Mission & Justice

Jim Forsyth; 24/5/08

Texas overstepped its authority when it removed some of about 460 children from a polygamist compound last month, a state appeals court has ruled. The ruling is the latest twist in a lurid tale of adolescent brides, teen pregnancies and a secretive religious sect following its faith in a dusty corner of the lone-star state. Although the court did not order the children’s immediate release, it raised the prospect of many of them being reunited with their families, possibly within 10 days. The children have been placed in foster homes scattered across Texas. Officials of the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services, which led the raid on the ranch in Eldorado, defended their actions as being taken in the children’s interest and said they were considering their next steps. The state has 10 days to appeal against the ruling.

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20/5/08

Kevin Rudd has rejected an investigation into the activities of the Exclusive Brethren on the grounds that it would “unreasonably interfere with members’ rights to practise their faith freely and openly”.His concern is well-founded, in that, generally, the government should not attempt to control religions any more than religions should attempt to control the state. However, as religious groups have every right to make suggestions and representations to the government, so the government has not only the right but also the responsibility to investigate complaints and accusations against religious bodies - for example, where there is evidence of a risk to minors, inappropriate electoral interventions or incitements to terrorism.

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Michael Bachelard; 18/5/08

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has rejected the pleas of former members of the Exclusive Brethren for a broad-ranging inquiry into the sect, saying such an investigation would “unreasonably interfere” with their right “to practise their faith freely and openly”. Yet, before the election last year, Mr Rudd described the Brethren as an “extremist cult” whose activities “break up families” and, in the days leading up to the November election, he called on four federal agencies — the police, the tax office, the Australian Electoral Commission and anti-money-laundering agency Austrac — to investigate their activities.

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17/4/08

Officials on Tuesday defended their decision to suddenly separate mothers from many of the children taken in a raid on a polygamist ranch in West Texas. Texas Children’s Protective Services spokeswoman Marleigh Meisner said they separated children from their mothers on Monday after they decided that children are more truthful in interviews about possible abuse if their parents are not around. When state troopers and child welfare officials seized 416 children from the compound, 139 women accompanied them on their own and had been allowed to stay with the children until Monday, when they were driven back to the compound. Only women with children under 5 could stay at the San Angelo Coliseum where they were being held.

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Maxine Frith; 13/4/08

An Australian man who was a former high-ranking member of the Church of Scientology is calling for the religion to be “totally dismantled” because of the human rights abuses he says it inflicts on its followers. David Graham has gone public after years of keeping quiet when he feared retribution from the church. He says members are encouraged to cut ties with non-Scientologists. And they are threatened with being ostracised from members, including family and friends, if they try to leave the church - an act known as “disconnection”. He supports the actions of an internet-based group called Anonymous that has launched a wave of global protests against the church.

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Sylvia Moreno and Adam Kilgore; 10/4/08

The cry for help came late at night — at 11.32 — and it came in a whisper. Speaking so not to be overheard, the 16-year-old girl — mother of an eight-month-old baby and pregnant again — spoke of teenage girls, some as young as 13, forced to have sex with older men for the purpose of bearing their children. She said she was the seventh “spiritual” wife of a 49-year-old man and described beatings by him so vicious that several of her ribs had been broken. The March 29 phone call, and one the next day from the compound of an insular, secretive splinter sect of the Mormon Church, prompted raids by authorities, who took into protective custody 416 children, the largest child removal in Texas history. The children, mostly girls, ranged in age from infants to 17. Several have babies or are pregnant.

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