Text claims disputed by sect mom's attorneys
 Sect mom's attorneys say bits out of context
 
By Paul A. Anthony
San Angelo Standard-Times
 
Attorneys for YFZ Ranch matriarch Barbara Jessop sharply dispute a report intimating that the woman's daughter was coached on how to behave while in foster care.

Valerie Malara and Brett H. Pritchard broke from their practice of declining comment on issues related to the state's investigation of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints to criticize both the publication and the content of a report filed last week by the court-appointed guardian for Jessop's 14-year-old daughter.

The attorneys' remarks provide a rare public prelude to what is expected to be a lengthy, possibly contentious hearing Friday in the Tom Green County courthouse.

The guardian's report, obtained and published Tuesday by the Standard-Times, describes text messages telling the girl - an alleged wife of sect leader Warren Jeffs - to "please stay angry" and "to keep crying, pout, sleep in."

"Jessop's attorneys have reviewed the CASA report and compared it to complete transcriptions of the text messages prepared by the Department," Malara and Pritchard said in a joint statement released Wednesday. "Jessop's attorneys do not believe the statements contained in the CASA report accurately reflect the actual text messages and were taken out of context."

The statement chastises the release of the report, calling its publication "inappropriate," and asks media organizations to refrain from publishing any further reports "made in connection with the case so as to maintain the right of privacy of the individuals involved, as well as ensure a fair trial for all parties."

The attorneys also reject recommendations from the report - filed by the Children's Advocacy Center of Tom Green County, which runs the area's Court-Appointed Special Advocates program - that the girl be restricted from visiting her mother except when supervised by a therapist, and from calling her at all.

"Jessop's attorneys believe that CASA's recommendations are not supported by" the state Department of Family and Protective Services, the attorneys said.

"They further believe that the recommendations are inappropriate, factually incorrect and heavy-handed."

State investigators allege the girl was married at age 12 to Jeffs, who has since been arrested and convicted in Utah of forcing a 14-year-old girl to marry her adult cousin.

She is the only one of 439 children removed from the ranch to have been taken into state custody since appellate courts ordered their return in June.

The attorneys' statement serves as a prelude to what could be another in a long line of contentious hearings, as 51st District Judge Barbara Walther is expected to take up Friday several motions in the still-jumbled FLDS case.

The attorneys have asked Walther to seal the CASA report, and said in their statement that the state's Child Protective Services agency supports that effort.

Meanwhile, the girl's court-appointed attorney, Carmen Symes Dusek, has asked to be withdrawn from the case for reasons that are not yet clear.

Motions have also been filed to seal the transcript of a deposition given by the girl's father, sect bishop Merril Jessop.

The deposition was used as evidence during a Jan. 26 hearing to compel Jessop's testimony after the ranch leader invoked his constitutional right against self-incrimination roughly 300 times.

The motion, filed by Jessop's attorney Amy Hennington, also includes a request to seal the transcript of the hearing.
 
gosanangelo.com
Originally published Thursday, February 5, 2009
 
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