- An FLDS member informed the FBI that Samuel Bateman in 2020 married a girl born in 2010.
- Bateman then complained that he was wetting the bed, according to the FBI.
- Bateman is accused of taking 20 wives, most of them under the age of 15, and taking advantage of his own daughter.
A promising “prophet” of the polygamous fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints demanded that a follower give up his youngest daughter to be his wife and then complained to his other young wives that the girl, no older than On Jan. 10, he was urinating on the bed, according to a recently filed FBI affidavit in a related kidnapping case.
In 2019, Samuel Bateman, who for years tried to advance his position within the sect, declared himself a “prophet” of the FLDS. The radical group has long been led by the infamous cult leader Warren Jeffs, who now reigns over many FLDS followers from prison.
Bateman has obtained a small following of around 50 FLDS members, splintering the sect, according to the FBI, and has taken 20 wivesmost were girls under the age of 15, federal investigators said in court documents.
In May 2020, Bateman went to his follower, Moroni Johnson, and took their daughter, born in 2010, as his wife, according to the FBI.
A police informant close to the child brides told the FBI that Bateman was “disgusted” by the younger girl’s bedwetting.
Although Moroni “expressed great distress and was under extreme stress at having to hand over his youngest daughter to Bateman,” the FBI affidavit said, he remained a loyal supporter. Since then, Bateman has taken all of Moroni’s daughters and at least one of Moroni’s wives as his own.
Bateman’s underage wives, several of them Moroni’s own daughters, were forced to watch in November 2020 as he had sex with Moroni in a Nebraska hotel room, according to the court document.
The women and girls were told it was the “brothers union” and were forced to have sex with other men in the cult, the FBI said.
In August, Bateman was arrested in Arizona on child endangerment charges after three underage girls were found in his cargo trailer. Nine underage girls were then taken from the homes he used and placed in group homes for children in Arizona, according to the Spokesman-Review.
Last Thursday, a 24-year-old woman, Moretta Johnson, was arrested on federal kidnapping charges and eight of those girls, who had run away from group homes, were found at a Spokane, Washington AirBnB. reported the Salt Lake Tribune.
The FBI alleges that Moretta Johnson and two other of Bateman’s followers conspired with him to transport underage girls for illegal sex between Arizona, Utah, Nevada and Nebraska.
