The judge handling the massive custody case involving children taken from the Fundamentalist LDS Church's YFZ Ranch has ordered the Texas Attorney General's Office to prosecute any potential criminal cases involving the polygamous sect.

Court clerks said the order was signed for the magistrate case, which was the case involving the initial search warrants for the FLDS compound.

"The state prays this honorable court appoint the office of the attorney general of the state of Texas as special prosecutors to assist with the prosecution of any criminal cases that may arise in relation to the above numbered search warrant investigations," Tom Green County District Attorney Stephen Lupton wrote in a motion obtained by the Deseret News Tuesday.

Judge Barbara Walther approved the request. The Texas Attorney General's Office did not immediately return a call seeking comment on Tuesday.

An estimated 1,000 boxes of evidence were seized from the YFZ Ranch and the FLDS temple, which are currently being reviewed by an appeals court judge. At issue is whether some of the evidence is protected under priest-penitent privilege and the First Amendment.

An 88-page search warrant return listed items seized from the compound, including photographs, computers, hard drives, journals, temple clothes, cameras, cell phones, scriptures, tax records, baby books, letters from attorneys, letters dubbed "prison mail," "mail from Canadian Saints" and "mail from houses in hiding."

A "bishop's record" was recently unsealed, revealing a census of the people at the YFZ Ranch and in Short Creek, the name of the FLDS enclaves of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz. Some of the men named in the records are listed as having wives who are 16 and 17 years-old.

Lawyers for the FLDS Church are challenging the seizure of the evidence, saying it was improperly obtained based on a hoax phone call. Prosecutors in Utah and Arizona have sought to get their hands on that evidence, to see if it could assist their criminal investigations against the FLDS Church and its leader, Warren Jeffs.

On April 3, Texas law enforcement and Child Protective Services workers responded to a call to a San Angelo family crisis shelter by a 16-year-old girl named Sarah, who claimed she was pregnant and in an abusive, polygamous marriage to a man named Dale Barlow. When authorities went on the ranch, Texas CPS said it found evidence of other abuses, including teenage mothers.

That prompted Walther to order the removal of all of the children from the ranch. A series of search warrants were also served, including a federal search warrant on the last day that law enforcement was on the ranch.

Authorities have not found Sarah, and have declared a Colorado woman a "person of interest" in their investigation into whether the call was a hoax. Dale Barlow, a convicted sex offender who lives in Colorado City was questioned by Texas Rangers, but never arrested. An arrest warrant for him was dropped last week.

Attorneys for the 464 children in Texas custody have said that the initial call that prompted the raid will not likely affect the custody case, because it is what CPS workers saw when they responded that led to the removal of the children.

After spending weeks in makeshift shelters, the children are now in foster care facilities scattered across Texas.

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E-MAIL: bwinslow@desnews.com