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SAN ANTONIO - More than 400 children taken from a polygamist ranch in Texas will be reunited with their parents next week under a tentative agreement reached on Friday between state officials and lawyers for the mothers.
The Texas Supreme Court ruled on Thursday that the state overstepped its authority when it removed the children from the Yearning For Zion ranch in a remote area of West Texas last month after allegations of abuse.
A court official said the pact, which requires approval by the judge overseeing the custody cases, requires that parents who want to be reunited with their children stay in Texas, allow child welfare authorities access and agree to take parenting classes.
"There is an ongoing investigation of child abuse," Susan Hays, an attorney for some of the children said. "This is just shifting custody of the children back to their parents while this investigation continues."
As part of that investigation, Texas officials on Friday obtained a DNA sample from Warren Jeffs, the leader of the breakaway Mormon sect.
Jeffs is in Arizona serving a prison sentence of 10 years to life for being an accomplice to rape by forcing a 14-year-old to marry her cousin.
"In the search warrant you will see that evidence was collected that Jeffs married four young girls," said Jerry Strickland of the Texas Attorney General's Office. "Two 12-year-olds, a 14-year-old and a 15-year-old. All of these marriages took place at the Yearning For Zion Ranch in Texas."
The search warrant alleges that Jeffs, 52, was at the YFZ Ranch on several occasions when young girls there are believed to have become pregnant.
Texas child welfare officials have charged that under Jeffs' direction and leadership, leaders of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints trained young girls to become "spiritual brides" of older men.
Records seized at the ranch indicate that some men who live there admit to having up to seven wives and dozens of children.
- REUTERS
