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Post by withay on Feb 20, 2010 0:52:55 GMT -5
I thnk ot put aside the women's aages kind of puts aside what the real issue was with the sealings. That was the baiss of the charges against roman and why the UEB was originally being investigated , right? I think Bill's referring to the seaings at JC were about all the underage girls, women being bartered in general , etc. Obviously he's aware that Alby intended to seal his mother in law (adlaeen) to his wife's ex husband. I dont know if the sealings were banned in genral though? Doesnt seem the state would haev the authority to say a consenting legal age couple coudlnt be married or sealed though. The state would not have a problem with the marriages if niether the bride or groom was already married to someone else. Utah has some laws in place that are supposed to prohibit "common-law" type plural mariages also. Most of the marriages and sealing that were taking place that day were either plural or underage; both are illegal. I think we are also confusing marrying and sealing on this thread. A man can be sealed (and married) in FLDS to multiple women at the same time. A woman can only be sealed to one man. In order for her to be sealed to a second man, she must be unsealed, even if the first man has died. She could, however, be married to a second man after her first husband had died. Marriage is for time (until death). Sealing is for eternity (continues after death). That is why, if she was sealed to JJ instead of just being married to him, it would be even more catastrophic to Adaleen. It would mean she was being separated from Roman for eternity.
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Post by JJ77 on Feb 20, 2010 2:57:07 GMT -5
It was basically my understanding that even though plural marriage is against the law, since most poly men only "legally" marry one woman it is difficult to prove & prosecute them effectively. In fact, successful prosecution based on poly would basically mean one of the "wives" would have to testify against the husband. So , even though law enforcement knows it goes on... prosecting for polygamy is too difficult a task.
When the issue of underage marriage, welfare fraud, tax evasion, or even bigamy come into play... it opens up a more solid line or prosecution.
On the show, it was my understanding that under age marriage and sex were the means by which roman was being prosecuted. So that's why I said, if you put age aside in that instance... the state had no means of persecution. (or rather none solid enough to warrant going forward with presecution)
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Post by withay on Feb 21, 2010 0:43:01 GMT -5
It was basically my understanding that even though plural marriage is against the law, since most poly men only "legally" marry one woman it is difficult to prove & prosecute them effectively. In fact, successful prosecution based on poly would basically mean one of the "wives" would have to testify against the husband. So , even though law enforcement knows it goes on... prosecting for polygamy is too difficult a task. When the issue of underage marriage, welfare fraud, tax evasion, or even bigamy come into play... it opens up a more solid line or prosecution. On the show, it was my understanding that under age marriage and sex were the means by which roman was being prosecuted. So that's why I said, if you put age aside in that instance... the state had no means of persecution. (or rather none solid enough to warrant going forward with presecution) That is true in most states but we were told last year by some Utah LDS folks more familiar with how things actually work that Utah has some laws in place that make illegal the "spiritual" marriages also. Now I do not know how often these laws are used but they do exist. And even Bill said that they were "only" misdemeanors when he was talking about "coming out" as a polygamous family. I suspect law enforcement does not look to prosecute people but if they came upon a large group openly marrying or sealing polygamous couples, they would feel like they could not ignore it.
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Post by JJ77 on Feb 21, 2010 6:23:20 GMT -5
From what I have read- Utah has laws in place against plural marriages (spiritual, polygyny, polgamy, etc) , cohabitation, and bigamy.
Having these laws does not mean they are enforced.They are tricky to enforce or get a conviction on. The laws were written along time ago, for one - for another thinkof it this way...
Prosecuting someone for polygamy basically means you must prove the person has more than one wife - "spiritual" wives are hard to prove b/c there is not written record of the marriages.
so they go for Bigamy charges instead - which are also hard to use b/c most men are only "legally" married to one woman.
So onto the "cohabitation" part of Utah's bigamy laws (living together as man and wife) however, getting a conviction based on people who are "living together" is pretty much impossible. The state can't regulate private sexual relations between consenting adults, and in this day and age people "cohabitating" is barely looked down upon... never miond prosecuted.
so where does that leave prosecutors who want to go after polygamist? It basically only leaves them room to prosecute based on underage offenses (marriage / sexual) and other forms of abuse - not the stand alone act of polygamy.
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