Warren Jeffs

Warren Steed Jeffs (born December 3, 1955) is an American religious-cult leader and felon, convicted of several sex crimes and two assisted sex crimes involving children.

He is the leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (an offshoot of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints), a polygamous cult.

Warren Steed Jeffs was born on December 3, 1955, to Rulon Jeffs (1909–2002) and Merilyn Steed (born circa 1935, a descendent of pioneer Thomas Joseph Steed).

Warren was born more than two months prematurely in Sacramento, California.

Jeffs became principal in 1976, the year he turned 21.

He was known for being "a stickler for the rules and for discipline."

Rulon Jeffs became the President of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS Church) in 1986 and had nineteen or twenty wives and approximately 60 children.

Former church members claim that Warren has 87 wives.

Warren grew up outside of Salt Lake City, Utah, and for more than twenty years served as the principal of Alta Academy, an FLDS private school at the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon.

Prior to his father's death in 2002, Jeffs held the position of counselor to the church leader.

Jeffs became Rulon's successor with his official title in the FLDS Church becoming "President and Prophet, Seer and Revelator" as well as "President of the Priesthood".

The Revelator was the head of the organization of all adult male church members who were deemed worthy to hold the priesthood, a tradition carried on in the Latter Day Saint movement.

Following Rulon's death, Jeffs told the high-ranking FLDS officials, "I won't say much, but I will say this – hands off my father's wives."

When addressing his father's widows he said, "You women will live as if Father is still alive and in the next room."

Within a week he had married all but two of his father's wives; one refused to marry Jeffs and was subsequently prohibited from ever marrying again, while the other, Rebecca Wall, fled the FLDS compound.

Naomi Jessop, one of the first of Rulon's former wives to marry Jeffs, subsequently became his favorite wife and confidant.

As the sole individual in the FLDS Church with the authority to perform marriages, Jeffs was responsible for assigning wives to husbands.

He also had the authority to discipline male church members by "reassigning their wives, children and homes to another man."

Until courts in Utah intervened, Jeffs controlled almost all of the land in Colorado City, Arizona, and Hildale, Utah, which was part of a church trust called the United Effort Plan (UEP).

The land has been estimated to be worth over $100 million.

All UEP assets were put in the custody of the Utah court system pending further litigation.

In January 2004, Jeffs expelled a group of twenty men from the Short Creek Community, including the mayor, and reassigned their wives and children to other men in the community.

Jeffs, like his predecessors, continued the standard FLDS and Mormon fundamentalist tenet that faithful men must follow what is known as the doctrine of plural marriage in order to attain exaltation in the afterlife.

Jeffs specifically taught that a devoted church member is expected to have at least three wives in order to get into heaven, and the more wives a man has, the closer he is to heaven.

Before his 2006 arrest, Jeffs had last been seen on January 1, 2005, near Eldorado, Texas, at the dedication ceremony of the foundation of a large FLDS temple on the YFZ Ranch.

In 2006, Jeffs was placed on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List for his flight from the charges that he had arranged illegal child marriages between his adult male followers and underage girls in Utah.

On June 10, 2006, Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard told the Deseret News that he had heard from several sources that Jeffs had returned to Arizona, and had performed marriage ceremonies in a mobile home that was being used as a wedding chapel.

In 2007, Arizona charged him with eight additional counts in two separate cases, including incest and sexual conduct with minors.

In September 2007, Jeffs was convicted of two counts of rape as an accomplice, for which he was sentenced to imprisonment for ten years to life in Utah State Prison.

On March 27, 2007, the Deseret News reported that Jeffs had renounced his role as prophet of the FLDS Church in a conversation with his brother Nephi.

The ranch came into the public eye on April 7, 2008, when Texas authorities conducted a raid and took legal custody of 416 children, in response to a March 31 phone call alleging physical and sexual abuse on the ranch.

The caller claimed to be a 16-year-old girl married to a 50-year-old man, and stated that she had given birth to his child a year prior.

Residents, however, told authorities that there was in fact no such girl, and the calls were ultimately traced to 33-year-old Rozita Swinton, totally unconnected to the FLDS Church, and known for repeated instances of filing false reports.

Nevertheless, Texas authorities continued to investigate whether Swinton's claims were a hoax.

The women and children who were suspected of being minors were returned after Texas courts established that the state had not presented sufficient evidence of abuse to have removed them.

This conviction was overturned by the Utah Supreme Court in 2010 due to flawed jury instructions.

Jeffs was extradited to Texas, where he was found guilty of sexual assault of a minor, for raping a 15-year-old child bride; and aggravated sexual assault against a child, for raping a 12-year-old child bride; for which he was sentenced to life in prison, plus twenty years, and fined $10,000.

Jeffs is incarcerated at the Louis C. Powledge Unit of the Texas Department of Criminal Justice near Palestine, Texas.

In 2011, he was convicted of two felony counts of child sexual assault, for which he is serving a life sentence.

As the result of a November 2012 court decision, much of the UEP land is to be sold to those who live on it.