Kingston can't contact 11 children

Accused polygamist John Daniel Kingston cannot have any contact with 11 of the children he fathered with one of his wives.

Monday afternoon, a 3rd District Juvenile Court judge halted Kingston's weekly visitations with his children, who have been in state custody since June.

Ten of the children he fathered with Heidi Mattingly have been in state custody since June, when Judge Andrew Valdez ruled Kingston abused them and that their mother failed to protect them from that abuse.

Since then, Kingston's interaction with the children has been limited to weekly supervised visits. Kingston was scheduled to have one of those visits Monday night. It was unknown Monday why the judge cut off Kingston's visitations.

Before the children were taken into state custody, Kingston spent just 15 minutes to an hour every week with the children, according to court testimony. Visitations usually last an hour per week.

"In my estimation, he's visiting the children more now than he was previously," Valdez said in a Nov. 10 hearing.

Now Kingston won't be visiting them at all.

Attempts to reach Kingston's attorney Monday were unsuccessful.

The couple's 4-month-old daughter remains in the custody of her mother. Kingston is barred from any contact with Mattingly.

Kingston has fathered at least 108 children with 14 wives, according to state officials.

The family landed in court after Kingston threatened two of his teenage daughters for piercing their ears without his permission. The girls, ages 13 and 16, told police they were afraid of their father, who threatened to rip out their earrings for going against his wishes.

That incident led to further investigation of abuses in the home. Kingston's 13-year-old daughter told police her father beat her, her mother and her siblings and forced the children to eat rotten food he dug out of the garbage.

Since the beginning of the case, the state has maintained Kingston is the one who physically abused the children. Now prosecutors are pointing the finger at Mattingly. In a petition scheduled for a December trial, guardian ad litem Kristen Brewer alleges Mattingly is "physically and emotionally abusive to the children on a day-to-day basis."