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Six members of a polygamist Mormon sect pleaded guilty to food stamps fraud Wednesday and will pay no fines, nor serve any additional prison time.
They have agreed to take a class on proper food stamps use, FOX 13 of Salt Lake City, Utah, reported.
The six leaders of the Fundamentalist Church of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS) who pleaded guilty Wednesday join two others who were charged with food stamps fraud and money laundering. A total of 11 members of the FLDS church were brought up on charges, and eight have pleaded guilty so far.
In pleading guilty, FLDS leaders agreed that they violated laws of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), or food stamps, that restricted the federal benefits only to the person who applied and received them.
Prosecutors claimed that FLDS leaders encouraged church members to donate their food stamps to the church, where leaders used the benefits to stock FLDS-run stores, or exchange the benefits for cash and use the money for other things. For example, the FBI’s indictment alleged that Kimball Barlow used proceeds from the food stamps fraud “for 16 checks totaling $30,236 payable to Ford Motor Credit for installment payments on a 2012 Ford F-350.” Barlow pleaded guilty to the charges Wednesday.
Defense attorney Hyrum Dutson argued that the “law of consecration” allowed FLDS members to donate their benefits to the church, attempting to make it a case of religious liberty.
“We won,” Dutson said.
“It’s like Vietnam – the government declared victory and got out, and everyone’s benefited for it,” Aric Cramer, attorney for one of the defendants who worked as a cashier and handled food stamps, said. Prosecutors wanted the class “to show that they’ve taught everybody what the correct use of SNAP cards are,” Cramer said according to Cedar City, Utah, newspaper The Spectrum.
Ryan Stout, an attorney for one of defendants, asked the judge in the case that the class, a “one-time training event” to be taught by the Department of Agriculture “doesn’t exist yet.”
One man charged in the case, erstwhile leader of the FLDS operations Lyle Jeffs, has been missing since he slipped his ankle monitor in July and fled. (RELATED: Polygamist Fugitive’s Attorney Says He Was Probably Raptured)
Seth Jeffs, younger brother to Lyle, pleaded guilty to felony charges of conspiracy food stamps fraud Dec. 28 and was also sentenced to time-served with no fine. The oldest Jeffs brother, Warren Jeffs, is currently serving a 20-year sentence for sexual abuse of a minor after he took several underage wives.
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