Execution-Style Murders Expose Polygamous Splinter Morman Cult in Chihuahua teleSUR
go to original November 12, 2017

Around 100 officers descended on the ranch (Chihuahua State Attorney General's Office)

Update: Mexico Deports American Polygamist Suspected In 3 Killings (The Huffington Post)

The execution-style murder of three U.S. males – two of them teenagers – has cast damning light on a polygamist Mormon cult in Mexico, following the arrest of its fugitive leader.

Orson Black Jr., 56, had been on the run for more than 15 years after being charged with five felony counts of sexual misconduct against two minors in Arizona, where he is still wanted.

Last weekend, more than 100 law-enforcement officials descended on his remote five-hectare Rancho El Negro compound in the north Mexican state of Chihuahua, in a predominantly German-speaking Mennonite community.

The state has been a safe haven for Mormon polygamists since 1885, when the mainstream church sent 350 families – including that of Mitt Romney’s grandfather – across the border to avoid federal prosecution, reports Rolling Stone magazine.

The Mormon Church officially abandoned polygamy in 1890, but the practice is still observed by various splinter groups, including the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), of which Black was once a member.

The FLDS teaches that men must have at least three wives in order to reach the highest level of salvation. Its former spiritual leader, Warren Jeffs, is currently serving a life sentence for sex crimes against two girls aged 12 and 14.

Black, who disavowed the church in 1990 and declared himself a prophet, has now been charged with human smuggling and extradited to the United States, where he is currently being held in El Paso, Texas.

Read the rest at teleSUR

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