In a small, unremarkable desert village just south of the Arizona-Utah border, three children who mysteriously disappeared more than two years ago have been found alive.
After a multi-year search, the children’s unexplained disappearance from their Beaver County, Utah, home in October 2022 has finally been resolved.
A information about the children’s possible location was given to the local police in late August.
Authorities at the time speculated that the father of the children might have “planned the disappearance and subsequent concealment” of his three children.
In Fredonia, Arizona, a small desert village less than five miles from the Arizona-Utah border, the missing children were later discovered in the custody of their grandmother.
Further investigation by the Fredonia Police Department revealed that the youngsters had been deliberately kept out of the public eye, with family members aiding in the concealment of their location.
In connection with the 2022 disappearance, the aunt and grandmother of the unidentified youngsters have been placed under arrest. Meanwhile, their father remains at large.
According to reports, the children shared a home with the Fundamentalist Latter-day Saint church, a religious organization that has often been compared as a cult because of its involvement in several illegal activities, including child trafficking, child marriage, child abandonment, and sexual slavery.
According to a department press release, the children were released on September 1st after the cooperation of the law enforcement agencies in Arizona and Utah.
The children have since been returned to the mother.
The press release said, “The Fredonia Police Department would like to thank all involved for their assistance.””The children are safe with their mother as of right now while this investigation is ongoing.”
There are just 1,203 people living in the quaint community in northern Arizona that is the gateway to the North Rim of the Grand Canyon, according to the US Census Bureau.
A former Fundamentalist Latter-day Saint church member previously described what it’s like to reside in a Latter-day Saints commune.
In December, popular YouTuber Peter Santanello spoke honestly with Sam and Melissa, a married couple from Hilldale, Utah, about their religious background.
The two told Santanello that they grew up in an era when girls might be married off as early as 14 and “men were living in fear” due to Warren Jeffs’ polygamous Mormon cult.
Sam highlighted the reality of the pervasive control that exists in the church and the tactics of intimidation used to make its followers fearful.
He began by explaining that he was raised by three mothers in a trailer with hundreds of children living there at the same time, all of whom were his siblings.
“My mom was the second wife,” he claimed. The tale of how the women got along and everything is fascinating, but my mother was the second of her twelve children, and I am roughly the middle child.
“In total, I have 36 siblings.”
He clarified that “the sexual stuff was so taboo” and that birth control was “completely against the rules.”
“All marriages were arranged and entirely based on what Warren Jeffs decided at the time—whether someone was deserving of another wife or sufficiently moral,” Sam clarified.
According to the ex-member, this frequently meant that people were “forced” to marry, including girls as young as 14 to older men.
“The majority of men in the community are assigned their wives, so if the prophet says, ‘Here’s your new wife, she’s fourteen, will you look him in the eye and say, ‘Well, I don’t want a fourteen-year-old?’” Melissa clarified.
When he sees you, he will say You’re wondering what God has in store for you. This 14-year-old is destined to be your fourth bride, according to what God told me. Do you mean that you don’t believe in God?
“And who is going to question that authority in that sense, given what these men are dealing with?”
“The men can also be victims, and I think we overlook that a lot,” she added, adding that “women can have situations where they are oppressed or in circumstances where there is abuse or these other things that can happen.”
“We don’t consider the pressure this man has to live a perfect life, and if anything in his life and home isn’t perfect, he could lose everything.” This is especially true if his wife, children, and family aren’t perfect.
Sam said that Warren Jeffs often accused individuals of sin and said they were no longer worthy to being in the group, thereby kicking them out.
“All of this space would be created for women to be passed around to other men if he forced them out.”
“Men were constantly living in fear that if I don’t obey perfectly, this will happen to me and I’m gone,” he added.
“He used a lot of people as an example to instill fear in the other churchgoers.”
Warren Jeffs received a life sentence after being found guilty of two felonies related to child sexual assault.