San Angelo, USA - Attorneys helped set schedules and presented motions Thursday for six members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.
Abram Harker Jeffs, whose trial is scheduled June 7, was arraigned and pleaded not guilty.
“The summons have gone out,” 51st District Judge Barbara Walther, who has presided over all the FLDS criminal cases, said of the call for jurors in Schleicher County, where Jeffs’ case will be heard.
Some of the motions sought by Stephanie Goodman, Jeffs’ attorney, include having sufficient time to look over redactions done to evidence and to have access to bills and transcripts of witnesses.
Another motion Goodman asked for was to end trial days “at a reasonable hour,” about 6 or 7 p.m. and beginning at 9 a.m.
Walther has been known to keep the court going late.
“The court will do the best it can,” Walther said.
Another motion brought out for the Jeffs trial includes quashing the indictment for being too vague about how an enhancement clause applies to Jeffs.
Walther will take up that and other motions Wednesday.
Merril Leroy Jessop, whom a San Angelo jury convicted of sexual assault of a child and sentenced to 75 years in prison and a $10,000 fine, entered the courthouse in an orange jumpsuit as his attorney Dan Hurley argued for a motion for a new trial.
The primary point of contention in that motion regards an allegation that the girl he allegedly abused had “developmental delays.”
Hurley said he had reason for not protesting after Carolyn Jessop, a former FLDS member who testified in Jessop’s trial, made the statement.
“I didn’t know it was false until later,” Hurley said.
Hurley brought the victim’s mother to testify that the victim did well in school and on standardized tests.
“She was very bright,” the mother said.
Eric Nichols, representing the office of the Attorney General of Texas and who has served as the lead prosecutor for the FLDS criminal trials, said Carolyn Jessop’s testimony should still stand as accurate since the family had put their daughter into first grade a year later than usual.
The mother said the reason for the late start was that their daughter wanted to go to school with her brother and wanted to be in the same grade.
Hurley put himself on the stand, and Brandon Hudson asked questions about whether he had ever been aware of the any evidence of the girl being mentally disabled.
Hurley described the evidence room and the evidence in it that he scrutinized.
“This room is 30 by 30. It is full, top to bottom, full of evidence,” Hurley said. “There was nothing that I saw from that group of evidence ... indicating that she was mentally disabled, delayed.”
Walther did not rule on the motion, saying she would consider the motion for a new trial.
Walther also heard a motion for Merril Leroy Jessop to be declared indigent so that he could have a court-appointed attorney, who he requested to be Hurley. Being declared indigent would enable him to afford the appeal.
“Do you have any income from any source whatsoever?” Hurley asked Merril Leroy Jessop.
“No,” Merril Leroy Jessop responded.
Merril Leroy Jessop also said he receives nothing from the United Effort Plan Trust that owns FLDS land in some parts of the country.
Nichols argued that he has had access to the communal funds, and that those funds can be used again.
“This money is out there,” Nichols said.
Hurley protested.
“He has no legal entitlement to any funds,” he said.
Before considering motions, Walther laid out the schedule for other FLDS members’ trials and hearings.
Keith William Dutson Jr.’s pretrial hearing will occur July 1, and his trial will go on July 26. Wendell Loy Nielsen’s pretrial hearing will be Aug. 12 and his trial on Sept. 7. Frederick Merril Jessop’s pretrial hearing is scheduled Sept. 28 and the trial Oct. 12. Leroy Johnson Steed’s pretrial hearing is scheduled Nov. 4 and the trial Dec. 6.