Three girls embrace before being led away from the home of Samuel Bateman after his arrest in Colorado City, Ariz., Wednesday, Sept. 14, 2022. Seven were led away from Bateman’s home, as well as two others from another home. part of the research. A leader of a small polygamist group on the Arizona-Utah line pleaded not guilty Thursday to federal charges of tampering with evidence, weeks after he was pulled over on a highway with young girls in an enclosed trailer. Samuel Bateman, 46, was charged earlier this month with three counts of destroying or attempting to destroy records and tampering with criminal proceedings. He pleaded not guilty in U.S. District Court in Flagstaff, a mountain town where he was arrested in late August by a state trooper after someone spotted small fingers in a gap in the trailer’s back door. Authorities found three girls, between the ages of 11 and 14, in the trailer he was transporting through Flagstaff, according to court documents. The trailer had a makeshift toilet, a couch, camping chairs and no ventilation, the documents state. The documents do not say whether the girls are related to Bateman, and it was not discussed during Thursday’s hearing. Bateman was a former member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, or FLDS, until he left in recent years and started his own small offshoot group, said Sam Brower, who has spent years researching the group. Bateman was once one of jailed leader Warren Jeffs’ trusted followers, but Jeffs recently denounced Bateman in a written exposé sent to his followers from prison, Brower said. Bateman’s group still practices plural marriage with a minimal following of fewer than 100 people, estimated Brower, who wrote a book about the FLDS and appeared in the recent Netflix series, “Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey.” Federal prosecutor Patrick Snyder said Bateman spoke to supporters in Colorado City, Arizona from the Coconino County Jail in Flagstaff and instructed them to delete communications sent through an encrypted private messaging system and asked all women and girls to obtain passports. Snyder said state child welfare has removed children from Bateman’s home in Colorado City, where the FBI recently served a search warrant. Darren Daronko, a spokesman for the Arizona Department of Child Safety, declined to comment in an email Thursday, citing confidentiality laws. FBI spokesman Kevin Smith said in an email that the search warrant is sealed. Bateman posted bond on the state charges. He was arrested again Tuesday in the Colorado city by federal authorities investigating whether children were being transported across state lines for sexual activity, Snyder said. If convicted, Bateman faces a maximum sentence of 20 years in prison on each federal charge. Samuel Bateman previously pleaded not guilty to three counts of child abuse in an Arizona state court, according to court documents. Bateman’s attorney, Adam Zickerman, cautioned against inferring that the federal case was about religious persecution, though he did not specify Bateman’s faith or say whether he practices polygamy. Zickerman said Bateman is not a danger to the community. Schneider cited a pretrial services report saying Bateman had affairs with multiple women, but also did not say whether Bateman belonged to any polygamous group. Both the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona and Zikerman declined to comment after Thursday’s hearing, as did two women who sat in the gallery and met with Zikerman. U.S. Magistrate Camille Bibles ordered Bateman to remain behind bars while the case works its way through the courts. He noted that Bateman is a pilot and survivalist who has followers and international contacts who could help with financial or other resources at a moment’s notice. She said she was also concerned about young girls in vulnerable positions. “The courts have a huge interest in protecting people who can’t protect themselves,” he said. Bateman listed a home address in Colorado City, where a mix of committed members of the polygamous FLDS, ex-church members and non-practitioners live. Both the Colorado town and its sister community of Hilldale, Utah, have seen significant cultural changes in recent years. The FLDS group led by jailed leader Jeffs has lost much of its control over the communities. Jeffs is serving a life sentence in a Texas prison for child sexual abuse related to child marriage. Polygamy is a legacy of the early teachings of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, but the mainline church abandoned the practice in 1890 and now strictly forbids it.
