FLDS case cost Texas $12 million

AUSTIN, Texas, March 29 (UPI) -- The investigation into alleged sex abuse at a polygamist sect with 439 children has cost Texas $12 million so far, officials said.

The costs range from foster care and genetic testing to security, hotels, transportation and overtime pay for hundreds of state workers, the Houston Chronicle reported Sunday.

In all, child protective workers found that 12 teenage girls among the 439 children had been sexually abused by marrying adult members of their sect, the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

The newspaper noted that Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott's office has criminal charges pending against 11 of the sect's men for their role in arranging illegal marriages.

The investigation began with a hoax call to authorities by a woman who claimed to have been abused by members of the sect in Eldorado, Texas.

"They were trying to pull another Waco. They didn't bring in all those guns for looks," said Willie Jessop, the spokesman for the 800 or so living at the compound. "When there wasn't any guns, they changed their story to 'The belief was the problem.'"

In May, a state court ruled that "removal of the children was not warranted." By July, lawyers for child protective officials began moving to dismiss all of the children's custody cases from court.

"It became apparent to us that the decision had been made to kind of shove it (the children's cases) down," said Debra Brown, executive director of the Children's Advocacy Center of Tom Green County.