Salt Lake City, USA - A former high-ranking member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints said yesterday he's siding with the state of Utah in a battle to strip reclusive leader Warren Jeffs of authority over church assets.
"Something has to be done to protect the beneficiaries of the trust," said Winston Blackmore, subpoenaed for the hearing over the United Effort Plan Trust because he was once listed as a trustee.
Blackmore has fled the southern Utah polygamous enclave and now runs a Canadian offshoot of the church near Creston, B.C. Jeffs is no longer defending himself or the trust in lawsuits, and the state has alleged that he's selling off assets to keep them from being frozen.
All the land in the twin border towns of Hildale, Utah and Colorado City, Ariz., was at one time given to the trust and intended to benefit all of the sect's estimated 6,000 to 10,000 members.