Short Creek Raid - Aftermath

Aftermath

After the Short Creek raid, the fundamentalist Mormon polygamist colony at Short Creek eventually rejuvenated. Short Creek was renamed Colorado City in 1960. In 1991, the Mormon fundamentalists at Colorado City formally established the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (FLDS Church). The members of the sect did not face any prosecutions for its polygamous behavior until the late 1990s, when isolated individuals began to be prosecuted. In 2006, FLDS Church leader Warren Jeffs was placed on the FBI Ten Most Wanted List; he was arrested in 2007 and in 2011 was convicted in Texas of two counts of child sexual abuse.

On 3 April 2008, following allegations of physical and sexual abuse by an unidentified caller who claimed to be a 16-year-old girl, law enforcement officers raided a FLDS compound Jeffs had founded in Texas called the YFZ Ranch. As of 8 April, a total of 416 children had been removed from the compound by authorities. A former member of the FLDS Church, Carolyn Jessop, arrived on-site 6 April and stated her opinion that the action in Texas was unlike the Short Creek raid. Others, however, have drawn direct connections between the two events.