Word: ranched
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...event. But residents found the newcomers distant and unresponsive to their gestures of friendship. Four years ago, posing as Utah businessmen, David Allred and a small group of companions said they had come to Eldorado to build a hunting and game preserve in what was once the Red Cheek Ranch. That wasn't surprising. While most people in Schleicher County work in the oil field support business, some ranch or farm, and others have turned to eco-tourism offering mountain bike trails, wildlife tours and stargazing parties. Soon, enough, however, the community discovered Allred's real plans...
...That calmed the anger. For a while too, the town feared that the newcomers would take over the local government. When that did not happen, the mayor said the community developed a "detente" with the FLDS leaders, who nevertheless assiduously kept non-believers off their Yearning for Zion Ranch...
...Doran was quietly working his own leads, developing an informant inside the FLDS community, where few outsiders were allowed. Doran traveled to Utah and met with state and local officials, including law enforcement officers who were members of the FLDS community. The sheriff also paid visits to the YFZ Ranch because he was occasionally called on by its residents to be a notary or to remove illegal aliens the FLDS found crossing their land, and even once to investigate a traffic death, making him one of the few Eldorado citizens to see inside the compound...
...been prompted by a call from a young girl to a child abuse hotline - the state has yet to confirm they have located her and an FLDS spokesman says she does not exist. The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services (TDFPS) then removed 416 children from the ranch, more than anyone anticipated lived at the compound, Mankin said...
...will be for naught," Helen Pfluger says. "But any way you look at it the kids get hurt." Meanwhile, the FLDS, usually a closed community, has embarked on a media campaign featuring the grief-stricken mothers along with photographs, taken by the group, of armed Texas officers at the ranch. As of yet, no one has been charged with abuse as the TDPS tries to unravel a maze of family relationships - many of the children have one of four common FLDS surnames: Jeffs, Jessop, Steed and Barlow. Sources also say the children and mothers have been misleading the investigators...