This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated.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.
Seth Jeffs, one of the defendants in a food-stamp-fraud case involving a polygamous sect, has arrived in Utah from South Dakota.
Jeffs and 10 other leaders and members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints were indicted in the federal case last month.
Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz. — collectively known as Short Creek — are home to the FLDS church, though Jeffs leads a congregation in South Dakota, where he was taken into custody. The U.S. Marshals have transferred him to Utah, the U.S. Attorney's Office announced Thursday.
Federal prosecutors say FLDS leaders ordered members to give their food-stamp benefits — in food and cash transfers — to the church, which collects and redistributes commodities to the community. The leaders tell church members that they must obtain their food and household goods only through the church, the indictment alleges.
Jeffs is scheduled to be arraigned Monday afternoon in federal court in St. George.
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