Attorneys, media, others descend on San Angelo for FLDS custody hearing

"The removals happened based on what we saw out there."

Attorney Rod Parker, acting as spokesman for the Fundamentalist LDS Church, said Texas officials know there is no "Sarah."

"How can they think they have her inside with the other children when what they really have is uncorroborated and refuted?" said Parker. "Do they think they have the wife of Dale Barlow? Because that's who they say she is."

The three-day raid on the YFZ Ranch was based on allegations from phone calls to a family shelter hotline from a 16-year-old girl named Sarah who said she was married to Barlow. The caller said she was pregnant and was being physically and sexually abused by the man who she said had six other wives.

Texas Rangers traveled to Utah last weekend to interview Barlow, 50, who lives in Colorado City, Ariz. He insists he doesn't know the girl and has never been to the Texas ranch. He was not arrested.

"That is because she's not the wife of Dale Barlow, because she doesn't exist," Parker said.

When the custody hearing gets under way today, attorneys with the legal affairs division of the state agency will argue to keep the children in state custody — regardless of whether they are able to prove the allegations they say were lodged by Sarah.

"What we are going to have to prove to the judge is that these children have been abused and are in danger of further abuse if they are returned to their homes," Cunningham said. "In doing that, it will not just be CPS trying to prove this, it will be a lot of parties in the courthouse."

The relatively small Tom Green County Courthouse in San Angelo cannot handle the anticipated crowd, so in addition to the setting where the action will unfold, authorities have set up a teleconferencing site at City Hall to accommodate interested parties, mainly the media. The hearing is expected to last all day and perhaps spill into Friday.

Although sexual abuse is front and center at the case that led to the raid, Cunningham would not comment specifically on whether any medical exams have been performed to determine evidence of sexual activity among the young FLDS women and girls.

"Generally, that evidence is something we would secure as part of our investigation," he said.

Procedurally in child sex abuse cases that result in the removal of a child from a home, an exam is performed to determine if the allegations can be substantiated. If so, that evidence at the very least can lead to a judicial order barring contact between the accused and the child victim while the investigation continues or it can culminate in criminal charges that result in prison time.