Original subtitles

( music playing )

Mike Watkiss: Mr. Jeffs, did you rape those two girls?

Mr. Jeffs?

The trial was of Warren Jeffs was as bizarre

as anything I have ever seen

because, at one point,

they played the audio.

Warren Jeffs had recorded himself

basically committing statutory rape

against one of these little girls.

His creepy voice basically

grooming her moments before

he was about to sexually assault her.

It was stunning.

This little timid voice responding to him.

It was probably a really good thing

that there were all these big Texas Rangers

in that courtroom

because I think that jury would've jumped across the railing

and killed him with their bare hands.

Warren Jeffs: So anxious for Heavenly Father's spirit to guide me

and all of you can receive the truth.

Larry King: Osama bin Laden and eight other men

were joined on the FBI's Most Wanted List

by Warren Jeffs.

Reporter 1: Prophet Warren Jeffs

is considered one of the most sinister

polygamists of his time.

I think he had 78 wives.

Reporter 2: Young girls no more than 12 or 13 years old.

My dad is a pedophile.

I had tried so hard to protect my children.

Mike: I think he's a sociopath.

Flora Jessop: He was able to convince

15,000 people

that he was Jesus Christ to them.

I love him, I know that he loves me.

The level of blind obedience

is staggering.

Mike: It is a complete

church-run state.

If there were a Taliban of America,

I would say this is it.

Richard Ream: The church and Warren

controlled everything.

Brock Belnap: He's either the mouthpiece of God

or the most evil person on Earth.

Everybody deserves to know the truth.

Woman: And it will shock the world, the evidence that comes out.

Reporter 3: Mr. Jeffs,

should your followers

still consider you a prophet?

Warren Jeffs is a monster.

( music playing )

( birds chirping )

Hello, everybody.

Wonderful to see you.

- You all fit in. - ( laughter )

Rachel: I remember Father telling me once,

"There's two things a man loves...

( laughs )

women and power."

And he says, "But they love power more."

Which position's better?

Warren: No, this is fine.

You don't need to lean over, that's fine.

I can see them.

- Do you see me? - ( women chuckle )

Flora: Warren Jeffs was a special kind of predator.

He learned how to control

and manipulate people

to the point that they couldn't see

the real him.

Warren: ♪ Sweet spirit ♪

♪ Of prayer ♪

♪ Sweet spirit of prayer ♪

Brock: He has co-opted

the religious faith of believers

and manipulated and maintained his power

over them in a way that satisfies

whatever personal pleasure he gets.

I see him as both a narcissist

and a sociopath.

There is this grandiose

false sense of self.

And other people tend to be kind of objects to him.

Sam Brower: There's been people who've stood in front of trains,

shot themselves, poisoned themselves

because of Warren's

ability to decimate their lives.

The man has blood on his hands.

He's as guilty as if he had put the gun to someone's head

and pulled the trigger.

Dowayne Barlow: This story of Warren Jeffs

has to be told

because the values,

the virtues of good people

has been marched through and destroyed.

Elissa Wall: A lot of people ask,

"How did Warren do what he did?"

And it stems to one thing: fear.

And Warren became a master at commanding fear.

Well, thank you, that was a privilege.

( music playing )

Mike: In many ways, Warren Jeffs was sort of the anointed prince.

Came from this prominent family,

Rulon Jeffs and Merilyn Steed.

Winston Blackmore: Rulon Jeffs, the businessman,

he was just focused on his job

and he was very well-scriptured,

and he was a no-nonsense kind of person,

and he didn't like jokes,

and he didn't laugh at them.

And, you know, he was just one of those kind of guys.

He was really tough.

I think that he

lived a life of shutting the outside world out.

He had great big concrete walls around his home

in Salt Lake.

By and large, the Jeffs were reclusive.

( music playing )

Rachel: So Grandfather Rulon ended up marrying a lot of women,

but they didn't all live in the same house

until my father was 14 years old.

That's when all the families came together

and lived under one roof.

I know he had a lot of struggles

as a family coming together.

Warren is

the son of a polygamist,

which means you have a lot of competition

for your father's affection,

You have to stand out,

and Warren wasn't really remarkable.

My understanding

was that Warren Jeffs was a nerd.

Smart, really liked technology,

but awkward.

Elissa: He didn't have a lot of education

when it came to sexuality,

or growing, or how his body would change.

Lindsay: Being raised in a large family,

you have lots of kids without adult supervision

and you have a lot of access to

really complicated situations where

you have maybe a half-sister that you weren't raised with

and all of a sudden, you're 13 and you see this

cute girl, and she's your half-sister,

but you're not quite sure what the rules are.

Sam: When Warren was a boy,

all the women and children

would put paper over the windows,

towels under the doors

because Warren was a voyeur.

He had learned how to peek in

on the girls changing their clothes.

Lindsay: Warren would have been around

some family members who,

the rumors are,

that their families were known for...

sexual abuse.

Ron Rohbock: My wife has a master's degree in psychology,

and she tells me all the time that

an individual that ends up like Warren

usually has had it done to him in some way.

Briell Decker: There is a lot of speculation on that

I don't know how you would tell that for sure.

I do believe, I believe he probably was.

Elissa: I believe there was a lot of unhealthy sexual

desires and questions and problems that were swirling

within that family.

I think not having an education

and maybe being victimized himself

really added onto the fact

that he turned around and became a perpetrator.

Ron: Warren molested many of his sisters.

The three that I had married,

he had molested all three of them.

Attorney: Would you tell us your full name

and the community in which you reside?

Lorraine: Lorraine Jeffs Johnson.

( music playing )

Attorney: "This first couple of times,

you took me into your room downstairs..."

Do you remember that happening?

Lorraine: Yes. ( crying )

Attorney: "Another time, taking me into the bathroom

by the backdoor.

You took off your clothes and mine

and you asked if I wanted to see what makes babies."

Do you remember that happening?

Lorraine: Yes.

( tape fast-forwarding )

Attorney: Was this again when you were about 14?

Lorraine: It could've even been in my 15th year.

I remember thinking,

"Do all my brothers do this to all my sisters?

Was this a common thing?"

I didn't know,

I was never taught one way or the other.

( tape deck clicks )

Whatever Warren was dealing with,

it seems to me that shame is a huge element there.

And I think he tried to make sense of it.

And so, he studied and read Mormon theology,

spent hours looking for old Mormon documents,

trying to reconcile that shame...

with God.

Rachel: The religious studies

must've made him feel good.

It made him feel like

he was being a good person.

And I think he tried to deny

what he was becoming.

Noel: He was looking for himself outside himself.

That probably limited his own

real, deep self-awareness.

He was blinded in many ways

to his own impulses and thinking

that later come up and begin to create problems for him.

Dowayne: He felt like that he was

not accountable at all to anybody.

That he was just accountable to God.

Then that put this thing on such a reckless course.

I think it was the beginning

of big trouble.

( music playing )

Elissa: In our religion,

we had a prophet.

And he was the one man on Earth who was God to us.

For many generations,

any logic or any reasoning or thinking,

these were slowly weeded out,

all under the name of religion.

I look back on it and Warren did not just appear out of nowhere.

An entire society created him.

They all prepared the pathway that he came on.

Mike: This story started long before Warren Jeffs

That community has been operating, basically,

in the same fashion for generations.

Isaac Jeffs: Father very much took inspiration from Joseph Smith.

He always told us that he was here

to continue Joseph Smith's work in the Earth.

And I know that he was probably his role model.

( music playing )

Lindsay: The story goes that

Joseph Smith saw himself as restoring

things from Bible.

Anne Wilde: Abraham had more than one wife

and several others in the Old Testament

had more than one wife.

And so that's when the Lord made known to them

that it was a celestial principle

and that it was something that they should do.

Lindsay: Some Mormons believe that

if you have three wives,

you can go to the lower level

of the highest level of Heaven.

If you have five wives, you go into the middle level.

And seven, seven or more, gets you into

the highest level of the celestial kingdom.

Anne: Joseph Smith had about 30, 33 wives.

Was very controversial,

even in the early days of the church.

Lindsay: When we have to abandon

this idea of polygamy,

there are still thousands of people

that are living this principle.

What do you do with those people?

They don't just, like, disappear

because the church says it's over.

Anne: Some of the plural families then

were going to Mexico

so that they would hopefully get away from

the legal persecution.

And some of the people went to what now is called Short Creek.

Lindsay: They have to go on this exodus

into the wilderness.

Short Creek is the wilderness.

They've got big vermillion cliffs on one side,

Grand Canyon on the other side.

It's the perfect place to hide out.

Mike: They went to isolated places

so they could continue what is the most fundamental

and most important practice in their lives:

plural marriage.

And this little dusty town

morphed into the center

of the practice of polygamy in America, and certainly

the most dramatic example of, in essence,

a small cult called the FLDS Church.

Noel: The only way that the fundamentalists

could hold their religion,

they had to go into very isolated places.

And that's part of the context for Warren Jeffs.

Isolation worked for a long time for this community,

but it became extremely difficult

to maintain.

( music playing )

Roger: In 1953, there was a raid

with law enforcement coming from Arizona on one side

and from Utah on the other side

to get this community

and shut down plural marriage.

It was against the law.

Dowayne: My father was

a 15-year-old boy in the time of the raid.

And so he saw a lot of the emotional trauma

that was involved in that raid.

At the time, Leroy Johnson,

who was the Fundamentalist Mormon leader there in Short Creek,

his announcement to the Arizona Law Enforcement is,

"These sands will drink our blood

before we're gonna give up our principles."

Dr. Dan Fischer: After the raid of '53,

the people were taught to really live in secret.

In fact, my second mother,

she never came out of the house in the daylight

for 11 years.

They end up having extreme trust for each other

and very little trust for anybody else

because it was them against us, basically.

Brock: "Life" magazine published a bunch of pictures.

The fallout

was very negative

about families being torn apart.

Roger: It was a public relations disaster.

Arizona and Utah were burned so badly

that, for the most part,

they looked the other way for years.

Mike: The fallout from all of that

basically inoculated the FLDS community

from any outside interference or involvement

for decades.

And in that vacuum,

I have always argued that Warren Jeffs

was a historic inevitability.

Flora: The first time I remember

interacting with Warren Jeffs,

I was maybe eight or nine.

And we were climbing the trees.

I was sitting up on a branch

and he's very tall.

And he come up and was standing there talking to us

looking up at us

and he's running his hand up my leg

underneath my dress.

Warren Jeffs was absolutely

abusing children from the get-go.

( film reel clicking )

Roger: Soon after Warren Jeffs

graduated from high school,

he became the principal

of what's called the "Alta Academy,"

where the FLDS kids living in the Salt Lake City area

went to school.

And they were taught a religious curriculum

and Warren Jeffs was made the principal

at age 17 or 18.

Noel: His father felt this was a preparation

for him for bigger things.

And Warren took that opportunity.

And so a young generation grew up knowing him

and seeing him as their leader.

Stand up and stretch, please.

- ( children clamoring ) - Stretch time.

Your own strength.

Flora: He used the Alta Academy

and all of the students

as a means of perfecting

his ability

to control people.

( music playing )

Dan: Warren Jeffs became

obsessed in trying to enforce

such extreme dress codes and the like.

Having 'em stand on a chair to measure

the length of the hem.

And so obsessed with

the color red, that nobody could wear red.

He had a craving for power.

We learned later

after getting out of there

of scary things that he put those young people through.

Noel: You have this incredible power

and was grooming them

for his later pleasure.

Warren: I trust today I'm talking to young ladies

who are more spiritually minded.

Ahead of you is the test of how you will get married.

Let the Lord reveal

the man that you belong to.

( music playing )

Lindsay: He used scriptures

and doctrine in theology

to groom his victims.

And I think that that was

more probably for Warren.

He needed a scriptural basis

for doing it.

What I noticed about him is that he--

my older sister was very, like, favored by him

a lot,

but he didn't ever notice me.

I mean, he acted like he didn't.

But I knew he did.

He called in six of my sisters and brothers,

and skipped me.

I'm just like, "Yeah, right."

You knew that I was the only one

you didn't call on.

There was no way that you just

didn't notice me at all, you know?

And I knew it was a tactic.

Brock: He knew exactly what he was doing,

he preparing the young brides.

And, as he rose in power and prominence,

he got to pick the ones that he wanted.

Sam: That was like his training ground,

he could setup anybody he wanted to,

go after anybody he wanted to,

and molest anybody he wanted to.

And in the meantime, he's starting to have

his own family.

( camera shutter clicking )

Rachel: As the principal's daughter,

Father required us to be a good example

to the rest of the children in the school.

There was always some kind of spiritual teaching

to help us become better people.

( music playing )

As a child, we had a lot of fun times

with Father.

He sang with us a lot.

Warren: ♪ As a child I learned ♪

♪ That my mothers need ♪

Rachel: He made it a point to

take time with his children.

He was there for us.

Most of us were pretty close to him.

Warren: ♪ A young boy prayed ♪

♪ And opened up the heavens ♪

Roy Jeffs: There was a lot of the wives having children,

and so there was always babies.

And we'd have a line of five or six high chairs at least.

It was very lively.

I would give anything now to just spend a day with my mom

weeding a flower bed.

Most of my memories here are actually quite fond.

Rachel: There was a wonderful, fun, religious

yearning-for-us-to-be-good -people side of him.

And yet, I also got to experience

that he had a weakness.

I was at eight years old when he started his abuse.

It was like...

he was just two different people.

He had taken me in one of the bathrooms

and he had said...

he had said, "Don't ever do this."

He was trying to teach me to never touch myself.

And then, at that point,

I can't clearly remember

if he exposed himself to me

or if he touched me.

I just remember there was some sexual contact

and I was so confused.

Rachel: I knew as a child that he was doing wrong.

And he also would tell me he was doing wrong.

It was like he couldn't help himself.

I don't think he wanted to be that way, but he was.

'Cause most of the time, I mean,

I would always just think,

"Oh, Father won't be like that anymore."

But then it would happen again.

( music playing )

Roy: From a young age, they teach, you know, the boys

that we're supposed to grow up and be men.

Women are inferior

so we can't confess to women,

so I couldn't talk to my mom about it.

I never thought that it was anybody's fault but my own.

It was always my fault...

in my mind.

Rachel: Everybody felt like he was a very good person.

He was very good with his words and teaching,

and explaining the gospel.

His abusive side was so hidden from the church

and the world.

And that's why

being a victim of his abuse,

I knew that nobody would believe me if I ever told 'em

that he was doing that.

He played his part as a father very well and then...

not as an abuser-- I mean, he played his part well

as an abuser too, I should say, but...

yeah, there was two sides to him.

( music playing )

Warren: ( over recording ) We come to third Nephi, chapter 12 now,

where the Lord himself appeared and gave

the sinners the law,

the keep sweet training.

And you will see we have always been taught

to keep sweet.

Roger: The phrase "keep sweet"

was a phrase introduced by Rulon Jeffs,

Warren Jeffs' father.

"Keep sweet no matter what" means...

always have a smile on your face.

Flora: It's the polygamy mask.

You show to the outside world

the happy face.

And if you don't,

you're isolated, you're shunned,

you are locked up.

You name it, you get it.

Keep sweet mask.

Look at the eyes, though.

Because the eyes will always tell you the truth.

Reporter 4: It is a community that has been frozen in time.

They are fundamentalist Mormons,

excommunicated from the larger Mormon church

because they continue to practice polygamy.

( music playing )

Ron: After LeRoy Johnson died,

there was a dispute as to who actually the key holder,

meaning the prophet.

It was supposed to be that God came to the people

and told them.

Well, that never happened.

Flora: Rulon Jeffs was LeRoy Johnson's accountant.

He saw an opportunity to grasp the mantle.

He grabbed it with both hands and ran with it.

Anne: When Rulon Jeffs came into power,

he became much more controlling

and so the people accepted that

because that was their role,

they thought that was the role of a prophet.

Mike: The prophet controls every aspect

of life in Short Creek.

He controls the land.

He controls what you do.

He controls,

certainly, who you wed with.

Ruby Jessop: When Rulon Jeffs was the prophet,

my step-father called me into his office

and told me, it was time for me to be married.

I was just a child.

We drove to Caliente, Nevada.

They had a hotel there.

They took us into this room

and they said, "We're only gonna do one at a time,"

so the other two of us had to go sit out in the waiting room.

I was just scared.

( sighs ) My sister went next.

And I was the last one to go in and be married.

I was married at 14 to my step-brother.

But you didn't wanna disappoint the prophet.

( music playing )

Sam: Warren's behavior,

in my opinion,

is learned behavior.

The mechanics of what he was able to do

were mimicked from his father.

Tommy Steed: I remember my brother and my sister and my mom

would go visit Rulon

once a year.

He would sit behind his desk

with "Keep Sweet" engraved on the bottom of his shoe soles

so that we could see.

Warren in every one of these meetings,

was always sitting right to the side of Rulon

with his little notepad.

Warren took very meticulous notes.

At the time, it was a protective, favorite son

looking out for the interests of his dad.

Looking back now,

I see it for what it really was.

Noel: The prophet's the most important person on the planet.

And you might be the next person

who's gonna be that most special person.

That's a pretty hard thing not to

buy into, it feels very important.

Ron: Warren was taking more control.

He was trying to keep it hidden

as much as he possibly could,

but, yes, he was taking more and more control.

( tape deck clicks )

Warren: Obey the prophet when he speaks

and you'll be blessed.

Disobey him,

it is death.

Ron: Rulon had had three strokes,

two of those strokes

made him less able

to control his speech, his ability to

run the church.

Richard: They had to walk him in

with assistance.

If you were sitting close enough

to the front row of the congregational seating,

you could actually tell that the man

was essentially an empty shell.

Brock: As his father became more ill,

Warren was in a position where

Warren's control increased.

There was actually kind of a vacuum that was

there for Warren to step into

and exert his authority through.

Sam: Warren would put a microphone

on a lanyard around his father's neck

and then ask his father to speak in church.

Rulon would just stand there for five, ten minutes

and not say a word.

That was Warren setting himself up.

Ruby: He would say

maybe one sentence.

"Listen to Warren speak my words.

Warren is my mouthpiece."

( music playing )

Dowayne: It was a big day.

It was a really big day.

It changed the landscape of that community.

It changed the whole landscape of the whole...

effort there.

Mike: And you saw this extraordinary turnout

for the funeral

of Rulon Jeffs.

5,000 plus people assembling.

on the overcast day.

Don Barlow: Time will tell if there is going to be

another leader like President Jeffs.

Winston: It was interesting to see.

Most all of the speakers were trying to proclaim

who the new leader was.

A funeral is not the time and place

to do anything like that.

( music playing )

Sam: After his father died,

Warren would stand up in meetings.

For five minutes, he'd act like he was standing there listening,

and then he'd say

what his father had been telling him

from the other side.

Ron: He started telling people that

his father is talking to him

and telling him to take so and so for wife.

Roy: One day, we got up

and there was like seven of my grandpa's wives

standing right down the hall,

outside of my dad's door.

Then he walked them upstairs

and introduced them to the whole--

he says, "These are my wives."

Sam: He married 20 wives

from his father.

It was Warren saying, "I'm the boss,

I can do whatever I want,

and nobody better dare say a word about it."

Dowayne: It was not a traditional situation

for Warren to have those women marry him.

So the alarm bells were going off.

( tape deck clicks )

Isaac Jeffs: I know Father's spirit

and I know it is in Uncle Warren.

I do not question it.

Roy: He had one of his brothers,

Isaac Jeffs bare their testimony

about how they had witnessed

Grandfather name my dad as the next prophet.

Isaac: Warren is going to be the next leader of this people.

And he said that over and over again.

Roy: That's kind of when it became known

to the rest of the people

that he was the next prophet.

Mike: This guy is a conniving rat

who seized power.

Nobody was powerful enough to stand up to him.

Warren Jeffs was the prophet.

The coup was complete.

it's not really quoted in any religious book.

It goes along the lines that,

"When a righteous king rules,

the people rejoice.

When a wicked king rules,

they mourn."

( music playing )

Elissa: At this point within the FLDS,

the stakes were incredibly high.

A lot of times in Warren's preaching,

he would bring the fact that the world was coming to an end

and that we were preparing for that end.

Mike: To run a cult, you have to keep your cult followers always in fear

of the outside world and the impending doom.

"The end is coming, and get your house in line

and show how faithful you are to me

and do everything I tell you."

And that's what buys obedience.

Rachel: I feel like, at first,

Father didn't really feel like he was worthy.

But when everybody turned to him,

I think he suddenly wanted it.

And then I think he just started wanting it more and more.

Winston: Warren was enjoying the attention that he was getting.

You could tell.

You know, he soon put on his father's shoes

that had "Keep Sweet" on the bottom of 'em.

Noel: I think what we see

is a great deal of narcissism.

Narcissism is a trait in which

a person develops a grandiose false sense of self.

One doesn't have to acknowledge one's weaknesses,

one always is above all of that.

Mike: Warren was always

behind big walls

and gated mansions,

protected by bodyguards.

He was always secretive.

Briell: He's very manipulative, like,

in every way.

He wants to show he's humble,

but yet he has this gigantic house.

He wanted people to think

the Lord just gave him everything.

Roy: We lived off the church, we didn't work.

We lived off of tithing...

and contributions to the church.

( music playing )

Sam: At first it was give their 10%,

but then Warren commanded another $500

on top of that.

And that 500 jumped to about a 1,000.

Then that 1,000 jumped to 2,000.

Then it gets to the point where Warren wants it all

and he'll distribute your just wants and needs

Richard: I don't think he gave two ( bleep ).

What did the man really want?

He was lustful for greed,

the greed of money and the greed of power

and more and more and more.

Mike: At one point, they bankrupted the school district,

pulled all their kids out of school,

but continued to loot the school district,

bought themselves an airplane.

Sam: Talking to people

and getting people's feelings that were around at that time,

he becomes more cloak and dagger-ish,

he becomes, like, more paranoid.

( music playing )

Sean Keveney: There are cameras all over town.

People are constantly under surveillance

and there's a direct link between

church security

and the Marshal's office.

Mike: The cops up the there,

the sworn police officers,

their allegiance has always been to protecting Warren.

We believe in plural marriage.

Are you a polygamist?

I'm not gonna answer that, it's none of your business.

Winston: I think Warren enjoyed

that cat and mouse game.

He enjoyed knowing what people were doing without them knowing.

He enjoyed recording people.

He enjoyed spying on folks.

He showed me once the security command post

that had every room monitored,

including the guest house.

that I was staying in.

And I never went back. ( chuckles )

Briell: There was cameras.

There definitely was.

I didn't know that at the time,

but there was definitely cameras.

It was all about himself,

what he could experience,

what he could control.

Noel: Warren Jeffs could do whatever he wants.

He was viewed as a prophet with a prophetic gift,

he was inspired by God,

so what he said had the authority of God.

Sam: He even has wives taking notes

of things that he says and does

when he's sleeping.

And comes up with these crazy, grandiose revelations.

Brock: The problem with that is that Warren

can have a revelation saying that,

based on a bad dream, that somebody was evil.

And even though it's not true,

that person is exiled from the community

and cut off from all their family and friends.

Dowayne: He picked out men that had large families

men that had stature in the community.

He particularly picked them out and destroyed them.

He didn't waste any time to take care of me.

Warren called me up and he asked me

if I could bring all my wives

and meet with him at his father's home.

That afternoon I says, "Sure."

He says, "How soon can you be here?"

He put me on one side of the hall,

my ladies on the other side

and then he handed me

my revelation that he, supposedly, had had

from God and he said

I had plotted with other brethren

to take Rulon's life.

That I was proud and aspiring

and he says, "Do you have any questions there?"

And I looked at him and I says,

"So, if I say right here and now

that I'm guilty of all these things,

that... that's all I need to do?"

He just laughed at me and said, "No."

And then he sent me home and told me gather up my stuff

and leave.

Sam: That's Warren's style;

kick somebody out, discredit them,

anything they say is a lie,

and accuse them of whatever you want.

Ron: All my wives,

they were told to not communicate

with the children about me.

They were not to talk about me in any way, shape, or form.

I shed a lot of tears,

I had lost a lot of people that I was very close to

and that I loved.

I started all over again.

Lindsay: Instead of seeing him as a villain,

I think Warren saw himself as an underestimated,

underappreciated man.

And I think in so many ways,

he proved everybody wrong.

Mike: Ruth, how old were you when you got married?

- 16. - 16 years old.

How old were you when you became pregnant with your first child?

- 16. - 16.

( music playing )

And this was an arranged marriage

by the religious leaders of that town?

Yes.

There are really a handful of stories

that changed the course of history

in this saga.

And the day that Ruth Stubbs fled Colorado City

was one of 'em.

Turns out the man she was forced to marry

was a cop, a sworn police officer

in Colorado City named Rodney Holm.

My name is Mike Watkiss.

- I'm a reporter here in Phoenix. - I know who you are, sir.

My understanding that you have teenage brides

and perhaps impregnated this young woman

when it would be a statutory rape.

We don't have anything to say except to the court.

Mike: Suddenly with Ruth

and Rod Holm,

we had a story that the outside world

couldn't ignore.

Leave the girls that are underage alone.

Don't marry underage girls.

Mike: Teenage girl, statutory rape victim,

a police officer

and Warren's fingerprints were all over this.

Warren is the one that performed the marriage.

Mike: Warren Jeffs performed your marriage

- to Rodney Holm? - Yes.

Mike: You're 16 years of age

and he marries you to a 32-year-old man

that he knows already has two wives?

- Ruth: Yes. - Mike: Utah

took Rod Holm to court,

found him guilty of these crimes

that had been going on forever.

Soon as Rod Holm got sentenced,

I think Warren rightfully predicted,

"If they can come after a polygamous cop

because of a marriage I arranged,

it's only a matter of time before they start coming after me.

Ruth: I think he's an evil man.

I don't any man of God

would destroy people's lives,

and take families away

and marry them to other men...

like he's doing.

So he knew he was in for it.

( music playing )

Sam: At that point in time,

there were no charges against Warren.

But he's just kind of letting the people know

that he needs to be in the background,

he needs to be hiding, he needs to be on the run.

He's going to the outside world

on the premise that God is having him

go witness the evils of the world.

We thought it was for a really righteous reason

because he made it sound like it was.

But, at the same time, he wanted to have some fun

that he never had had.

Sam: He went to Disneyland,

went to the beaches in Florida.

He's going to Mardi Gras

and going to strip clubs.

Lindsay: Becoming a prophet for Warren

probably offers him, you know, absolution to things.

You don't have to be responsible for your own sins if it's God.

If it's God telling you to do it,

then you don't have to be accountable for that.

Noel: Narcissists break rules a great deal,

but they do it because they feel that they're important

and special and nobody else is nearly important,

so I think Warren Jeffs,

a sense of "Anything goes

because I am the authority,

I'm special,

that's a big part of what we see.

Mike: The state of Arizona

was the first to file charges against him.

So Warren sent his lieutenants out

to start buying up these compounds

all over the United States

because, suddenly, it was too hot in Utah and Arizona.

( music playing )

Sam: Warren begins going around the country,

establishing these

places of refuge.

Sean: The church had three

primary places of refuge.

There was a compound in Pringle, South Dakota,

Mancos, Colorado.

There was also a ranch in Texas.

The church then also used

an extensive network of rented safe homes

and trailers to move

church leaders and underage girls

around the country.

Dowayne: People in Short Creek,

we did not know that Texas existed,

we didn't know Colorado existed,

we did not know that his settlement up in

South Dakota existed,

it was such a shroud of secrecy.

Sam: Warren had everybody in Short Creek

run up their credit cards

and borrow money in bank accounts

and give everything they have to him,

which was used to help build

these other places of refuge.

Dowayne: There was a tremendous amount of money being funneled to him.

Vehicles, cash, lands.

I had a home that was completely finished

and got a call

from Warren Jeffs to give it up

and move to another place.

I moved to circumstances that were far less

than what I had.

We just determined,

we're not gonna tie our heart strings

to these physical things.

What the hell did he care if they lost their homes,

their lands, their birthrights?

But it's okay

because Warren said to do it

and he's the prophet.

Dowayne: It began to be

the sand moving underneath our feet.

Warren put the people on unsettled dirt.

Roy: During that time,

I was, you know, kind of in hiding off and on.

My dad

kept saying, "You know, they're after us,

they're trying to find you

so they can hurt me," is what he would tell us.

And so we didn't so much as open the blinds

for like a month.

Primarily, I was by myself

in a camp trailer, just nobody around,

just desolate.

That was kind of my first experience of just

brutal isolation.

I moved down to Texas

and we hardly ever got to see Father

because he was always runnin' from the law.

Sometimes he was there for a week,

sometimes a month, sometimes one day,

and then he was gone and we didn't know where he was.

But, even when he was runnin' from the law,

he still governed the whole system.

He told us to get seven years-worth of grain.

He had the temple built during that time.

Father said Heavenly Father told him that

the people would be driven out of Short Creek

and he wanted a place for the people

to be able to go to that were pure in heart.

Sam: FLDS have long said that

they're living a higher order and they don't have need

for temples.

I started seeing that foundation going and...

that kind of signaled

he was preparing for the end of the world.

And what that meant

to somebody as deviant and twisted as Warren,

could be anything, and that's what bothered me.

I didn't know if Warren was planning another Jonestown,

if he was gonna be passing out Kool-Aid,

if he was gonna have

all these men gather there

and go out in a blaze of glory.

He was essentially saying,

This is where we're making our stand."

Mike: ( At that point,)

Warren was definitely a man on the run, a fugitive.

And the community was bending over backwards

to do everything they could to sustain him,

to communicate with him on the road,

to allow him to know that

they completely loved him.

I'm Gary Tuchman with CNN.

I just wanted to check with you,

do you have any idea where Warren Jeffs is?

Any idea at all?

Do you know where Warren Jeffs is?

What do you think of him?

Sam: I'm actively looking for Warren at the time.

And sometimes I feel like I'm getting close,

and other times I just, you know, I don't know where he's at

or what's going on.

'Course, I don't know

the depth of his depravity.

Roy: Every...

few months, I guess,

he would come home with another 16-year-old.

He would page over the intercom,

he would say,

"Everybody come down to the dining room,

meet a new family member."

So we'd all come down

and, you know, say hi.

I think the youngest he went was 11,

going on 12.

Rachel: I read a little entry he wrote

in his journal about...

his young, underage wives.

He said, "The Lord wants me to take these wives

at a young age to teach and train them

and guide them through boy troubles."

And then he wrote,

"I will just be their boy trouble."

Alyshia Blackmore: He was very kind to me.

I mean, he took special interest in me, I felt like.

I was only five years old and...

I liked him, I liked him a lot.

My two older sisters were married to him.

He told me that I was a very special spirit

and that the devil was seeking to take my life.

And I didn't understand that.

I believed in God and in...

very much a spiritual side of life.

And I wanted to be saved.

But being so young, I could hardly wrap my mind

around it all.

Right after we got married,

then we were automatically in hiding.

We didn't go outside a lot.

We were mostly just supposed to stay in the house and not be seen.

In my mind,

I was trying to prove worthy of this greater blessing.

All the children,

and they, you know, immediately

started calling me Mother,

and that was very different to me.

( chuckles ) Most the children were older me.

But I got used to it.

I definitely wanted to be a mom.

At the same time,

I really wanted to be a kid

while I was a kid.

( laughter )

I mean, I just really did,

I never let go of that.

( laughter )

On the outside, I was a very happy person.

This is the hairspray commercial.

But, to not have any contact

with former family and friends,

that kind of felt like I just fell off the edge of the world

and, so I basically just buried my feelings

and... lived.

Mike: Warren became the Caligula

of the court of polygamy.

Bad practices got more perverted.

And younger girls got forced into these marriages,

And boys

were cast aside.

( music playing )

Dan: Like any other society, there will be

one half boy babies born

and one half girl babies born.

It means that

a whole lot of males are never gonna get married.

How are they going to continue this practice of plurality

of wives forever if they don't thin the herd?

I mean, the math doesn't work.

Mike: You've gotta get rid of

a lot of the young men.

And Warren established a very effective

social architecture to deal with getting rid of the boys.

Roger: You can imagine how much pressure

is on a parent...

to take their son

and drive them 50 miles away,

and drop them off and say

"You are never to contact us again."

And they did that,

over and over and over again.

Newscaster: Rich was expelled from the community

when he was 20 years old.

Richard: I had no driver's license,

no real life skills,

they're not old enough to be lawfully employed.

Add to that the fear that everyone

out there that wasn't from home,

that wasn't part of your church

was going to do something

intentionally to harm you.

Who do you go to for help?

Tommy: My mom,

she had...

a history of being a little bit rebellious.

So I was never really, truly openly accepted

by Warren Jeffs.

One of my uncles,

he had arranged a meeting with me and Warren

at the print shop.

That's when Warren told me

I wasn't welcome to church.

and... that was it, out.

After I stood up to leave,

he just casually let me know that

I wouldn't be allowed into Heaven.

That was probably the darkest day of my life

considering I believed him,

I was convinced I was going to Hell.

I got in my little, crappy pickup truck

and I...

got out of that town as fast as I could.

I didn't know where to go.

I had nothing.

The world outside is against me and...

the only thing that I knew

I was cut off from.

It was only another couple months after I was kicked out

that I started seeing this wave after wave

of other boys,

just showing up.

Dan: It went from what was called a wave in the late '90s

to what became a flood there for awhile.

I knew that something had to be done.

Roger: Dan Fischer was born and raised

in the FLDS community,

had three wives, and ended up leaving.

He and his wife

had done tremendous things

to help people who had been kicked out of the FLDS.

Dan: We went public on the steps of the Capitol.

with some 70 of these boys.

Reporter 5: Some of the so-called "lost boys,"

all banished by Jeffs,

told their stories.

Dan: Hundreds of boys,

aged 13 and above,

have fled or been expelled

from this society.

And at the demand of its fanatical leader,

Warren Jeffs.

Tommy: Dan made it his mission

to help these boys who were exiled with nothing.

Dan: Nobody else

had both a knowledge of what was going on,

the financial resources,

and the understanding to do it.

And you either accept that or you don't.

It's... pretty damn simple.

Even though very uncomfortable,

it's pretty damn simple.

We wanted to take Warren out of power.

Even after he was on the run,

he was still destroying families,

removing people from their homes.

Roger: Warren Jeffs had absolute control

over the homes of the people.

And so

the Lost Boys decided to

go after the land.

Dan: And so,

we came to realize that

there could and should be a court case

brought against the ownership

of the properties.

And that was Warren Jeffs.

So the court case was filed.

Warren Jeffs came out

with the mandate that,

"We will answer them nothing."

And basically saying, "We're above the laws of the land,

we answer to a higher power."

He mandated that there'd be no response

from his attorneys, that they not show up in court.

Tommy: Warren had thought

the veil of religious freedom,

protection was enough.

That there would be no judgment against him.

I mean, this is the first time this has happened.

No one had blatantly came out

and tried to sue them like that.

We showed up with to court with our counsel.

And what happens when you go to court and only one side's there?

The side that showed up won.

Mike: He still had thousands of followers

and millions of dollars

to run on.

But his world

was starting to shrink,

his powers were starting to be curtailed.

It was really the beginning of the end for Warren Jeffs.

Elissa: I was born into a polygamous family,

24 children and three mothers.

I knew marriage was a part of my future.

I dreamed of it,

I prayed for it,

I did all the perfect things

that a perfect prissy girl would do

to prepare themselves

for marriage.

But I was young,

I was 14.

Brock: And up to that point,

it had been very difficult to actually find a witness

who was willing to talk.

I met Elissa Wall one night at a restaurant.

As we had dinner, she told me her story.

Usually when a girl is to be married,

they're excited, they're happy,

and they're just so lucky and blessed

to have the prophet love them enough

to find a place for them to be married.

Then I learned that I was to marry my first cousin,

Allen Steed.

And I had a very deep hatred for him.

I remember going to Caliente in Nevada.

There was a hotel that was owned by

by a member of the FLDS there.

I broke down for a moment to my mother and I just said,

"I can't do this.

I cannot do this, Mom."

And she, as a good FLDS mom,

"Yes, you can.

And you will."

( music playing )

We were taught from a very young age

deep religious beliefs

about what it meant to be a woman.

A woman's job

was to ultimately become married to a man,

hopefully with many wives,

and to have children.

A woman cannot go to Heaven

on her own,

she has to be sealed to a man.

And meant to listen

to whatever the husband said.

He was the connection to my salvation.

There's that moment of me walking down the stairs

in this beautifully crafted wedding dress

that any other girl, it seemed in the community,

would be so happy to be wearing.

For me, it really felt like I was dressed to face death.

I really wanted to die.

At the end of the ceremony, Warren took both of our hands

and looked me in the eye and he said,

"Now go forth and multiply and replenish the Earth."

I don't remember much of the drive back,

I just kept seeing Warren's eyes

in my head over and over and over,

wondering... what was next.

About three years into my marriage to Allen...

it was hell.

It was abusive,

both physically, mentally and sexually.

And Warren knew what's happening in this relationship

that he had put together.

I often just begged for release.

And within the FLDS, that is, in essence, a divorce.

( phone ringing )

One day, Warren called in

and he told me that I was evil

and a wicked person.

In our teaching, we had been told

quite a bit about blood atonement.

Someone who had committed the worst crimes

could atone for those crimes

by giving their own life.

We would lay on altar

and have our throat slit

and we would be giving God

the gift that he gave us,

which is the gift of life

in atonement for our sins.

I remember Warren said

that that was my only saving grace.

This would lead

to giving me the courage

to just make the leap, to run.

We had a very compelling case because we had

a courageous young woman

who was articulate, sincere

and there was corroborating evidence for.

So everything we looked for in terms of building a case

we had for the very first time.

The criminal charges allege

that Mr. Jeffs encouraged,

commanded,

aided, abetted another

to have sexual intercourse

with a victim between the ages 14 and 18

without her consent.

At the time, Warren was on the lam,

so Elissa Wall tipped the balance for the FBI

and they put Warren Jeffs on the FBI Most Wanted List.

Larry King: Good evening.

Over the weekend, Osama bin Laden,

and eight other men were joined

on the FBI's Most Wanted List by Warren Jeffs.

Reporter 6: The FBI considers him armed and dangerous

and he's allegedly known for crimes against children.

We had the FBI come to our house a couple times.

When they showed up,

it created such a hatred for them

because we felt like they were always

trying to get us and hurt us.

Anderson Cooper: Warren Jeffs hasn't been seen

in more than a year.

The FBI has been searching for him since June

on charges of fleeing prosecution

in Arizona.

Elissa: There was that fateful day.

I remember

we turned the TV on and there,

all over every channel was news coverage

that Warren had been caught.

I'd like to announce the arrest

of FBI Top Ten Most Wanted Fugitive, Warren Steed Jeffs.

It was just a routine traffic stop

by a Nevada Highway Patrol.

Reporter 7: He was arrested near Las Vegas late Monday.

He'd been on the run for two years.

Mike: He was riding around

in a big, fancy Escalade

with all kinds of money,

and communication devices, and wigs.

One of his cute, little wives and his brother

were basically running around the world seeing Disneyland.

Dowayne: It was more shocking to me

that he was arrested with Isaac and Naomi

in the gentile clothing.

And I think that anybody that was watching that circumstance

saw the hypocrisy of it.

I did.

Briell: I think he would've ran

as long as he could've and as far as he could've.

But I do think he knew he was going to be caught.

We didn't think that Father would get arrested,

he always told us that the Lord would protect him.

For us, it was the saddest thing in the world.

It seemed like the whole religion went into prison.

We did a lot of fasting and...

you know, just praying for him,

and that he'd be strengthened,

and the Lord would bless him and help him through.

( camera shutters clicking )

Brock: Warren was arrested in Nevada

so he was held in Las Vegas.

And two of my deputies went down

to do the paperwork with regard to transferring him.

It was a simple hearing, nothing was involved,

and there were mobs of cameras.

( camera shutter clicking )

And that was when we first realized

this is gonna be a different prosecution for us.

Judge: Okay, what would you like to do?

You wanna waive your rights in regards to extradition

and go back as quickly as they can have--

that they can come pick you up?

All right.

Brock: I immediately called Elissa

and said,

"It's happening. It's on."

( music playing )

Sean: While Warren Jeffs was incarcerated

at Purgatory Correctional Facility in Washington County,

and awaiting trial on charges of rape as an accomplice,

he gave what has been called a confession.

Flora: I think he realized,

"Oh, ( bleep ).

It caught up with me."

Noel: He had no limits within that small community.

Now, as soon as he got outside the community,

of course, no one acknowledged his legitimacy

or his authority.

And I think that was a rude awakening.

He lost all of that control

that he had always had.

Roger: That recording

was hidden, buried,

discredited.

People were told it was made up,

that he was drugged.

In actuality, it was the one time he told the truth.

Brock: With the case pending,

the rules of ethics and evidence

didn't allow us to just go announce,

"Hey, world, look what Warren has said."

( phone placed on receiver )

( music playing )

Reporter 8: The legal case against Warren Jeffs,

the leader of a polygamist religion or cult,

is now underway in the state of Utah.

Brock: The trial was extraordinary

for Washington County.

The security was out in force.

We had a great deal of concern about protecting Elissa.

She was in a Witness Protection Program,

we took great care to safeguard her

and make her feel comfortable

so that we could get our case to trial.

I mean, the case rose and fell on her,

and her ability to connect with the jury

to convey the story as to what happened to her.

( music playing )

Elissa: The day of the preliminary hearing,

it was the first time

that I would actually face Warren Jeffs.

I sat on that stand and I looked dead in Warren's eyes

and I forced myself to hold eye contact.

I remember we sat there and stared at each other

for a good few minutes and, ultimately,

he shook his head and just dropped his eyes.

I had claimed my power

and I had claimed my freedom

because he did not control me.

Judge: Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, we are back in session.

State of Utah versus Warren Steed Jeffs.

Mr. Jeffs is here with his counsel.

Roger: It's not easy

to convict somebody of accomplice to rape.

Especially when they're a religious leader

and the defense is

he was just giving religious advice

to this couple.

Just marriage counseling,

trying to help them work out their problems

as husband and wife.

I don't believe that Warren Jeffs

has ever done anything wrong.

Roger: Well, it wasn't a husband and wife,

she was not married,

it was an illegal marriage.

Elissa: I was... shocked

I was like, "No way I...

there is no way I'm going to marry that man.

This entire time that I was there,

I was... I was crying.

And I just, I honestly just wanted to die

because I was so scared. ( sobs )

Because I had two younger sisters

still in the FLDS...

I had the overwhelming realization

that what happened to me

would probably, most definitely happen to them.

( music playing )

During the trial,

I had this picture of my two sisters.

And, every day, I would look at that.

They gave me the courage I needed

or allowed me to, at least, tap into the courage I possessed

and hopefully protect my sisters.

Judge: Has this jury reached a verdict?

- Foreman: Yes. - Judge: Would you hand that to the bailiff, please, sir?

Brock: Waiting for that verdict was not easy.

I mean, the work was done,

and now, everything we've done is out of our hands

and in the hands of the jury.

Judge: Mr. Jeffs, would you please stand

as the verdict is read?

Roger: We needed so desperately

to have Warren Jeffs held accountable

to try and stop the damage he was doing to these people.

It could've gone either way, it was really tough.

You'd think that this would be an easy thing... you know?

But it wasn't.

Bailiff: The defendant is guilty

beyond a reasonable doubt.

Reporter 9: 51-year-old Warren Jeffs

showed no emotion as the verdict was read.

Elissa: He didn't really let it faze him.

There was definitely a kind of a hushed silence.

I just started to cry because I knew that

my mother and thousands and thousands of other people

that loved Warren more than loved themselves,

that this was going to be a shot to their heart.

And it was a painful, conflicting moment of realizing

that the right thing had happened...

but that the people were the ones to pay.

( music playing )

Brock: When you look back

at her courage

to overcome years of indoctrination

and say, "This just isn't right,"

and to come and say, "I'm gonna say that

the man who is the mouthpiece of God was wrong."

Her example will shine a light

of hope for others.

That was really scary for her.

Really scary.

Talk about a hero.

When I was young,

my mother taught me

that evil flourishes when good men do nothing.

This has not been easy for us.

The easy thing would've been to do nothing.

Brock: I have a picture of her standing there

alone in front of a microphone with all the cameras around.

She demonstrated enormous courage and fortitude.

She was definitely the right person

at the right time for the right job.

Without Elissa,

it's very probable that Warren wouldn't be in prison.

Reporter 10: Aboard this helicopter,

the man thousands believe is a prophet of God,

Warren Jeffs, being transported to jail

as a convicted felon.

( music playing )

I was hopeful at the time that that would be

a turning point for his people.

It didn't really turn out that way.

Reporter 11: Warren Jeffs, the leader of the largest

polygamist sect in North America

received two consecutive sentences

of five years to life.

Unfortunately, the story doesn't end when Warren goes to prison.

Elissa: At this point within the FLDS,

the stakes were incredibly high.

They've lived their entire life in a state of

horrific fear.

And now, the outside world

had the community under the microscope.

( helicopter blades spinning )

( music playing )

( sobbing )

They brought in their lines

of officers.

"If you resist,

we will arrest you."

I'm Rich Matthews in El Dorado, Texas

where authorities are serving a search warrant

on the compound of Warren Jeffs.

We knew about the compound in Texas.

Very secretive.

And we knew there was a lot going on down there.

When they finally gained entrance,

they began to witness

young girls that were pregnant.

Elissa: Texas walked in prepared for what they were faced with.

They were under the impression there was a small amount of children

and they were just there to kind of investigate.

They really wanted to

do the right thing.

And it was just kind of the snowball effect

that ultimately lead to all of the children

being removed.

They ended up removing

463 children

from the YFZ Ranch.

Roger: The problem was

the optics publically were terrible.

( music playing )

Elissa: If you parade sobbing mothers

on television, our natural instinct for viewers

are to say, "Oh, that's horrible,"

without even thinking for a second

that there's a reason that they were taken away.

I want the world to know

that I forgive everybody.

Woman: We want our children, they took 'em.

They didn't give us a chance to say goodbye.

Sam: They'd created this PR image

of the 1953 raid.

And that's what they tried to recreate.

And in some sense,

they accomplished that.

Mike: The FLDS hierarchy

knows the optics.

They're good at seizing the moment

and presenting their victimization.

Elissa: The timing of the Texas raid couldn't have been better

for Warren.

Sadly, it played right into his narrative.

Evil was trying harder than ever to take out

the Lord's people.

There are some disturbing new details

about what investigators have found

during their now concluded search of that compound.

In this photo, crime scene technicians are seen

examining a bed

found in the temple.

A bed investigators say

maybe have been used to consummate marriages

between adult men and underage girls.

Reporter 12: Texas prosecutors are said to have

church marriage records,

photos, even DNA evidence

that Warren Jeffs had sex

with girls as young as 12.

( music playing )

Mike: Mr. Jeffs,

did you rape those two girls?

Warren Jeffs decided he wanted to represent himself.

I can tell you with complete

conviction that that was a bad idea.

He got up, talking about religious history

and the persecution of his people over the last 150 years.

Your eyes glazed over.

Reporter 13: In his closing argument,

Warren Jeffs stood silent,

staring at the jurors for 30 minutes,

speaking only once saying, "I am at peace."

Elaine Anderson: He's a pervert.

And the crazy thing is

is he perverted his own religion.

Reporter 14: Warren Jeffs has been sentenced to life in prison.

Jeffs was convicted in Texas

of having sex with girls as young as 12.

He won't be eligible for parole until

he's at least 100 years old.

Isaac: It was really hard to hear the sentence.

In my mind,

I was like, "It'll never--

it's never gonna be that long,

they have no way to hold him."

'Cause Father would tell us stories about,

in the Bible or stuff where

God delivered people from the hands of their enemies.

He said that that could happen for him

if we were good enough for it to happen.

Warren: ♪ Sweet spirit of prayer ♪

♪ Sweet spirit of prayer... ♪

Dan: Sad to say, after some amount of time

his mother and some others go in

and convince him that he is the prophet.

And now he's back in being the prophet again.

Mike: His followers, they don't believe it.

They don't believe any of this stuff.

"I don't believe the confessions,

I don't believe that he's doing this."

Noel: The follower wants to have somebody

to tell them who they are

and that they're special.

The followers often sacrifice a great deal,

but, in return, they get this confidence

that they are different than all the evil people

out in the world today,

that they're God's special people.

Sam: In some ways, I think that

Warren is maybe even more effective

from behind bars

than he was outside of prison.

In prison, he's a martyr.

And the people believe that

he is there atoning for their sins,

for their misgivings,

and that they need to try harder.

Alyshia: Basically, we blamed ourselves.

We knew it was because we didn't exert the faith

and we weren't worthy to have him among us

and that's why the Lord took him away.

That's... very much the mindset that we had.

Sam: That is really the source of Warren's power,

is that loyalty and blind obedience.

( music playing )

Gabriel Dutson: I grew up in Colorado City, Arizona,

Short Creek.

My dad,

he actually came out

and said that, um...

that he still believed in Warren Jeffs.

And I just didn't believe that.

So he just said, "Pack your things and go."

I have three little sisters that I can't say hi to,

not even "Hi."

And they don't even remember who I am

because you don't let me come around.

( sniffles ) And now they're seven years old.

That I can't be a part of the family I grew up with.

Tommy: Warren's in jail

and he's still controlling that town.

It's kind of despicable

what he's still allowed to get away with

from behind bars.

The last time I took Warren Jeff's deposition

was in Palestine, Texas.

This is continued deposition of Warren Jeffs

taken on February 13, 2014.

We're on the record at 2:08 p.m.

We wanted to give him a chance

to maybe explain to the FLDS people

and the public in general

what he was thinking.

And give him a chance

to come clean.

Well, he didn't come clean.

All of a sudden, he's taking the Fifth Amendment.

I don't know how much guilt's there,

how much shame is there.

Sean: The fact that Warren Jeffs is incarcerated in Texas

has done nothing to diminish his control

over the everyday lives of FLDS members

How do you feel that he's in jail,

maybe for the rest of his life?

I feel really bad.

I love him, I know that he loves me.

Sean: He continues to serve as the prophet

and, at least as of January 2016,

we had evidence that he continued

to direct the day-to-day operations of the church.

Including things like excommunicating individual members

and directing what women

should be placed with what caretakers.

The prison in Texas suspected

that Warren Jeffs' brothers were

were using hidden recording devices

to capture their weekly meetings with him.

Devices disguised as watches and pens.

Warren Jeffs was sending out coded letters.

A handful of trusted wives were the ones

who were able to unencrypt those letters

and get the messages back

to Short Creek.

Isaac: Father Calvin said, "Yes,

the work's not stopped,

and we're going to keep going.

Heavenly Father's guiding us how he wants,

so you need to stay focused."

Even though he was in jail,

he would tell us "I'm happier than I've ever been before."

Flora: There's no hardship on him.

What's changed?

He's just not driving around,

kicking the dust off his boots.

Right now, he still gets visits from his wives.

He's still feeding his doctrine to the people of the FLDS.

Tommy: You can't just go into that town

with an ice cream truck and get on a megaphone

and say, "What you believe is bull( bleep ), here's why."

You can't just list off the reasons.

All you can really do is

show your support.

And when they're ready to

make that step to come out,

all you can do is be there for 'em.

Dan: It takes generations to overcome,

but you believe to your core.

Just as it takes generations to instill

new cores for future generations.

Dr. Fischer actually pays for my books in college.

They gave us the possibility

for a good future.

And I've chosen to live a different life.

More and more people are starting to wake up.

That's the term they use, they're waking up.

Elissa: They started with 200 children,

and this year they began with almost 600 kids.

Families are putting their children

in school, they're going against their culturing,

and their brainwashing,

and they're choosing to make a life for themselves.

I moved back and so did many, many other people.

And we moved back with a reason.

I believe that we can

recover this town.

Rachel: I still love him 'cause he's my father.

I am so sad that he's made the choices he's made

I don't justify him, ever,

but it makes me sad that he has made those choices.

and that he has to suffer.

Roy: I want to forgive him,

but realizing what he's done,

it would require something pretty drastic for me to forgive him,

but it's not happened yet.

Not happened yet.

( music playing )

Isaac: There is no way to see it fairly

from the outside world.

I hope that people will understand

what those religious people are going through

and why they make their choices.

They made their mistakes.

And they're still-- they have good in 'em,

they did good things in their life.

Warren: Hear, little children,

that I will lead you.

Let's tie ourselves to the prophet,

purifying ourselves where we can

always keep sweet...

no matter what.