The YFZ Ranch
It has been nearly eight weeks since law enforcement raided the "Yearning For Zion" ranch in Eldorado, Texas - eight weeks since more than 460 children of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) were removed from their homes, separated from their parents, and scattered across the state's foster care system.
"This is about children at imminent risk of harm we believe have been abused and neglected," an official from the state's Child Protective Services division told reporters.
But Willie Jessop, a member of the FLDS and the point man in the church's mess with Texas, says the state had it all wrong. "They were wrong when they kicked in the gate…. They were wrong when they brought in the guns and they ordered the children at gunpoint on the buses…. They were wrong when they raided it with a false and fake allegation to get into the place…. Where do you wanna stop saying it was wrong?" he asks.
"People are presumed innocent. Where's the presumption of innocence here?" Jessop asks correspondent Peter Van Sant.
"So people who are tuning in and watching this show tonight who think they've got a pretty good handle on this story, that a group of middle aged men who are raising these young girls, having sexual relationships with them when they were 14, 15, 16 years old, you're telling me that that's a bunch of nonsense?" Van Sant asks.Escape
"It's the biggest bunch of bull crap that's ever been sold to this nation," Jessop says.
But the standoff between the FLDS and the state of Texas didn't begin eight weeks ago. It really began five years ago, when a mysterious group bought almost 1,700 acres in Eldorado and started building what they said was a hunting retreat.
"I say, 'Hey. How ya doin'? I'm your neighbor.' And they said, 'Oh.' That's about it," remembers Chip Cole, who with his wife Kelly owns a ranch next door. "They weren't very friendly," says Kelly.
"And Chip called me and said, 'Somethin' weird is goin' on next door because all the women are wearing long dresses. There's some kinda cult goin' on,'" Kelly remembers.
Then word got out that the new neighbors were in fact members of the FLDS. The controversial religious group broke with the Mormon church decades ago and believes that polygamy is the path to heaven.
"They had one steely-eyed old religious fellow that wanted to talk about religion. He wanted to tell me that plural marriage was at the core of their religion. 'Course I said, 'Well that's great. I guess a gal can have two or three husbands, huh?' You know, they don't have much sense of humor," Chip Cole recalls.
An uneasy truce between Eldorado and the FLDS followed until the end of March, when a call came into a hotline from someone claiming to be a teenage victim of sexual abuse at the ranch.
Police now believe that call was a hoax. But once inside, investigators said they saw a number of pregnant girls and young mothers who appeared to be underage. That shocking discovery, the state said, was reason enough to remove all the children. It turns out now that many of those young girls are actually adults, and the FLDS has gone on the attack against Texas.
"It's un-American," Willie Jessop argues. "They haven't got one woman that says, 'Please save me.' They haven't found one child that says, 'Please save me.'"
To win sympathy for their cause, Jessop and the FLDS launched a public relations campaign. The parents they made available to the media are monogamous, like 24-year-old Dan Jessop and his 22-year-old wife Louisa.
"It's pretty rough to see what my children are going through, what we're going through for no reason," Dan Jessop explains.
The Jessops' three children became wards of the state, including their two-week-old baby boy, who was born after the raid. "We're innocent of any of these crimes. Me and my wife have not abused my children," Dan Jessop says. "I wish they'd let me have my children back."
Dan and Louisa Jessop have been in court fighting to win custody of the baby.
Last Friday, during their hearing, the state introduced disturbing photos that show FLDS leader Warren Jeffs kissing a pre-teen girl in 2006. 48 Hours tried to show these pictures to Dan Jessop after court, but he didn't want to be filmed holding them.
What might have made him most uncomfortable is that the girl in Jeffs' arms is one of his own little sisters. "It is a potential problem for a 13-year-old girl to have intimate relationships with a man. In my opinion, that's where I stand. That is definitely a problem," Jessop says.
"What about these allegations that underage girls have been sexually abused at the ranch?" Van Sant asks Willie Jessop.
"You called it exactly right, allegations," Jessop replies. "I don't know that that's happened. You don't know that that's happened."
But Texas officials made public a hand-written ledger called the "Bishop's record," which seems to refute what Willie Jessop is saying. Seized during the raid, the record suggests that young girls at the ranch have married and engaged in illegal sex with older men. Jessop refused to even look at it.
"This is a document taking from the ranch. There's five 16-year-olds here that are married to older men," Van Sant explains.
"Is this alleged?" Jessop asks.
"No, it's by the FLDS' own documents. You wanna take a look?" Van Sant asks.
"I don't need to take a look 'cause I didn't fill it out," Jessop says.
"Have middle aged men, members of your church, had spiritual marriages with 16-year-olds?" Van Sant asks.
"Let's put it this way, has any member in society had sex with under-aged girls?" Jessop replies.
"One of the things that would really help in this case, would be if the FLDS provided birth certificates of these kids, marriage certificates of these kids, if the men would agree to DNA testing," Van Sant remarks.
"You want that for yourself? Do you want me to go into your community and gather up everybody in your city streets? And do you want the government to have your DNA on your daughter and your children and your family for what purpose? To try to come up with some perverted allegation against you?" Jessop asks.
"Of course, I wouldn't want that to happen," Van Sant replies.
"Then why do you want me to answer those questions?" Jessop asks.
"Because your church has been accused of sexually abusing children, that's why," Van Sant says.
"So has the Catholics, so has any other religion, including Mormons. Should we just take them all down? Is there not a crime committed in any religion? Why do we single it out?" Jessop says.
"You're telling me that this raid, the pulling apart of these families, the destruction of this religious of community is all based on lies?" Van Sant asks.
"What part of, 'Hell, yes,' don't you understand?" Jessop says.
The Texas Supreme Court is expected to rule shortly on whether the State's removal of the children was illegal. Until then, what happens to them, and their parents, is anyone's guess.
"We want to be together in the home that we want to live in and the place we want to live," says Dan Jessop. "And the YFZ Ranch is where we want to live. But we are willing to move out of town, move out of Texas even, if that's what they expect us to do to get our children back."