WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A Utah man convicted last week of bigamy said on Monday that nothing, not even a lengthy prison sentence, would keep him from his commitment to his five wives and their 25 children.
In a round of television interviews, avowed polygamist Tom Green said having more than one wife had been a belief in his Mormon culture for over 150 years and he would not abandon it.
``I don't know how you can legislate against someone's beliefs and expect them, if they have any faith at all, to give up their beliefs,'' he said in an interview with ABC's ``Good Morning America'' program.
Pressed on whether a lengthy prison term would force him to change his mind on multiple marriages, he said: ``I'm a father, I have a family and I am committed to my wives and to my children and there is nothing that will keep me from my commitment.''
Green, who lived with five women and their children on a remote desert compound in western Utah, was found guilty last Friday on four counts of bigamy and one count of failure to pay child support. He faces up to 25 years in prison when he is sentenced on June 27.
The case is believed to be the first against a polygamist in the United States in nearly 50 years in a state where plural marriages once thrived among Mormon pioneers who settled there. The practice is now banned by the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as the Mormon Church is formally called.
The state had charged that Green married the women in their teens, divorced them, but continued to live with them while they collected welfare payments.
Green said he believed he was legally single and was married only in the ``eyes of God''.
``We have a spiritual marriage which for us is good for all time and eternity,'' he told NBC's ``Today'' show.
Two of his wives are sisters and their mother was also once married to the 52-year-old telemarketer.
Asked whether this might appear strange to some people that two sisters and a mother were with the same man, one of the sisters, Shirley Green, told ABC: ``Yes, I can.
``But I also think that people need to allow for everyone's beliefs. If it's not hurting people and we're fine with it then why should people bother themselves with it?''
Her sister, Leeann Green, said people should understand that from a young age, the two had been raised to learn how to be good mothers and take care of their family.
``We don't go out and cruise the malls like all the rest of teen-age girls. When we take on a family, that's a commitment that we take on for the rest of their lives.''
Green said he was optimistic he would win his case on appeal, telling NBC he did not see himself as a bigamist, who he described as someone who committed fraud against the state by having more than one marriage license at a time and deceived his spouses.
``In polygamy we don't get more than one marriage license at a time and we don't deceive our spouses into thinking they are the only one,'' he told NBC.
Green said he had been singled out by the state because he had been outspoken about his marriages.
``There's somewhere between 30,000 and 50,000 people living in polygamist families in Utah ... I thought that if people understood our lifestyle they would not fear it and there would not be problems like this,'' Green told NBC.
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