Mormon True Crime

She had no choice in the matter - none of the girls did. Her mission was to give birth to and raise many children in devoted service to a shared husband. Susan was 15 years old when she became the sixth wife of Verlan LeBaron, one of the leaders of a rogue Mormon cult, who was engaged in a blood feud with his brother that from 1972 to 1988 claimed up to two dozen lives. In this gripping and eloquent book, Susan Ray Schmidt tells the story of growing up on the inside and of her ultimate escape with her children from an oppressive and violent life.

Valarie Clark Miller seemed to have it all. Smart and beautiful with a wealthy, successful husband and growing family, Valarie appeared to be the picture-perfect Mormon wife. But it was all a façade. Inside, she was crumbling from the pressures of long-repressed memories of a childhood filled with sexual and physical abuse.

In May of 2013, Max and Joyce Eliason entrusted their estate valued in excess of $250 million to the LDS law firm of Kirton McConkie located in Salt Lake City, Utah. They did so with the belief that their estate rich in oil properties was just as safe as the millions of dollars they had paid in tithes and offerings over the 59 years they were married. What has followed is the most criminal and heinous display of corruption which has led to Kirton McConkie and the leaders of the LDS Church unable to account for $1.00.

In 1878, Elder Joseph Standing traveled into the Appalachian mountains of North Georgia, seeking converts for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. Sixteen months later, he was dead, murdered by a group of 12 men. Most accounts of this event have linked Standing's murder to the virulent 19th-century anti-Mormonism that also took the life of prophet Joseph Smith and to an enduring southern tradition of extralegal violence.