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Lawyers for the U.S. Department of Justice and the towns of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., have filed a slew of motions in the last week arguing what should and should not be discussed in the civil rights trial scheduled to begin Jan. 19 in Phoenix.

In two of the more interesting motions, lawyers for the two towns want to ban discussion of polygamy and whether the police force in Colorado City and Hildale knew of underage marriages.

Each topic, according to the motions, "is irrelevant, unfairly prejudicial, and an improper use of a witness' religious beliefs to attack their credibility."

The issue in the civil trial, the motions point out, is whether the Hildale and Colorado City marshals and the town governments engaged in a pattern of misconduct and discrimination.

The Justice Department lawyers had not responded to the motions as of Thursday afternoon. Hildale and Colorado City, collectively known as Short Creek, are home to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, and many of its followers believe in polygamy as a tenet.

The Justice Department case is built on the notion that the municipal governments in Short Creek act to benefit the church and discriminate against those who do not follow FLDS leaders. Federal lawyers have filed a motion asking the judge to admit statements and evidence that show a relationship between FLDS President Warren Jeffs, his family and the municipal governments.

In one example, the Justice Department reveals it has a recording of a conversation from 2013 between Jeffs and his brother Nephi Jeffs. Warren Jeffs is serving a sentence of life plus 20 years in Texas for crimes related to taking underage brides.

In the conversation, the motion says, Nephi Jeffs informs his brother that the church has documents that Short Creek marshals seized from men who were leaving the church.

The federal motion also recites a list of correspondence gathered by law enforcement over the years that government employees in Short Creek have sent to Warren Jeffs to update him on municipal business and asking him whom to appoint to various posts.

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