This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
"Oh Heavens! You will never guess what has happened! Oh! The Government raided Eldorado ...."
That's how then 16-year-old Jessica Rohbock began her journal entry for April 4, 2008. She is referring to Eldorado, Texas, and the Yearning For Zion Ranch. Texas authorities arrived there a day earlier and began searching the ranch and questioning members of the polygamous Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Texas Child Protective Services (CPS) would eventually take about 400 FLDS children from the ranch and prosecute 10 men for crimes related to bigamy and underage marriages.
Rohbock, a former FLDS member, publishes a blog with her journal entries from her time as a child in the FLDS and annotations for those entries. On Monday, she posted entries from April 2008. Rohbock was living in Hildale at the time and offers insight into what the faithful there was being told about the Texas raid. Meanwhile, Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., collectively known as Short Creek, still had to grapple with efforts to evict people who weren't paying their occupancy fees and ongoing investigations from law enforcement.
For Rohbock's entire post, click here. Her annotations can be as illuminating as the original journal entries. Otherwise, here are some highlights from those journal entries.
• From April 5, 2008: "They took the Mothers and boys today. Now all that is left is the Fathers. 35 houses got eviction notices today here in town. So many things are happening, I wouldn't be surprised if the destructions started happening soon."
• April 8: "We were at work when at 11:00 (1 hour before my lunch break) Manda yelled out 'come on girls, we are going home' Everyone was like, are you okay? We still have an hour left. Then she yelled in a really shrill voice "GO GET IN THE CARS RIGHT NOW! Father said to drop everything and go RIGHT NOW" So we gathered up and rushed to the cars and went home. ...later Father said that the FBI were going through all the businesses and finding out where the money comes from, our people need money really bad cause all of the 400 people need a lawyer. I pray to God that it all turns out the way he wants!"
• April 13: "... Uncle Lyle's voice came over the pulpit, he was on the phone. He updated us on what was going on in Texas. He said we needed to donate all the surplus money anybody had."
• April 14: "Uncle Lyle said that the CPS had lied to all the Mothers.... They took the Mothers with children 5 and older and told them they needed to talk with them, the Mothers asked if they would get to go back to their kids and the CPS said yes so they went with them where they were surrounded by police men and CPS officials and were forced to leave their children. The Mothers begged and said that they promised their children they would come back and asked if they could at least say goodbye and they told them no and loaded them onto buses and carted them back to the ranch. I am so sad. Those poor children being taken from their Mothers! I pray to God that this will end soon!"
• April 21: "The stinking CPS are doing DNA tests today. I don't think they could get any dumber. My only consolation is that they'll have Heavenly Father to answer too."
• April 23: "They have started putting the children 5 and older into foster care. I can't believe it is really happening! I thought the Lord would stop it before it came to this. But I know when Uncle Warren gets out he will gather them up!"
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