Reader comments
Confusion on FLDS kids' status ongoing

An editor at the Deseret News needs to consider whether the FLDS is using the paper. There is no corroboration of the accusations being made. This could be a public relations offensive, not credible information, as could the unsubstantiated claims of lost children. I spent half of my working life as a reporter and editor for print media. If people were feeding me wild claims about children being harmed without real sources I would be skeptical. As for Ms. Martinez, she is endangering her own credibility (and possibly her license to practice law) by acting as a conduit for FLDS alarmism.

Basically this entire story is the word of CPS officials pitted against the word of FLDS. Neither seem to be particularly trustworthy sources, but at least D-News reports on BOTH sides of the story. Nobody else seems to be.

This is crazy!!!! the children are afraid and getting real sick behind this; all this is child abuse, get rid of the men. don't let them see the children but for God sake give the babies back to the moms 13years old and up should stay with CPS until all is investigated but babies the are in danger of dying of a broken heart, if your children where yanked from you they to would be ill and mentally they will have problems. Sad;lonely,frightend and with strangers in world unknown to these little people,who's causing child abuse now!?

Interloper, the same could be said of the original "alarmism" used to take the children. I believe there were "wild claims about children being harmed without real sources" that started this mess in the first place. There still is "no corroboration of the accusations being made" against the FLDS.

The Texas CPS has consistently lied. Since they took away cell phones, it is rather hard to tell whether they are lying this time. However, since they took away cell phones, that is a pretty good indication that the CPS is fighting a PR war, and using the apparatus of the state, including armed law enforcement, to do it. Makes me trust the CPS less than the FLDS.

It would have been a better choice for the kids if they just left the children on the ranch and made the men and women leave. The CPS could have cared for the children while DNA tests were done on all of them, and the men and women would have all been put into another place (which would be much cheaper) and all their DNA would have been obtained too. Of course, I realize that it must be volunary to obtain it, and they would most likely not have volunteered it unless they were threatened with the loss of their kids. What a mess!

Who cares if the FLDS parents don't know where their kids are and CPS officials can't account for their whereabouts? We've all decided FLDS parents don't love their children anyway, right? FLDS parents no longer have the right to know where their kids are. Right?

CPS says they know where all the kids are and that's all that matters. FLDS parents have no right to be concerned about where their kids are or if they are accounted for or not.

If you're a good lawyer you'll make Noise to press the issue. They're seeking visitation, by any means necessary.

However, I do agree with 'Interloper' that Desert News is starting to be spin central for the FLDS. Same for the Salt Lake Tribune.

FLDS won't be the same once Texas gets done with them.

UT will feel the heat to do something more, because I do believe the eventual evidence WILL show abuse of many girls.

This case needs to go to the supreme court as I have never seen people found guilty in mass before the trial. Not in the USA, but maybe this is our NEW WORLD ORDER.
These people should have been dealt with on a one on one basis and only the guilty punished. The way it is handled it becomes a Religious persecution case and has the risk of the guilty going free. They should have taken the men away and left the women on the ranch with in house arrest, and sorted it out from there.
The one good thing is that they are not violent like we experienced in WACO.
This is just plain terrible, and should never happen in the USA.

How would you feel in their shoes? Your neighbor is accused of something so they come to YOUR house and rip your kids away causing physical and emotional trauma/abuse to them. Then they take your personal property (phones) away, and deny you the very thing you live for (your children). Our Constitution is hanging by a threat and what are we doing about it? Are we excusing secret combinations (CPS) and condemning the press for telling us about their corruption? These mothers have done nothing wrong and have a right to have their children. Since when do we take kids away just in case they might eventually commit a crime. Ridiculous! No one would have children if that were the case, as all mortals are potential law breakers. Give the kids back and prosecute the fathers who have allowed underaged children to wed.

It's deplorabable with all the DFPS is getting away with. Having all these children taken away from their mothers with no just cause, and so boldly at that is something I have never heard of in my lifetime. There's no doubt in my mind these children are scared out of their wits and are bound to get sick. They've always lived a protected lifestyle and now this trauma!!! It use to be that we were innocent until proven guilty, now it's the opposite. With so many questions to the chilren's whereabouts and their safety, then DFPS should be held accountable under the same law. I believe the FLDS are being used as ginny pigs and if we do nothing, we will be giving the USA government the go ahead for us all to be hald off so they can go ahead with their agenda, (THE NEW WORLD ORDER OR ONE WORLD EMPIRE).

You do not share a communal home with your neighbors.
It is standard procedure in an abuse case to remove children from the household that is under investigation. In this case the entire community is under investigation.
The cellphones were taken away to avoid tampering with the children, so that the investigation could be handeled as efficiently as possible.
Add to that mothers lying about the childrens name, ages, and their own ages in order to puprposely confuse the investigation further, they have proven themselves to be untrustworthy in the investigation.

The information on the entire situation is questionable. CPS has changed the information they provide so often that the information they provide cannot be trusted. There are several cases where they decided children looked older then 18 and therefore were even when the papers were provided to show their age as 18 or over.

CPS took the papers, so stating the families will not provide the information is redundant. CPS has the information, not the families.

Illegal alien supporter groups routinely tell immigrants, illegal and otherwise not to provide information to authorities. Its ok for them to do it, why isn't it ok and standard operating procedure for citizens to do it too.

CPS, the Judge, and the Sheriff are the criminals and child abusers in this fiasco.

If I was a mother over 18 (that could pass for under 18) with a nursing baby/toddler, and found out the only way I could stay with my kids was to claim I was minor, I would do so in a flash.

It just makes me so angry what the authorities are doing to those kids (especially the little ones); and then presenting to the public the fantasy of protecting them.

Had it not been for the authorities removing all the babies and kids under 12, I might have had some doubts that this was not be purely religious persecution ... but religious persecution is exactly what it now appears to be to me. Nothing more nothing less.