Arizona files 8 new charges against Jeffs

A grand jury in Mohave County, Ariz., has indicted Fundamentalist LDS Church leader Warren Jeffs on criminal charges, accusing him of arranging more child-bride marriages.

Jeffs already faces charges in Utah of rape as an accomplice. In Arizona, he is charged with four counts of sexual conduct with a minor as an accomplice, a class 6 felony; and four counts of incest as an accomplice, a class 4 felony. The indictments were handed down earlier this year and announced today, but Mohave County Attorney Matt Smith released few details.

"The cases involve two separate victims," Smith said in an e-mail to the Deseret Morning News. "Mr. Jeffs will not come to Mohave County to face these charges or to have an initial appearance on them until his Utah case is resolved."

Authorities said Jeffs performed a pair of marriages involving underage girls in the FLDS enclave of Colorado City, Ariz.

"He married two people who were closely related," Mohave County Attorney's investigator Gary Engels said today, declining to comment further.

One indictment accuses Jeffs of performing a marriage between May 1, 2002, and June 30, 2002, "in the vicinity of a trailer in Colorado City." The other indictment charges Jeffs with performing another marriage around August 30, 2003, "in the vicinity of 40 West Johnson Avenue, Colorado City."

Jeffs was served with the indictments on Wednesday at the Purgatory Jail in Hurricane, where he is awaiting a September trial here in Utah on charges of rape as an accomplice, a first-degree felony. Jeffs, 51, is accused in that case of arranging a marriage between a 14-year-old girl and her 19-year-old cousin. Jeffs is also facing federal charges of unlawful flight to avoid prosecution, stemming from his time on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted list.

In Mohave County, Jeffs already faces other charges of sexual conduct with a minor and conspiracy to commit sexual conduct with a minor. One of those cases has been on shaky ground after an alleged child bride refused to testify against her former husband, Randy Barlow. It led to the dismissal of criminal charges against Barlow.

Unlike that case, the child brides in these latest indictments "are cooperating with law enforcement," the young women's attorney, Roger Hoole, said Thursday. "These are not cases that Mohave has had in the past where the victims have been reluctant or refused to cooperate."

Hoole is also the lawyer for the star witness in Washington County's case against Jeffs. She has filed a multi-million-dollar civil lawsuit against the FLDS leader.

Hoole declined to say if the women in the new Mohave County cases planned to file civil lawsuits against Jeffs, but did say they were in a sort of "witness protection program" to conceal their identities.

"We're trying to protect their privacy and safety," he said.

Jeffs has not retained an attorney to handle the Arizona charges.

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E-mail: bwinslow@desnews.com