FLDS leader faces federal and state charges in Arizona
Samuel Rappylee Bateman, the leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, has been charged separately in federal and state courts after Arizona Department of Public Safety troopers pulled him over with three children stowed in a wooden trailer.
Troopers noticed the trailer's gaps and one saw "children’s small fingers moving in the gap of the rear trailer door," they claimed in court.
On Thursday, Bateman was arraigned in federal court in Flagstaff, after being arrested Tuesday.
Bateman faces two counts of destruction of records and one count of tampering with official proceedings in federal court, as well as, three counts of child abuse in state court.
The FLDS is a radical offshoot of the mainstream The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which abandoned the practice of polygamy more than a century ago.
FBI agents raided Bateman's home in Colorado City, according to media reports. Federal agents believe the 46-year-old deleted messages from his Signal app after DPS troopers pulled him over on Aug. 28, according to an indictment in U.S. District Court.
Bateman was driving a gray GMC Denali down Route 89 with the trailer in tow. Troopers later spotted him on Interstate 40 slowing down onto the emergency shoulder. Troopers then began to follow the SUV because it was described by callers as "a suspicious vehicle," according to court records.
Troopers pulled over the Denali in a small Flagstaff parking lot and Bateman and four others stepped out of the car. Two were adult women and the others were girls younger than 15.
Three girls, ages between 11 and 14, stepped out of the trailer, DPS said.
Inside the trailer, the girls had sat in temperatures hotter than 80 degrees, with a trash bag and bucket as a toilet, and camping chairs to sit in, according to court records.
The women in the Denali told troopers the group had been headed toward Phoenix or Tucson, according to the records. Naomi Bistline, the oldest of the group, spoke on behalf of the girls when DPS troopers asked what was going on.
It remains unclear what happened to Bateman between getting pulled over in Flagstaff and his arrest at his Colorado City home in Arizona on Tuesday.
During the arrest, the FBI also executed a search warrant, but it remains unclear what agents were looking for or recovered.
The Salt Lake Tribune reported that during the raid, officials found nine girls living in two homes owned by Bateman. They were taken in by the Arizona Department of Child Safety, the Utah paper reported.
The girls and women shared notes with the Tribune about Bateman: “Samuel is the most precious and dear thing in my life,” one of them wrote.
Colorado City and neighboring Hildale, Utah, make up “Short Creek,” the name locals use for the twin-city border community best known as an enclave for fundamentalist polygamous sects and a church long controlled by Warren Jeffs.
Jeffs is serving a life prison sentence in Texas after being convicted in 2011 of sexually assaulting the young girls he had taken as wives. He continues to maintain control of his followers through communications made from prison, according to media reports. The town has split along often contentious lines between those who have since left the church, and those who remain loyal to Jeffs and see him as a victim of religious discrimination.
Bateman is next scheduled to appear in Coconino Superior Court next month.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
Republic eporter Lacey Latch, in northern Arizona, contributed to this article. Reach Lacey at llatch@gannett.com.
Reach crime reporter Miguel Torres at Miguel.Torres@arizonarepublic.com or on Twitter @TheMiguelTorres.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: FBI, Arizona officials bring in Samuel Bateman to Flagstaff court
