The police department in a polygamous community on the Utah-Arizona border is inflicted by an entrenched culture of following sect leader edicts at the expense of the constitutional rights of nonbelievers and should be disbanded, the federal government recommended in a new court filing.
Outside agencies such as local county sheriffs need to handle the duties because of the deep-rooted control of the town marshals by leaders of a polygamous sect run by imprisoned leader Warren Jeffs, the U.S. Department of Justice attorneys said.
The recommendations are proposed punishment for the towns after a jury in Phoenix found in March that the towns denied non-sect followers of basic services such as police protection, building permits and water hookups.
A federal judge has set a four-day hearing in October to address the issue. Attorneys for the towns said the government is asking for unprecedented action that is unwarranted.
Justice attorneys said less severe remedies, such as assigning an outside monitor to the department, wouldn’t be sufficient to change the culture. They said 30 percent of town marshals over the last 15 years have been decertified, including four chiefs since Warren Jeffs took over in the early 2000s.