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Rights tribunal agrees to hear polygamy
case
Four ministries accused of failing to protect the girls and women of Bountiful
Jim
Beatty
Saturday, September 04, 2004
VICTORIA - The B.C. Human
Rights Tribunal has agreed to hear a case alleging the provincial government
allowed discrimination to flourish in the polygamous community of Bountiful,
The Vancouver Sun has learned.
Four government
ministries are being accused of failing to protect girls and women from abusive
practices in the well-known commune, located near the southeastern B.C.
community of Creston.
The allegations, made by
eight women, only one of whom lived in Bountiful, say the government was
wilfully
blind to polygamy, discriminatory
education practices and religious indoctrination.
Former Bountiful resident
Debbie Palmer, one of the complainants, said the B.C. government has failed to
live up to its responsibilities.
"There is no other
community that I know of in Canada where teachers and elders and heads of
companies and bishops can take underage female children and impregnate them and
get away with it," she said in an interview Friday. "It is blatant
abuse. The ministries of the government aren't going to waffle for another
decade."
The four ministries named
are the Ministry of the Attorney-General, the Ministry of Education, the
Ministry of Children and Family Development and the Ministry of Community,
Aboriginal and Women's Services.
The complaint, which has
been accepted by the tribunal, says many women who have escaped from Bountiful
are struggling to overcome a "lifetime of abuse, religious indoctrination,
psychological coercion as well as fear and threats of retaliation."
Palmer said she suffered
physical abuse on the commune, was married off at 15 and ended up having seven
children by three different men she was assigned to marry.
She said the government
could have intervened by not funding an education system on the commune known
to be discriminatory towards females, by apprehending girls being traded by men,
and by doing more to investigate cross-border trafficking of women.
No one in the provincial
government would respond to the allegations on Friday.
Government spokeswoman
Cindy Rose said Attorney-General Geoff Plant, who is responsible for the
government's legal-services branch, is the only official who could respond, but
he is on holidays.
"The
attorney-general is unavailable and won't be available until next week,"
she said.
Vikki Bell, the registrar
and legal advisor for the Human Rights Tribunal, would not comment on any
aspect of the Bountiful case, citing confidentiality concerns.
Speaking generally, Bell
said it could take six months or more Government spokeswoman Cindy Rose said
Attorney-General Geoff Plant, who is responsible for the government's
legal-services branch, is the only official who could respond, but he is on
holidays.
"The
attorney-general is unavailable and won't be available until next week,"
she said.
Vikki Bell, the registrar
and legal advisor for the Human Rights Tribunal, would not comment on any
aspect of the Bountiful case, citing confidentiality concerns.
Speaking generally, Bell
said it could take six months or more before a case normally reaches the
public-hearing stage.
For more than 50 years,
the Bountiful commune has been dogged by allegations of sexual exploitation of
girls, polygamy, physical abuse, cross-border trafficking of women and racism.
Those allegations and
renewed media attention have resulted in a new investigation by the RCMP and a
second one by the attorney-general's ministry.
The Bountiful commune,
which has a population of about 1,000, is run by the Fundamentalist Church of
Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a breakaway sect of the Mormons.
Police officials on both
sides of the border have had trouble investigating and prosecuting religious
sects because it is notoriously hard to infiltrate the communities and
interview alleged abuse victims. The laws around polygamy and religious
freedoms also present problems.
The lawyer representing
the women, Judith
Doulis
, said the government must now provide the tribunal with a
detailed response to the complaints.
Doulis
said her clients seek only one
thing: an end to the alleged abuse.
"They want this
outrageous situation to be addressed," she said. "How, within a free
and democratic society, can you have a community which is so overtly
discriminatory against females?"
Doulis
said the complaint is being made
by a group of women on behalf of those inside the commune, women and children
who are often either too nervous or too brainwashed to come forward.
The complaint indicates
posters, community bulletins and other forms of communication will be posted in
or near the commune in the hopes that some women will come forward with direct
allegations of abuse.
Palmer, who escaped from
the commune in 1988 with her seven children, has been fighting for the rights
of women at Bountiful ever since.
On Friday, she
acknowledged the mounting public pressure to investigate Bountiful, but worries
it will be a long time before action is taken to address alleged abuses.
"I've been working
at this for such a long time that I'm not having a celebration party yet."
The Human Rights Tribunal
is an independent, quasi-judicial body that addresses human-rights complaints
in B.C., including allegations of discrimination based on gender, race,
religion or age.
Because it's outside the
criminal-justice process, no one found guilty of discrimination is jailed or
excessively fined.
The tribunal is made up
of human-rights experts and acts like a court, but is less formal and more
flexible. If the tribunal determines a complaint is justified, it can order a
remedy that would address the discrimination, rather than punish the
perpetrator.
jbeatty@direct.ca
(c) The Vancouver Sun 2004
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