might protect (the girl) from being placed in another marriage."

"The major concerns were that Mrs. Jessop does not believe that abuse to (the girl) happened, she does not take responsibility for her role in that abuse, she is dependent on people that had involvement in the abuse to (the girl), she does not have a plan to protect (the girl) other than her promise, she is minimally cooperative with CPS and seems to be deliberately misleading CPS about her marriage to Frederick Merril Jessop," the report said.

The girl is doing well in foster care, the report claims.

"(The girl) has kept busy with piano, schoolwork and reading," it said. "The foster family continues to expose (the girl) to new things through outings, family gatherings and other social activities."

In therapy, the report said the girl expressed sadness at not being around her family. Attempts to find relatives to care for her have not worked out, CPS said, noting one did not believe the girl had been abused and "agrees with underage marriage and supports plural marriages."

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