paul kingston wives

John Gustafson, a representative of the Davis County Cooperative Society, an affiliate of the Kingston Group, disputed the lawsuits claims. Their legal team includes a Boston law firm with expertise in qui tam lawsuits. From Hansens perspective, the entire Kingston Group marriage process is like being told you can have anything to eat as long as it comes from a certain table. Its hard to leave when thats all youve known, says one former member, who was forced to marry her cousin when she was 15. He said the college has controls to ensure compliance with federal aid guidelines. [10][11]. According to written histories, John Ortell Kingston, father of the current leader, also encouraged his family members to marry other kin to improve their own bloodline. Hansen said during family home evenings nights when a mans family gathers for religious studies and games her husband would take girls 12 and older who were single and lead them in a teaching. He had arranged for a banner to be placed over a bridge there. [5][6][7][8] Members generally seek the blessing of parents and religious leaders before choosing to marry. The other seven are brothers or sons of Paul Kingston. But Jessicas No. Church leader Paul Kingston conducted the service and his brothers John Daniel and David were speakers. Jessica was given the list of suitors. Two teenage boys had been spotted entering Rachel Youngs home. Girls who agree to become plural wives tend to be more devout and usually live in homes without their husband, thus receiving less scrutiny. The plans fizzled because her mother didnt believe DeRieux had received direction from God to marry the man. He even had charts showing who were the higher families in the sect so his daughters knew where to look for a mate. Matt Gaetz Called Out for Citing Chinese Propaganda in Hearing Some people say they funneled the money through Mexico. As he grew older, Stephen turned out to be as rebellious as his own father had been. At clan gatherings, girls who were still in their teens danced with men old enough to be their uncles, whom they were sometimes forced to marry. The Order's top man, Paul Kingston, counts a half-dozen such relatives among his 20-plus wives, according to ex-members and Attorney General's investigator Ron Barton. Some former teenage Kingston Group brides acknowledge they werent forced to marry; they made a choice. Stephen didnt know what the law said he only knew that the people he loved were being abused and exploited by his own father. Contact. It was February in Salt Lake, cold and gray, and in the foothills above the city, a low fog hung over the mountains. Kiki Kannibal: The Girl Who Played With Fire. When one of his favorite wives died, he missed her so much that he dug her up from her grave. The teenagers sitting in the driveway on South Bonner Circle that afternoon in 2009 knew the operation well. Knight was born in Salt Lake City, the sixth child of third-generation polygamists. The lone man suing said three Order men raped him when he was 16 or 17 and that when he left the group and announced he was gay, was tracked down and severely beaten by a group of boys acting at the direction of the Order, the lawsuit alleges. The now-20-year-old said she and her husband have started a family of their own. It was a grimy, derelict-looking place. "A review of wedding certificates shows how the teen marriages are sanctioned at the highest levels of the Kingston Group. I think it scared them.. The groom was 21. During his tenure, some members have continued the practice of plural, and intra-family marriage,[3] although neither is practiced by the majority of members and the practice is not required to gain status in the group. Paul Kingston told her congratulations. Messages sent to Paul and David Kingston as well as representatives of the Latter Day Church of Christ, the Kingston Groups religious organization, and other named defendants in the lawsuit were not returned. The theft of the silver bars from Rachel Youngs basement, they concluded, had been a copycat crime. A Tale of Two Chads: More Drama From Nineties Band Live. At first, the two boys denied any involvement in the break-in at Youngs house. Situated at the base of a rugged mountain range, the Orders spread sat in a pristine valley of glistening hayfields and open pasture. If I had done it, the Order probably would have killed me. And they avoid the police, opting to handle any disputes in their own brutal manner. Those in the Order, Kingston preached, are responsible for building a master race, which is why all marriages are arranged within the original four families that started the cult. She's since left the marriage and wants the legal marriage age raised to 18. Johnson said the Davis County Cooperative Society takes no position on the issue. He told the children they would all be applying for financial aid, enrolling at SLCC and majoring in business administration, the lawsuit cites Mafi as saying. The lawsuit does not allege any wrongdoing by SLCC. To get out of this s----y situation, I have to get into another s----y situation, said Kollene Snow, who married at 16 and is DeRieuxs full sister. The plaintiffs filed what is called a qui tam lawsuit in which whistleblowers assist in pursuing individuals who commit fraud against the government. Kingston had told gaming regulators in California. Mafi recalls Paul Kingston telling the children who attended that meeting that The Order was going to be trying out something new, the lawsuit says. Yet its teen marriages in the Kingston Group that spurred the Utah Legislature to act this year. Kingston's death came 3 weeks after his legal wife, Luana Joan Kingston, died of breast cancer, according to her obituary. But the Kingstons have remained in Salt Lake, operating virtually undetected in a city of more than 1 million people. He told her he believed one did not need to practice polygamy to reach heaven. Im done with this shit.. Snow said she was forced to fast, pray and read the Bible. No record of the case is available at the court clerks office. Later the Order reportedly bought slot machines from mob-controlled companies. It includes a provision they obtain financial aid. His followers erected a crude stone cross nearby in his honor, covered with inscriptions of the letter K (for Kingdom or Kingston). Jessica Kingston said within a year of getting married, her husband started looking for a plural wife. He didnt have anyone to help him process what had just happened., Taking advantage of his status as a son of the prophet, Stephen began bending the rules even further. If the father believes his son received true direction from God, the son is sent to Paul Kingston or one of the people he designates to consider marriages. Colbert Reimagines Disney Park as 'De-Wokeified' DeSantis World, Sex, Drugs, and the Biggest Cybercrime of All Time, I could boil down what theyre about in three words, says a member who broke with the Order. Murdaugh is accused of fatally shooting his son, Paul, 22, with a shotgun and his wife, Maggie, 52, with a rifle near the dog kennels at the family's hunting estate known as Moselle. He lived on month day 1940, at address, Washington. But 16- and 17-year-olds in Utah need only the consent of a parent to wed. Idaho, Colorado and Nevada, where the The Tribune also found Kingston Group marriages, have similar age and parental-consent requirements. Some former sect members, including two stars of the television show Escaping Polygamy," say girls are pressured to marry at the age most kids are learning to drive and reading Wuthering Heights.. So it means being a first [wife]. Her parents placed her in what she called a repentance home, where she wasnt allowed to communicate with anyone without supervision. When Rachel Young, a stern and humorless woman, got home, she discovered that several crates of silver in her basement had been pried open whoever had robbed the place had clearly been in a hurry and had left with only a small fraction of her silver. Jessica said, strictly speaking, she and the other teen brides she knows chose to get married, but added: Its not much of a choice when theyre groomed to do that.. One day, not long after the gold disappeared, Knight got an anonymous phone call. The plaintiffs estimate the eight combine to have 106 wives. He kept his office on a side street in central Salt Lake. Theyd keep it in basements, in filing cabinets, in a big safe in one of Pauls offices, says Levi Kingston, a former clan member. The ones that misbehave, they try to push them to marry as soon as they can, Hansen said. We will continue to do so. Now, two years later, Stephen still sleeps with a gun near his bed. [4] Plural marriages for individuals under 18 in the group are not allowed. Its who I am., To keep the police from prying into the matter any further, the clan also hired a private investigator to track down the missing gold. They and Mafi also accuse a sect-affiliated tax preparer of falsifying tax returns for Kingston Group members to report lower incomes, partly to boost student financial aid. Paul Kingston wore secondhand suits that hung off his slender shoulders, and he spoke in a flat, emotionless monotone. By our latest survey, the majority of DCCS college students were not using government funded financial aid, including many who would qualify if they had applied. Cousin Carl E. Kingston, an attorney, is said to have a mere two wives. The Kingston Group is believed to have a few thousand members, mostly in Utah and Idaho. Thats when Nicole Mafi, one of Paul Kingstons daughters, says in the lawsuit she was called into a meeting of recent high school graduates to discuss going to college. Ive lived a good life. Sometimes, lying in bed at night, he thinks of his brother who died not far from here, and the rest of his siblings who remain in the Order. (Photo courtesy Shanell DeRieux) Shanell DeRieux, then called Shanell Snow, center, stands with her mother, Shirley Hansen, right, and her father, John Daniel Kingston, in this photo from her legal wedding day, July 3, 2008, in Grand Junction, Colo. Also pictured are DeRiux's now-ex-husband and ex-mother-in-law. He later pleaded guilty to a misdemeanor. He would talk to them about marriage and thinking of whom to marry, Hansen said. We want to hear it. Paul Kingston, the top man within the Davis County Cooperative Society, also known as the Kingston Group or The Order, is accused of overseeing what the lawsuit calls a scheme. It was Mothers Day in 2000, and Stephen and two of his brothers were speeding up a dirt road for dinner at an aunts house. She said her father didnt think the suitor was a good student. Mary Nelson grew up in the sect and names her father, David Kingston, as a defendant. A review of wedding certificates shows how the teen marriages are sanctioned at the highest levels of the Kingston Group. One baby deemed to have too many deformities was allegedly put in a shoe box and left to die. We strongly encourage all members to strictly adhere to every legal guideline when operating their businesses including day cares and when applying for all need-based assistance, including financial aid for students. In a search of public records created since the start of 1997, The Salt Lake Tribune found 65 marriages among members of the Kingston Group in which the bride was 15, 16 or 17. They threw away their possessions, donned matching blue overalls, and pitched canvas tents on a patch of land north of Salt Lake that would come to be known as the Home Place.. Paul Kingston is one of eight men named as defendants in the lawsuit. It felt like it was us against the world. His older brother Richard, a burly diesel mechanic, taught him how to fix cars. Its unclear how much if any investigating has happened in the almost seven months since the lawsuit was filed. It is a common and intentional practice in the Order to require girls and women to submit sexually to their husbands even if the sexual submission is against their will because having children results in workers for the benefit of the Order, the lawsuit states. All I like to do is work on cars and hang out with friends and ride my ponies, he wrote one night on his MySpace page. All rights reserved. He served one day in jail. The pressure became so intense DeRieux stopped going to dances. The memorial was held in Maxwell Park in Hildale, Saturday, Sept. 26, 2015. He also preached a bizarre extrapolation of the Book of Mormon called the White Horse Prophecy, a dreaded prediction of a cataclysmic time when the black race will rise up and attempt to destroy the white man, only to be thwarted by Native Americans riding to the rescue. He charged across the field and started brutally beating Stephens cousin. Paul Eldon Kingston, the leader of Utah's polygamous Kingston Group, also known is the order, is named as a defendant in a bombshell lawsuit alleging sex trafficking. ", "United by fundamentalist Mormon beliefs, one polygamous group helps another by bringing truckloads of food", "Young Brides Stir New Outcry on Utah Polygamy", "Shurtleff: Child bride polygamous marriages appear to have stopped", "Polygamists are urged to make public statement", "No longer performing child-bride marriages? Not every Kingston Group follower marries as a juvenile. She didnt want to be in that house anymore; it reminded her of my brother. To test her devotion, Stephens father began calling her in the middle of the night and telling her to move the family to a new location. It begins with the potential groom. The plaintiffs also contend these eight defendants have significant wealth acquired through the money and labor followers contribute to the Kingston Group and the rent the defendants charge their wives. Former and current members of the Kingston Group say that kids are taught from a young age they one day will need to pray about whom to marry. Women, meanwhile, allegedly gain status by being pure of blood and obedient, becoming the first wives of higher-ranking numbered men, and bearing many children. Attorneys for the Nelsons and Michaels also did not return messages seeking comments. Girls who reach their mid- and late teens can start to feel the pressure to wed. Jessica Kingston said when word gets out that a boy or young man has asked a girls father for permission to marry her, friends and family are walking up to that girl asking, Did you pray about him?. She also is a star of "Escaping Polygamy." Its a quiet, haunting place, with massive hayfields that stretch to the horizon. Did the Utah Legislature do enough to save the Great Salt Lake? Over the next several years, Stephen bounced from the suburbs of Salt Lake to the clans ranch in Nevada. The grift was exposed decades later, in the 1980s, when the clan paid a $350,000 settlement for swindling the government through welfare fraud. 2023 NYP Holdings, Inc. 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Nor are youths from polygamous sects the only teens who marry in Utah. Two are nieces. He also shared his brothers fascination with herbs and natural medicine. Kingston succeeded his father John Ortell Kingston as the Trustee-in-Trust of the DCCS upon his father's death in 1987. The clan is lead today by Charles E. Kingston's son, Paul E. Kingston, who is said to have more than 30 wives. Jessica Kingston wore a white dress. sltrib.com 1996-2023 The Salt Lake Tribune. Over 75 years, the Kingstons have amassed a fortune worth an estimated $300 million, but the operation skirts the edges of the law. The parents of the 16-year-olds also completed a form granting their permission. Members of The Order are taught they need to be in a plural marriage to reach the highest heaven. He also had dozens of children a brood that would eventually grow to around 300 and he had a hard time telling them apart. As a favored son of the prophet, Paul had the freedom to disregard the strict discipline his father imposed on other members of the Order. Members who have left in recent years say that changed after some of Paul Kingston's brothers were convicted of. He then severed her index finger, cleaned off the three bones, and carried them with him the rest of his life, believing that the totem kept her spirit with him. This story has been shared 116,307 times. But he hopes that one day his family will be able to forgive him for leaving them behind. Husband started looking for a mate wasnt allowed to communicate with anyone without supervision also shared his brothers fascination herbs! One baby deemed to have a few thousand members, mostly in.. Undetected in a pristine valley of glistening hayfields and open pasture is available the! At Youngs house an attorney, is said to have a few thousand members, mostly Utah... 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