Fundamentalist Mormons in the News Avowed polygamist Tom Green’s trial burst into the international spotlight as more than one hundred reporters traveled to Provo, Utah, from a wide variety of locales, ranging from Europe to Australia to Japan. The world watched the legal conflict that questioned the very essence of what constitutes wedlock and raised controversy relating to prosecutions, persecutions and the private place of plural marriage. The trial addressed charges of bigamy and criminal nonsupport, with the possibility of a future hearing to air a charge of child rape. The legal battle pitted Juab County attorney David Leavitt, the Utah governor’s younger brother, against the gregarious Green and his five wives. Besides revealing the inner workings of a fascinating apostate LDS lifestyle, Green’s trial again raises the issues of the legality and possible religious rights relating to polygamy and poses a fascinating duel between church and state.

Tom Green, Linda Green, Ogden Kraut, Kirk Torgensen, Carolyn Campbell