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SALT LAKE CITY - A federal grand jury in Utah has indicted US polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs on an additional charge of unlawful flight to avoid prosecution.
Jeffs, arrested in August after two years on the run, is the leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or FLDS, which split from the mainstream Mormon Church when it banned plural marriage more than a century ago.
Jeffs was on the FBI's Ten Most Wanted List for four months until his capture in a routine traffic stop outside of Las Vegas in August 2006. He is in jail awaiting trial on felony rape charges.
US Attorney Brett Tolman said the new charge carries a maximum penalty of five years in federal prison and a US$250,000 ($370,000) fine if Jeffs is convicted.
Jeffs, 51, already faces two charges of rape as an accomplice for arranging a marriage between a minor girl and a 19-year-old man. That trial is set to begin April 23 in state court.
- REUTERS
