Font Resize- FLDS trust case
- Feb 17:
- Supreme Court hears FLDS dispute
- Feb 10:
- Polygamous leader's diary mistakenly included in court case
- Feb 3:
- Shurtleff threatens to disband FLDS base Hildale
- Dec 30:
- Fiduciary fires back in polygamous sect's property battle
- Dec 29:
- Polygamous sect seeks to stop sale of farm
- FLDS asks high court to put brakes on trust case
- Dec 28:
- Arizona says liquidating property trust may be best option for polygamous community
- Dec 15:
- Land trust attorneys want Jeffs to testify
- Nov 23:
- Estate of dead FLDS leader seeks control of trust
- Sep 9:
- FLDS appeals trust rulings to Utah Supreme Court
- Aug 24:
- Disputed FLDS farm sale approved by judge
- Jul 29:
- Judge postpones ruling, but may favor sealed-bid sale of polygamous sect's farm
- Jul 28:
- FLDS controversy: Judge to take up sale of polygamous sect's farmland
- Jul 22:
- Utah judge rejects proposed deals on FLDS trust
- Jul 16:
- FLDS fiduciary defends cow sale decision
- Jul 1:
- FLDS attorneys: Fiduciary's proposal violates sect's beliefs
- Fiduciary rejects FLDS land trust settlement proposal
- Jun 17:
- FLDS property fiduciary pleads not guilty in trespass case
- FLDS: Court-appointed manager for polygamous sect's trust pleads not guilty
- Jun 15:
- FLDS: Settlement offered in 4-year polygamous sect property dispute
- Jun 11:
- FLDS: Former polygamous child bride offers to settle suit
The Utah Supreme Court on Wednesday agreed to hear a petition for emergency relief brought by members of a polygamous sect after a lower court judge ordered documents sealed in a property trust dispute and refused to hear sect members' objections to the sale of trust assets.
The order, signed by Justice Ronald E. Nehring, sets a deadline of Jan. 4 at 5 p.m. for responses to the petition filed by attorneys for members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
The order also extends the trust's right to repurchase cows sold from the Harker Farm in Beryl, part of the United Effort Plan Trust, until a ruling is made on the petition. That sale was to be final on Dec. 31.
In a petition filed Monday, the sect asked for a stay of all proceedings and orders in the trust case and requested a schedule be set to hear claims that members' religious rights have been violated in the court-sanctioned reformation and management of the trust.
The trust, set up in 1942, holds virtually all property in Hildale, Utah; Colorado City, Ariz., and Bountiful, British Columbia. Third District Judge Denise Lindberg has directed the case since 2005, when the trust was taken away from sect control amid allegations of mismanagement.
The FLDS are seeking stays on rulings related to sealed filings that discuss the trust's future, and those that barred sect members from joining the trust case. The sect also wants to delay a ruling that
The petition, filed by Stephen C. Clark, also asked that the option to repurchase the "irreplaceable" dairy cows, be extended indefinitely. Fiduciary Bruce R. Wisan, who manages the trust, sold the cows earlier this year.
Without a stay, the sect risks "immediate irreparable harm by the loss of unique trust property" designed to meet beneficiaries' needs, the petition states. The petition argues the reformed trust and its secular management also make it impossible for FLDS members to exercise a central tenet of their religion: organizing their lives in a communal "Holy United Order."
The sect filed a similar petition in October but says emergency action was needed now because of recent directives that "escalate [the court's] arbitrary and capricious abuse of discretion."
That included an order entered by Lindberg on Dec. 24 that sealed filings related to the trust's future, which was made with no notice, hearing or findings and deprives the sect and public from knowing what is happening in the case, the petition says.
