B.C. Polygamy Report

Friday, April 13, 2012

A Harrowing Tale from an Escapee

Rebecca Musser reveals a tale of fear and horror as she describes life with the senior Jeffs.

Polygamy Reference will not be appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada

The B.C. Minister of Justice said today that the Reference decision made by B.C. Supreme Court Chief Justice Robert Bauman in November 2011will not be appealed to the Supreme Court of Canada.

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Friday, January 27, 2012

Living with Plural Wives

On the stand in federal tax court, Bountiful leader Winston Blackmore confirmed that he had 21 wives, including sisters whom he married on the same day in the same ceremony.

“These are pretty much the list of people who lived with me as wives,” Mr. Blackmore said on Tuesday, following a series of questions from a Department of Justice lawyer that outlined the names and home communities of the women to whom Mr. Blackmore was “sealed” in ceremonies sanctioned by leaders of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, or FLDS.

Preparing for the End of Days?

B.C. polygamous leader Winston Blackmore says he took out a $25,000 loan from the bank to prepare for the end of the world.

During testimony in the Tax Court of Canada on Thursday, Mr. Blackmore said a patriarch in the community directed him to get the money to “prepare for the worst.”

Money, Money, Money .....

Polygamous leader Winston Blackmore acknowledges he may not be a prophet, but he’s a little less clear about whether or not he’s the leader of a church in southeast B.C

Mr. Blackmore is trying to make a case in the Tax Court of Canada for special status for his community in Bountiful, B.C

Under heated cross-examination Wednesday by federal lawyer Lynn Burch, Mr. Blackmore at first refused to answer whether or not he thought himself a prophet.

So Many Wives .........

Despite struggling Tuesday in tax court to name all of his wives, Winston Blackmore admitted Wednesday that he'd forgotten one.

Instead of having 21 wives between 2000 and 2006, Blackmore said he had 22.

During that period, Blackmore said he had approximately 67 children – 47 of whom were born in that six year period alone.

Blackmore's Unpaid Taxes Under Scrutiny

The polygamous community of Bountiful is not a congregation and by insisting that it is, community leader Winston Blackmore is trying to offload a tax bill on to those who can ill afford to pay it – including young men shipped out of the community to work at low-paying jobs, a federal tax lawyer said on Monday.