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The raids at the polygamist ranch in West Texas continue as local law enforcement agents removed more people from the retreat, but there are still no new about the 16-year-old girl who caused the raid.
After a standoff with Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints members, authorities said approximately 219 people were removed from the camp build by the followers of Warren Jeffs. Of the 219, 159 were boys and girls and 60 adults.
Officials said agents searched the camp for evidence regarding the marriage between a 15-year-old girl and 50-year-old Dale Barlow, but without success. The couple reportedly had a baby when the girl was 15.
Under the Texas state law, women under 16 aren’t allowed to marry, even with a parent's consent.
"[Barlow] said the authorities had called him and some girl had accused him of assaulting her and he didn't even know who she was," Bill Loader, Barlow's probation officer, told The Salt Lake Tribune.
The 50-year-old man who married the girl was sentence last year to jail after he pleaded no contest to conspiracy to commit sexual conduct with a minor.
Investigators are currently trying to determine whether the girl who called authorities last week was among the people removed from the1,700-acre ranch about 45 miles south of San Angelo, said Marleigh Meisner, a spokeswoman for Child Protective Services.
The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) bought approximately 1,900 acres near Eldorado about four years ago. There they build the ranch and called it the YFZ Ranch. About 400 members of the church were relocated from their Arizona and Utah compounds to the YFZ Ranch.
Since 2002, when his father died, the community has been led by Warren Jeffs. It’s one of the several religious groups which spread from the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints after the Mormon Church renounced polygamy in 1890.
Jeffs, the 52-year-old leader and "prophet" of the 10,000-member church, was later convicted for involvement in the rape of a 14-year-old girl in 2001, the year when she wed her cousin in an arranged marriage. In Utah, he was sentenced for to two consecutive sentences of five years to life in prison.
In Arizona, Jeffs also faces charges as an accomplice of incest and sexual conduct with a minor stemming from two arranged marriages similar to that above mentioned. He is now behind bars the Mohave County Jail in Kingman, Ariz., awaiting trial.
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