PHOENIX — A polygamous sect leader and 10 of his followers were indicted last week by a federal grand jury on charges relating to child porn and the act of amassing “wives” – including underage girls. – for the leader.
Samuel Rappylee Bateman, 47, of Colorado City, Arizona, was already facing a trial for kidnapping and evidence tampering charges in an investigation into his community on the Utah-Arizona state line.
Now, in a second superseding indictment, Bateman faces additional charges related to a years-long conspiracy to travel across state lines in order to obtain wives from among his followers in several states, documents from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona say.
"In order to claim these “wives” — 10 of whom were under the age of 18 —Bateman traveled extensively between Nebraska, Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. Throughout the conspiracy, Bateman had sex with the minor girls on a regular basis," the attorney's office said.
The federal documents claim Bateman exploited his religious followers' faith by convincing them to give their young children to him.
"These allegations are extremely troubling," former FBI special agent Michael E. Anderson said. "What Mr. Bateman did was threaten people with banishment from eternal salvation if they did not follow his will."
The second superseding indictment also charges Bateman with producing child pornography, alleging that in late November 2020, "Bateman coordinated group sexual activity in a hotel room in Colorado Springs, Colorado, with some of his followers, including minor girls."
Bateman is accused of having then coordinated a video call to a follower in Colorado City, in which the video participants, including a minor, were naked, the attorney's office said. Production of child pornography carries a maximum term of 30 years in prison, with a mandatory minimum of 15 years in prison.
A first superseding indictment was returned by the federal grand jury in December, adding charges against Bateman and adding three co-conspirators.
Bateman, a self-proclaimed profit, and his followers practice polygamy, a legacy of the early teachings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. The mainstream faith, known widely as the Mormon church, abandoned the practice in 1890 and now strictly prohibits it.
Bateman lived in Colorado City, an isolated community along the Arizona-Utah border where polygamy was long practiced openly.
He was first arrested in August when someone spotted small fingers in the gap of a trailer he was hauling through Flagstaff, Arizona. Police found three girls, between 11 and 14, in a makeshift room in the unventilated trailer.
Since his arrest last September, prosecutors claim Bateman's had sexually-explicit conversations with multiple juvenile girls in an Arizona jail.
Records show that one of those girls is a victim in a state child abuse case involving Bateman.
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