Netflix's newest documentary series has shocked viewers with its horrifying story detailing the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints and its disgraced leader Warren Jeffs. Four-part series 'Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey' includes archival footage never seen before from the FLDS which exposes some of his most heinous crimes of abuse.
The series begins with one of Jeff's survivors, Elissa Wall saying: "When I was 14-years-old, they forced me to marry my cousin. I asked Warren, begged him, please don’t make me get married and he said, ‘do you believe that you know better than the prophet and if you’re questioning me you’re questioning God.’"
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After his father, Rulon Jeffs, died in 2002, Warren stepped in and declared himself President and Prophet of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. The FDLS is an extremist offshoot from the Mormon church, which banned polygamy, also known as "plural marriage" in FLDS terms, in 1904. But the FDLS still believed in polygamy as they thought the more women a man married the closer he would be to God.
A report in Esquire magazine detailed the sinister goings-on in the group. of which authorities were aware of since 1953, when 36 men, 86 women, and 263 children were either arrested or taken into custody during a pre-dawn raid in Arizona. Some of the awful rules members were subjected to included, the women being forced to dress the same and made to pray on the hour every hour, all members were completely forbidden from going to or knowing anything about the outside world. If members broke the rules, or if the leader wanted rid of them, they were cast out and ex-communicated with mothers seeing their children effectively kidnapped and trafficked, other young people were thrown out of their families with no support, no money and no idea how the world worked outside of the FLDS doctrine.
And under Warren's control, things became a lot more sinister. He used countless underage girls to marry off to adults as well as making them marry him, so they could be repeatedly raped and impregnated. His abuse came with claims that it was all in the name of God. He married 78 females, 24 of which were underage children. His youngest abuse victim who he forced into marriage was just 14.
Utah attorney Roger Hoole explains in the series: "It is hard to prove, and law enforcement and politicians are not very interested in disrupting families,
"I think most people in Utah, the mainstream Mormons, people like me, see polygamy as an embarrassment."
In 2006, Warren Jeffs went on the run after being charged with two counts of accomplice to rape and was one of the FBI’s most wanted criminals. He was arrested as part of a routine traffic check in Las Vegas, but no action was taken to help the community until 2008, when federal law enforcement agents raided the Yearning for Zion Ranch in West Texas, following tip-offs of rape and abuse to a phone helpline. More than 400 children were rescued, making it the largest child custody case in US history.
In 2011, Jeffs was sentenced to life in prison plus 20 years for sexually assaulting two girls. He is currently being held in the Louis C. Powledge Unit in Palestine, Texas and he’s not eligible for parole until at least July 22, 2038. Unbelievably, he is still running the cult from his prison cell and believes he has been wrongly convicted.
When talking about the documentary, director Rachel Dretzin said: "The stories they told -- of the process of systematic coercion and mind-control exercised by the man they thought of as a religious prophet, Warren Jeffs -- were far from alienating. After many months spent reporting this story, it was clear to me that these women could have been my daughter, my mother, or me. And it was also abundantly clear that they showed incredible courage and strength in leaving this religion-turned-criminal cult.
"This was the story I set out to tell. The women in our series managed to leave the FLDS with no real education or skills, no money, no support whatsoever. For their whole lives they had been valued solely as plural wives and as breeders of children. To leave meant saying goodbye to everything and everyone they loved to start over in a society they didna understand. “Badass” doesn’t begin to describe how fierce they are. I am proud to be connected to them and grateful to have had the opportunity to tell their story."
