Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Follower of Polygamist Cult 'Prophet' Admits to Transporting Young Girls for Sex

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Starting point is 00:00:16 12. How old are you? How old are you? Those are teenage girls captured on police body camera. The FBI says a cult leader claiming to be a Mormon prophet took some of them as his wives. Now one of his co-defendants has turned against him. Thanks for joining me for Crime Fix. I'm Anjanette Levy.

Starting point is 00:00:38 The case involving Samuel Bateman is disturbing to say the very least. The FBI says Bateman created a polygamist Mormon cult and has more than 20 wives. And get this, nine of them are between the ages of 12 and 16. A 14-year-old, she had a ring on her finger, on her ring finger. She had a ring on her finger. They've all kind of like hidden those. I mean, we know what's going on here. Now, of course, you can't have wives who are 12 years old. That's illegal. It's called child abuse, molestation. Now a co-defendant of Bateman's has pleaded guilty to his role in the scheme. Maroney Johnson faces 10 years to life in prison. Johnson told the Daily Mail earlier this year that Bateman

Starting point is 00:01:25 took advantage of his deep Mormon faith and controlled him using sexual, mental, and physical abuse. Federal agents say Bateman forced Johnson to give up three of his wives to him to atone for his sins because, get this, he wasn't treating Bateman as a prophet. Bateman is scheduled to go on trial in September. He faces state and federal charges. He's accused of transporting girls across state lines and even enlisting the help of his adult wives to transport those girls. With me to discuss this disturbing case is somebody who knows a lot about cults. He's Rick Allen Ross, and he founded the Cult Education Institute. He's also

Starting point is 00:02:06 testified as an expert about cults in court many times. Rick, thanks for coming on. My first question to you is, how can somebody like Samuel Bateman convince people like Maroney Johnson and other women to help him kidnap essentially young girls, allegedly, and take them as wives. I'm just confounded by this. Well, Samuel Bateman is basically, he's created a splinter group of a splinter group. This goes back to the FLDS led by Warren Jeffs. Bateman was in that group. In fact, he lived in Colorado City. So he claimed to be the successor to Warren Jeffs, who is now in prison in Texas with a life sentence for sexually abusing children. And so Bateman would take on the mantle and say, I am the new prophet. I am the successor to Warren Jeffs. And he targeted people

Starting point is 00:03:06 within the FLDS community, which is a very kind of socially isolated community. And these people were predisposed to see him as a prophet and to accept his claims because they had grown up in that community. And that was all they knew. What is with the outfits that the women dress in in this sect? I mean, it seems it's obviously very conservative, but we have body camera footage of these girls. They're like 14 years old. These are children, and they're wearing these very matronly-looking dresses. Their hair is pulled back, and they've got wedding rings on because they are essentially married to Samuel Bateman.

Starting point is 00:03:52 You know, I said earlier in the show, they're not married to this guy. I mean, they're being sexually abused by this guy. So what, you know, what is with the attire and all of that? Is it just a part of this kind of conservative offshoot, as you say? Yes, there's a rigidly prescribed dress code, and they wear what they call prairie dresses. And there are very specific colors that are designated. For example, Warren Jeffs would not allow women to wear red. And then their hairstyle, the way in which they grow their hair, wear their hair, is also prescribed and regulated by the

Starting point is 00:04:33 leadership of the group. And so what you can see is that this is a very tightly controlled kind of group with an environment that is controlled by the leader. And in this sense, the leader cuts off the followers from the outside world. They have no other perspective. They have no other way of understanding the world. And so within this alternate reality, they are indoctrinated and led to believe that the only hope they have is to be married in a polygamist marriage and that if they are not obedient, they will be cast out and lose their salvation, lose their family, lose everything. This case involving Samuel Bateman is absolutely terrifying and just goes to show you,

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Starting point is 00:06:11 verdict. And in New York, there was a $6.8 million verdict. There are no upfront fees, and submitting a claim is free, and you only pay if you win. So if you'd like to submit a claim, log on to www.forthepeople.com slash crime fix, or click the link in the description. Maroney Johnson has pleaded guilty, and he told the Daily Mail that he was subjected to mental, sexual, and physical abuse by Samuel Bateman and that he was that Bateman took advantage of his deep faith. But this was also somebody who had many wives. You know, he he told the Daily Mail and he told the feds, actually, I should say I misspoke there, but he told the feds that Samuel Bateman made him give up three wives to atone for not treating Samuel Bateman as a prophet. So where is this belief that you can have multiple wives and some of them, you know, so young, teenage girls? between the FLDS, other polygamist groups such as the Kingston clan and the LeBaron clan of Mexico

Starting point is 00:07:27 and the mainstream Mormon church. In 1890, President Woodruff declared polygamy illegal for the church members. And there was a schism. And those people that continue to believe that polygamy was what God wanted them to do, they basically left the Mormon church and started their own splinter groups. And those groups continue to today. And, you know, for a man like Moroni, who is pled out in this particular situation, to disobey Samuel Bateman, in his mind, was to disobey God, because Bateman claimed to be the anointed prophet of God, and there could be no disobedience. And Bateman used what I would call standard coercive persuasion techniques to beat down and dominate people like Moroni.

Starting point is 00:08:23 What he would do is require them to do group confessions. He would shame them. And as you point out, he would punish them by taking away their wives. But in my opinion, you can see Bateman and Warren Jeffs as really pedophiles, masquerading under the guise of religion to exploit and do harm to children. And that was going to be one of my questions as well. I'm glad you brought that up. I mean, this is not religion. I don't know any religion that says, yes, it's okay to have sex with 12 year old girls, 14 year old girls and call them your wives. So it's somebody in your estimation, in your view, your expert opinion, who is really a pedophile who wants to molest children, but they're using religion to do that. And then they're controlling other people and bringing them kind of under their spell in order to help them accomplish these goals. I mean, he's traveling around to other states to abuse these girls and he's driving

Starting point is 00:09:26 them around. He's getting his other wives to transport these girls to other places. I mean, it's really disturbing stuff. Well, in this situation, victims become perpetrators. So you see these teenage girls who may be 18 or older, and they are Bateman's wives, and they are victims, from my understanding of what is going on in that group. That is that they are in submission to Bateman. They are basically his pawns, and he uses them to take advantage of and exploit even younger girls. And what we saw was horrible conditions of these children being held within trailers, being moved inside windowless trailers where they were like animals being carted from one place to another by Bateman. I mean, it's just horrible what he's done.

Starting point is 00:10:26 And one of the most insidious things about these polygamous groups is that they're multigenerational. And so you have parents perpetuating the victimization of their own children because they are so indoctrinated and so steep in this culture that is within our country. There are probably about 50,000 people living in polygamy in the United States. And for many years, these communities were not regulated. Nothing was done regarding the horrible things that were going on. And this was going on in Colorado City, Arizona, Hilldale, Utah. And these groups basically were a law unto themselves. The group in Colorado City

Starting point is 00:11:15 and Hilldale controlled the police department. So there was nowhere to go for help. And children would turn to their parents for protection, but their parents would perpetuate the system. Wow. And I was going to ask you that. How common is this? Like how many sects or little cults like this do you think exist? I mean, because how many Samuel Batemans are out there right now operating like this? Well, there are a number of groups. There's the Kingston clan, which has had its brushes with criminal prosecution. There is the largest group, which is the FLDS, led by Warren Jeffs, who succeeded his father, Rulon Jeffs. And then we see the Bateman group, which is a splinter of a splinter. And Bateman had perhaps 50 followers. And then there are groups in Mexico,

Starting point is 00:12:08 the LeBaron clan, for example, that is in Colonia, Mexico. And they were led by a man by the name of Ervil LeBaron at one point, who was eventually prosecuted for murder. All of these groups are similar in the sense that they all claim to be led by a prophet, and their prophet is the one true prophet. And so this is a claim that all the leaders make. There are also groups in Montana. There's the Pinesdale polygamist community. And there is a group in Bountiful, Canada, in British Columbia. So there are all these groups, and they include thousands of people and many, many children. Well, it is incredibly disturbing. We're going to keep an eye on it. Rick Allen Ross, thank you so much for coming on.

Starting point is 00:13:02 I want to bring in Dr. Steve Hassan. He is an expert in cults. Dr. Hassan, your thoughts on this co-defendant of Samuel Bateman's pleading guilty? It seems like the dominoes are starting to fall. Yeah, this is unfortunately a splinter group of the Mormon organization. And in this mindset, the prophet gets revelations and they think the mainstream church went to Satan because they abolished polygamy. They're gonna do it the way Joseph Smith said to do it.

Starting point is 00:13:42 And unfortunately, it involves hurting a lot of underage girls and women. One of the interesting things about this is the fact that Moroni Johnson acts like he was taken advantage of by Samuel Bateman. He said he had this deep Mormon faith. He had wives himself, multiple wives. I mean, what is this though about believing that you are entitled to having multiple wives? And in some of these instances, some of these people were these, they're not wives, they're children. I mean, these are teenage girls. They're not old enough to consent to be married. They were essentially kidnapped. So are you buying what Johnson is saying that

Starting point is 00:14:22 he was taken advantage of by Samuel Bateman? You know, he was sexually abused by him, subjected to physical and mental abuse, and his faith was kind of twisted and contorted by Bateman, and he was put in this position that way. It's a complicated case, but very simply, the way I think about brainwashing and mind control and destructive cults is to think about a continuum of influence from healthy, respectful, informed consent, conscience, freedom to question, freedom to leave without fear, harassment, all the way to the destructive mind control dimension, which is a dissociative disorder, and where the pseudo-identity is programmed basically to be dependent and obedient on the leader. And often in this situation, the leader is a prophet who presumes to get direct revelations from God. So there's a lot going on here,

Starting point is 00:15:26 but essentially this is an unhealthy splinter group of an unhealthy splinter group of an unhealthy group. So how do we wrap our minds around it? Being normal Americans with great difficulty, except to come back to human rights and children's rights and women's rights and say, wait a minute, this is abuse. So Johnson, Maroney Johnson, is facing 10 years to life in prison. I mean, he could potentially spend the rest of his life in prison. He's pleaded guilty. So he's throwing himself on the sword, admitting to the crimes he's committed.

Starting point is 00:16:07 You know, what happens to him in your estimation? Do you think this is somebody who can be rehabilitated and who has seen the errors of his way? Do you see him? I know you're not a legal expert. You're a cult expert. Do you think this is somebody who could be, you know, maybe doesn't spend the rest of his life in prison because he has admitted to wrongdoing. Right. So I'm actually a forensic expert, so I understand the law. And the law is about 100 years out of date with understanding undue influence and brainwashing and mind control. And for me, I've spent 47 years helping people to

Starting point is 00:16:48 understand brainwashing and mind control using Chinese communist brainwashing models, hypnosis models. And so yes, people can be deprogrammed. And yes, it is possible that they may be able to reenter society and be healthy citizens. But our law enforcement system is not set up to help people understand mind control, unfortunately. And it's unlikely he'll get better without specialized care. Interesting. Well, he's in a lot of big trouble. He's in huge, huge trouble. And it'll be interesting to see what sentence he does get. Dr. Hassan, thank you so much for

Starting point is 00:17:31 joining us. You're welcome. And that's it for this episode of Crime Fix. I'm Ann Jeanette Levy. Thanks so much for joining us. We'll see you back here next time. You can download Crime Fix on Apple, Spotify, Google, and wherever else you get your favorite podcasts and new episodes post each weeknight at 6 Eastern time on Law and Crime's YouTube channel. Daniel Camacho does our video editing. Our head of social media is Bobby Zoki. Our senior director of social media is Vanessa Vine. Savannah Williamson is one of our producers. Diane Kay and Alyssa Fisher book our guests and Brad Mabey is our audio editor.

Crime Fix with Angenette Levy - Follower of Polygamist Cult 'Prophet' Admits to Transporting Young Girls for Sex

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