Cult's sick sex Temple

Offficials say the "fundamentalist" LDS cult in Eldorado, Texas, used its temple as a place where teen virgins were raped to initiate their "spiritual marriages" to older men. The Smoking Gun has the documents, and the Associated Press reports:

Teenage girls at a polygamist compound in Texas were forced to have sex in a temple after sect-recognised marriages, a former member said.
The temple included "a bed where males over the age of 17 engage in sexual activity with female children under the age of 17," said an anonymous informant, who left the
Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, in an affidavit released yesterday. . . .
The temple has many locked safes, vaults and desk drawers which police want to open in a search for evidence of marriages of girls as young as 12 or 13 to older men, and of teens giving birth.
The affidavit says one 16-year-old sect member had four children. . . .
The search of the compound began last Thursday after a 16-year-old girl called a local family violence shelter to report her 50-year-old husband beating and raping her. . . .
Texas has an outstanding arrest warrant for the man alleged to have been the girl's husband, Dale Barlow.
He is a registered sex offender who pleaded no contest to conspiracy to commit sexual conduct with a minor in Arizona last year.
The sect leader, Warren Jeffs, is serving two consecutive sentences of five years to life for being an accomplice to the rape of a 14-year-old who was married to her cousin in Utah.

I previously blogged about the case here and here.

UPDATE: Here's the hunky dreamboat that I'm sure all those "spiritual wives" are crazy about:

The 16-year-old girl whose phone calls led to a raid on a polygamist compound in Texas identified Dale Evans Barlow as the man who she said beat, choked and sexually assaulted her after their "spiritual marriage," according to a court document unsealed Wednesday. . . .

Dale Evans Barlow, who turned 50 in November, was arrested in Arizona in 2005 on charges of conspiracy to have sex with a minor. He was placed on three years probation. . . .
According to the document released Wednesday, the girl said she has an 8-month-old child and is pregnant again. She said Barlow has beaten her -- once hard enough to break her ribs -- choked her and forced her to have sex with him.
She said another of Barlow's "spiritual wives" would hold her infant child while he beat her.

Yep, Mr. Barlow's a real winner.

UPDATE II: Here's MSNBC video about the raid:

The Economist writes:

In building the ranch in Eldorado, FLDS leaders planned to hunker down and escape notice. That was a mistake. Texans are not used to polygamists in their neighbourhood. Authorities went in as soon as they had legal occasion.

Yeah, don't mess with Texas. And don't mess in Texas.

UPDATE III: Linked by famous Texan, Rusty Shackleford, who says:

I really didn't want to write anything about this. From the beginning my 'something not right about the way this is being reported' detector has been going off.

Granted, the MSM seem to be taking at face value the most lurid allegations by law-enforcement officials. But who can blame them? From the standpoint of ratings, "Polygamous Teen Sex Cult" is a lot better headline than "Officials React to Abuse Claims." And TV is all about ratings, right?