A Fundamentalist Mormon Was Allowed to Keep Silent About Child Labor Violations Due to…Hobby Lobby

[applegrove]

A Fundamentalist Mormon Was Allowed to Keep Silent About Child Labor Violations Due to (Wait For It…) Hobby Lobby

Friendly Atheist

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2014/09/17/a-fundamentalist-mormon-was-allowed-to-keep-silent-about-child-labor-violations-due-to-wait-for-it-hobby-lobby/

"SNIP....................

Turns out that ruling wasn’t such a limited decision after all, and Justice Ginsburg may have been onto something when she referred to it as “a decision of startling breadth.”

Ben Winslow reports:


… [District Court Judge David Sam] has ruled that a member of the Fundamentalist LDS Church does not have to answer questions about child labor violations because of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in the Hobby Lobby case.

The individual in question is Vergel Steed (or Vernon Steed — his name appears both ways in the ruling), who refused “to answer even the most basic questions in a recent deposition, because he is protected under the Religious Freedom Restoration Act.” The questions were part of a case pertaining to the suspected removal of children from school by FLDS leaders in order to compel the kids to work in FLDS fields. Hundreds of children had been seen at work in pecan field in 2012 (rather than attending school).


In this case, the federal government is suing the town governments of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., alleging they are de facto arms of the FLDS Church and its leader, Warren Jeffs.




.....................SNIP"