Also, he said greater federal involvement would help ensure that groups such as the FLDS do not seize civil control in small, remote areas — to ensure local officials look the other way when crimes occur — which he said they may have done for decades in Hildale and Colorado City.

Some former members of the FLDS Church testified that leaders of the group control all aspects of its members lives, and members have no protection of law.

Carolyn Jessop was married to Merril Jessop, a lieutenant of Warren Jeffs and leader of the FLDS ranch in Eldorado, Texas. She wrote a book about her escape with eight children from the FLDS in Colorado City. "I was desperate because I could no longer protect my children from the increasing abuse within the FLDS as the result of bizarre pronouncements by the prophet, Warren Jeffs."

She said officials and police at Colorado City where she lived were all FLDS, and they did what FLDS leaders desired. Husbands would not allow women to have licensed and insured cars, so local police could arrest them on those charges if they tried to flee.

"The night I escaped with my children I knew I couldn't go to the local police for protection, because they would be the first men that Merril would contact to hunt me down. They could use the fact that my car was not licensed as a legal reason to arrest me," she said.

"I stand here today to ask the U.S. government to provide federal oversight into these closed communities, so that members, such as myself, seeking refuge know were they can find a safe haven should they choose to leave," she said.

Jessop added, "My rights to my own life and liberty were taken from me when I was forced to marry Merril Jessop. I had never known what it meant to be safe until my third day of freedom when we went into hiding. It took me a year before I could think of myself as a person and not an object."

Dan Fisher, who was an FLDS member and once was married to three women assigned to him by FLDS leaders, said, "Their prophet is as their God. Whatever he says takes precedent over any previous scripture of any previous century. It can also take precedent over the laws of the United States."

He said his extended family once received a 4:30 a.m. call ordering it to a meeting with FLDS leaders. At it, his father's three wives were "released" (divorced by mandate) from his father, who had not been invited to the meeting. Warren Jeffs told the group Fisher's father was not worthy of his wives and did not have time to repent — and their father had no hope for salvation.

The wives were assigned to other men, who claimed all their children as their own. Fisher said his father died shortly thereafter, probably in a suicide. He said such power over lives can be misused with tragic consequences.

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E-mail: lee@desnews.com