Texas makes deal with FLDS couple

SAN ANGELO, Texas — A deal has been struck involving an infant caught up in the raid on the Fundamentalist LDS Church's YFZ Ranch.

"I understand y'all have reached a tentative agreement," Judge Barbara Walther said today after a 2 1/2-hour delay, so lawyers could negotiate behind closed doors.

The deal gives the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services sole conservatorship over the baby, born two weeks ago to Dan Jessop and his wife, Louisa Bradshaw (Jessop). It names the parents as temporary possessors.

"I feel good about it," Dan Jessop said as he walked out of the courtroom. "It's one step closer to my family being together."

Bradshaw will stay in a San Antonio shelter with her baby. Her two other children, a 3-year-old girl and a 2-year-old boy, will be moved from a foster care facility in Austin to join her. The deal is also pending a decision by the Texas Supreme Court about what to do with hundreds of other children in state custody.

Today's hearing would have called numerous child witnesses, attorneys said, including a 13-year-old girl whom Texas Child Protective Services suggested last week was a child bride of FLDS leader Warren Jeffs. The girl is a sister of Dan Jessop.

Jessop's attorney, Pat Matassarin, said the agreement was reached in a "collective effort." She had filed a motion to continue the hearing when she learned that the witnesses were going to testify and CPS lawyers had come to court with documents several inches thick — but she had no idea what they would be talking about.

"The only thing they're supposed to be addressing is the physical well-being of the baby," Matassarin said. "Not 13-year-olds, not 15-year-olds, none of that."

Matassarin was referring to photographs introduced into evidence last week that showed a 12-year-old girl kissing Jeffs in a manner that lawyers for CPS described as "how a husband kisses a wife."

Rod Parker, a Salt Lake City attorney acting as a spokesman for the FLDS Church, accused Texas child welfare authorities of engaging in a "publicity stunt" with courtroom evidence.

"They have nothing to do with this family," he said. "It's just an effort by CPS to get publicity for their larger intent to paint everybody with this same brush. These photos have no tie to this particular family in a way that's relevant to these proceedings."