How did we miss this? Pentagon funds polygamous sect...

[Joanne98]

By Tim Sandler, NBC News Investigative Unit

As a child-abuse investigation continues at a polygamous compound in Texas, NBC News has learned who helped fund the controversial sect.

It was the U.S. Department of Defense.

Freedom of Information Act documents obtained by NBC News show that the Pentagon awarded contracts of at least $1.5 million to two Utah-based companies owned and operated by senior officials of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or FLDS. The contracts, issued from 1998 to 2006, were for aircraft parts and other military equipment.

The Pentagon contracts were awarded to Utah Tool & Die and Western Precision, Inc., which operated in Utah. The president of Western Precision was Wendell Nielsen, described in multiple media accounts as a senior official in the FLDS religious sect, whose West Texas compound was raided by police earlier this month as part of a wide-ranging child-abuse investigation. Neilsen disappeared with church leader Warren Jeffs after Jeffs was put on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted list in 2003. Jeffs, the sect's "prophet," was convicted last year on two counts of rape as an accomplice.

The records show that Western Precision continued to receive government contracts even after the well-publicized manhunt. And when Jeffs was captured in 2006, he was riding in an SUV registered to John C. Wayman, another Western Precision executive.

So how could federal funds have ended up aiding the FLDS church? According to an affidavit filed by Wendell Nielsen's son in a church-related court case, Western Precision gave the church up to $100,000 a month, a testament to the close ties between the manufacturing firm and the church itself.

For years before the Pentagon issued the contracts, newspapers were reporting sensational allegations about the Mormon fundamentalist church. The Pentagon continued issuing contracts to the firms as the media reports continued. A 1991 article in the Salt Lake Tribune, for example, reported that the church engaged in polygamy, "commingled church and municipal money" and evicted dissidents who disagreed with the church. The 1991 article quotes "sect member Wendell Nielsen" -- the president and CEO of Western Precision -- describing church leaders as "direct agents of God." Continued>>
http://deepbackground.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/04/13/886162.aspx

[kestrel91316]

1. Somebody at the Pentagon in charge of awarding contracts is

probably a secret polygamist masquerading as mainstream LDS - or is a Christofascist who wants money and power to get into FLDS hands and stay there because they are the "ideal".

[hunter]

2. The Pentagon was studying fundamentalism....

...trying to get inside the heads of those Islamic fundamentalists.

And of course they couldn't fund it directly because it was so blatantly unethical...

:hide:

Where the hell did I put my tinfoil hat????

[RC]

3. What is going on is the Pentagon is studying how best

to produce obedient canon fodder and the polygamous crowd seem to be the best at this.

[Joanne98]

4. Here's what somebody on another board said about this story..

This crap has happened before with the illegals at a meat packing plant. They are still in prison BTW.

This is a change of contract, but in order for the government to change it they must get rid of those who hold it. I will try to follow the contract but I believe it will end up with Morton Thiokal, a Utah based company with contracts with NASA and the Pentagon.

This is crap as the cops thought they were doing to right thing, but those who issued the orders knew the scheme.


Interesting!!!!!

[nashville_brook]

6. i'm not quite following here...what's the perceived rub?... that the cops weren't doing the right

thing?

this sounds really juicy, but i'm missing the point, somehow.

[spanone]

5. this was posted

[Joanne98]

7. Most of us missed it. KICK!

[Echo In Light]

8. That we did