Texas officials overstepped bounds in FLDS raid

We voiced our support of Texas authorities a few days after they seized 440 children from a religious polygamy compound and placed them in temporary government custody across the state.

But it’s starting to become clear that Texas law enforcement and child welfare officials relied on fraudulent and exaggerated claims of child abuse to conduct a sweeping raid that ripped families apart and appears to have turned into an assault on religious beliefs unpopular with mainstream society.

The Associated Press reported Thursday that a Texas appeals court found the raid to be illegal, and ordered all children from the compound owned by Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to be returned to their parents within 10 days.

Texas appeals sect ruling, lets 3 families reunite

Concerns documented by the court and various media accounts include:

• The initial “tip” from an underage girl who said she was raped by a man living at the compound appears to have been a hoax phoned in by a woman in Colorado Springs, Colo., who has a history of making false police reports.

• Texas authorities ignored concrete evidence that the male suspect they originally went to the compound to arrest actually was in Arizona.

• Of 31 females that Texas child welfare officials claimed were underage mothers, at least 15 have turned out to be legal adults, including a 27-year-old. In one case, Texas law enforcement officers have been accused of ignoring a woman at the compound who presented an Arizona driver’s license and birth certificate showing she was 18.

It’s likely that Texas officials were heavily swayed by far more compelling evidence from Colorado City, Ariz., the longtime headquarters of the FLDS, that at least some church members have developed a practice of forcing underage girls into second or third “spiritual marriages.” We certainly were.

But as a constitutional republic, the United States rightly sets high standards for government agents to meet before they can even temporarily force families apart. Arizona Attorney General Terry Goddard has said the recent Utah conviction of FLDS leader Warren Jeffs for arranging underage marriages is not enough justification to seize Colorado City children from families that have not been shown to be participants.

In a free society, police can’t act on rumor and dislike of religious beliefs. They must have reasonable evidence of wrongdoing first. Until Texas can make such a case, its FLDS families should allowed to reunite.