Carolyn Jessop




Carolyn Jessop
Tom Smart for The New York Times At 35 years old, Carolyn Jessop decided to escape her abusive marriage to Merril Jessop, get her eight children safely out of Colorado City, Arizona, and leave the FLDS. Seventeen years earlier, she had been forced into an arranged polygamous marriage with the 50-year-old Merril Jessop. If Carolyn got caught escaping, she knew that her children would be taken from her and that she would be shunned by the community. Worse yet, she feared that the local FLDS doctor would probably diagnose her as mentally ill. If that happened, she could be sent to a mental institution in Flagstaff, Arizona, where several other "rebellious" women from the community had been "warehoused." At 10 p.m. on April 21, 2003, she found her window of opportunity to flee. She and her eight children crept out of the home they shared with her husband's other six wives and 46 children, leaving forever. Below are some articles discussing the harrowing experience Carolyn endurred trying to escape her polygamous life.


Woman Tells How She Escaped Polygamy
KUTV News Channel 2 KUTV.com Originally broadcast June 24, 2003
A polygamous wife Tuesday told how she had to escape two months ago with her children from Colorado City. The woman believes people from the polygamous community are still trying to lure her children back into the polygamous religion and lifestyle. Rod Decker has more. Carolyn Jessop is a schoolteacher, an educated woman. She said the Colorado City community is growing more restrictive and she feared her daughters might be pushed into polygamous marriages. Jessop says she worked as a schoolteacher, but her husband took her paychecks. "I was required to sign that over to my husband and ask him for everything," she said. Jessop says she was the fourth of seven wives of 67-year-old Merril Jessop. They've been married 17 years and had eight children but she's wanted out for a long time. "The marriage has been abusive from the beginning," she said. Read more


Man wins visitation rights to children from estranged plural wife
The Associated Press Originally published June 25, 2003
SALT LAKE CITY (AP) - A polygamist father was granted visitation rights to eight of his children Tuesday. Merril Jessop, of Colorado City, Ariz., will be permitted to see his eight children by estranged plural wife Carolyn Jessop. The couple separated when Carolyn Jessop, 35, left home in April with her children, ages 2 to 15. A 3rd District Court domestic relations commissioner mediated the agreement, which still must be finalized with a judge's signature, said Rod Parker, Merril Jessop's attorney. Douglas White, Carolyn Jessop's attorney, did not immediately return several phone calls Wednesday from The Associated Press. Parker said accusations about child abuse in the home had thwarted his client's visitation rights. Parker said those accusations were baseless. Read more


Plural wife gets custody of 8 children
Deseret Morning News deseretnews.com Originally published June 25, 2003
A plural wife was granted full custody of her eight children Tuesday by a 3rd District Court domestic relations commissioner, who also granted the children's father visitation rights. "I think we had a really good result," said Rod Parker, who represents 67-year-old Merril Jessop of Colorado City, Ariz. Parker also represents the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, a church that openly practices polygamy in the twin border towns of Colorado City and Hildale, Utah. "What's good about this stipulation is that Merril and his children were given the same rights as any other family experiencing separation." Carolyn Jessop, 35, left her Colorado City home with the children in April. A message left for Doug White, Carolyn's attorney, was not returned by press time late Tuesday. The children, five boys and three girls, range in age from almost 2 to 15 years. Read more


Ex-polygamist wife talks about her experiences
By Jordan Muhlestein Standard-Examiner - Ogden, Utah Originally published October 22, 2005
OGDEN -- A woman who escaped from an abusive polygamist society two years ago says she finally has hope in her life. "Now, I'm not powerless," Carolyn Jessop said. "I know as bad as the day is, tomorrow can be better." Those leaving polygamy are refugees born into oppression and slavery, she said. "I was born in the United States and I never experienced the bounty of a free life," Jessop said. She spoke Friday at the Ogden Eccles Conference Center for an International Association of Workforce Professionals conference. She said private individuals, rather than state programs, have been most important in her adjustment into mainstream society. "I had difficulties with the system," she said. Her speech focused on the abuses she faced in the Fundamentalist Latter Day Saints society in and around Hildale, and how the state could better serve fleeing women. "The (FLDS) culture doesn't consider abuses against women a crime," Jessop said. "However, it does consider a woman talking about abuse a crime." Read more


Escape from polygamy
RUNAWAY \| When Carolyn Jessop fled a cult with her eight kids she 'jumped off a cliff'
By Daphne Bramham The Vancouver Sun Originally published Saturday, December 3, 2005
SALT LAKE CITY - Carolyn Jessop plotted for months how to escape her polygamist marriage, get her eight children safely out of Colorado City, Ariz., and out of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. "I had to have a window of opportunity because I was doing something that had never been done before," says Jessop. "I was going to take all of my children. Women had left before, but they only took their younger kids. But I had decided if I left, they were all coming with me." It was complicated. Her oldest child, 15-year-old Arthur, had been working construction jobs outside the community since he was 12 and only came home on weekends. Her "husband" Merril Jessop frequently went away during the week. But rarely was Arthur home when Merril was away. At 10 p.m. on April 21, 2003, the window opened. Read more


Honors for ex-polygamous wife
Former wife is publishing book on escape from FLDS marriage
By Ben Winslow Deseret Morning News Originally published August 29, 2007
In the middle of the night, Carolyn Jessop packed up her children and fled a marriage to a man 32 years older than she was. There was just one problem. "I had nowhere to go," she said Tuesday. She drove from the Fundamentalist LDS border towns of Hildale, Utah, and Colorado City, Ariz., headed for Salt Lake City. "I just felt like, worst-case situation, I'll start knocking on doors until I found a total stranger who would take me and my eight children," Jessop said. She had left behind the only life she knew — as Merril Jessop's fourth wife — headed for an unknown future outside of the cloistered FLDS Church. "It was pretty scary," she said of her situation. Now, Jessop is telling her story in a book that is garnering her an award — before it even hits store shelves. The ex-polygamous wife will be honored today by the Salt Lake Chamber of Commerce's Women's Business Center as a "Renaissance Woman." Her story will be celebrated at a high tea honoring some of the state's top businesswomen. "She's such a sweet, dear person, and obviously so strong," said Nancy Mitchell, the executive director of the Women's Business Center. "When you look at her, you can't imagine the strength she has." Jessop's book, "Escape," is a memoir of her life inside and outside of the FLDS Church. At age 18, she married Jessop — then 54 — and over the course of 15 years bore him eight children. She feared her husband. Read more


This Week On 'Oprah'
Friday: Polygamy In America: Lisa Ling Reports
WISN ABC 12 - Milwaukee, WI Originally broadcast October 23, 2007
It is a society that you may think you know, but you have never seen it like this until Friday's show. A polygamist husband comes forward for the first time and shares why he is risking everything to tell his side. And, Lisa Ling journeys to the dark side of polygamy to give us an inside look at this secret world.


Polygamy Survivor Carolyn Jessop
By ANDREA SACHS TIME Magazine Originally published Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Polygamy was the norm in Carolyn Jessop's life. After all, her own father had three wives by the time she was in fourth grade. Her family was part of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), a radical offshoot of the Mormon Church. But Jessop's own experience in the cult was so disturbing that she ran away with her eight children four years ago. Last month, the FLDS was in the news when its leader, Warren Jeffs, was found guilty of being an accessory to rape for forcing a 14-year-old girl in the group to marry her 19-year-old cousin. Jessop, 38, tells her extraordinary story in a riveting new book, Escape (Broadway). TIME's Andrea Sachs spoke with Jessop from her home in a suburb of Salt Lake City. TIME: You were 18 when you were told you were going to be the fourth wife of Merril Jessop, a 50-year-old leader of the FLDS. How did you feel? Carolyn Jessop: I was shocked. I was devastated. I really wasn't expecting that I'd be getting married. I didn't want to get married. I really had my heart set on going to college. The biggest concern I had with it was that once you're married, your husband really does own you. Did you try to escape? I had watched my sister make an attempt to try to get out of an arranged marriage. She ran away and then what happened to her was just so devastating and I didn't see any hope. Read more


Oprah profiles polygamy on TV today
By Ben Winslow Deseret Morning News Originally published Friday, October 26, 2007
An ex-member of the Fundamentalist LDS Church suggests the best way to reduce the negative effects of polygamy is to decriminalize it. Carolyn Jessop made those comments in an interview posted on the Web site for the "Oprah Winfrey Show." "If there was a way to decriminalize it, people could live honestly and in the open and with dignity and their children could be more mainstreamed. Then the children would have more options," Jessop said in her interview with Winfrey, published on oprah.com and scheduled to be broadcast on today at 4 p.m. on KUTV. Jessop recently authored the book "Escape," detailing her life in the FLDS Church as the fourth wife of Merrill Jessop, a leader in the polygamous sect. Her story and her book were profiled by the Deseret Morning News in August. Winfrey delves into polygamy in today's show, interviewing a polygamist man and his family from the fundamentalist community of Centennial Park, Ariz., and a plural wife who lives in the Salt Lake City area. Read more


Polygamy in America
From the show Polygamy in America: Lisa Ling Reports The Oprah Winfrey Show Originally broadcast October 26, 2007
Lisa's next stop in her investigation into the secret world of polygamy was Colorado City, Arizona — home to Warren Jeffs and his followers. When his father, Rulon, died in 2002, Jeffs assumed control of the largest and most secretive polygamist sect, known as the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or FLDS. Jeffs allegedly controlled the marriages of his followers, assigning wives to favored members and taking wives away from others. In May 2006 Jeffs was placed on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted List — and was later featured on America's Most Wanted — based on charges that he organized "marriages" between men and underage girls. In August 2006 he was arrested near Las Vegas. And in September 2007, Jeffs was convicted on two counts of accomplice to rape. He now awaits sentencing and a second trial in Arizona on multiple charges of both accomplice to incest and sex with minors. Lisa's guide in Colorado City is Carolyn Jessop. Carolyn was raised by three mothers and has 36 brothers and sisters. At 18, she says she was forced to marry a powerful 50-year-old FLDS leader, Merril Jessop. Carolyn had eight of Merril's 54 children, but she says she was always desperate for freedom. Four years ago, she risked her life by taking her children and escaping Colorado City in the middle of the night. Carolyn says her ex-husband and Jeffs were very close. She says Jeffs always chose young, pretty girls for his wives. "When I lived in the community, he had upwards of 60 [wives]," she says. "But I've heard stories and reports now from people who have left that now he has upwards of 180." Carolyn and Lisa's first stop in Colorado City is Merril Jessop's former house. She says she was Merril's fourth wife, but he added a fifth and sixth wife within six months. As they stand on the street in town talking, passing cars honk their horns at Lisa and Carolyn. "I'm sure we were not here for very long before word was circulated through the entire community that there's media here," Carolyn says. Read more


Excerpt from Escape
By Carolyn Jessop and Laura Palmer From the show Polygamy in America: Lisa Ling Reports The Oprah Winfrey Show Originally broadcast October 26, 2007
Early Childhood I was born in the bitter cold but into warm and loving hands. Aunt Lydia Jessop was the midwife who brought me into the world on January 1, 1968, just two hours after midnight. Aunt Lydia could not believe I'd survived. She was the midwife who had delivered babies for two generations, including my mother. When she saw the placenta, she realized that my mother had chronic placental abruption. Mom had hemorrhaged throughout her pregnancy and thought she was miscarrying. But when the bleeding stopped, she shrugged it off, assuming she was still pregnant. Aunt Lydia, the midwife, said that by the time I was born, the placenta was almost completely detached from the uterus. My mother could have bled to death and I could have been born prematurely or, worse, stillborn. But I came into the world as a feisty seven-pound baby, my mother's second daughter. My father said she could name me Carolyn or Annette. She looked up both names and decided to call me Carolyn because it meant "wisdom." My mother always said that even as a baby, I looked extremely wise to her. I was born into six generations of polygamy on my mother's side and started life in Hildale, Utah, in a fundamentalist Mormon community known as the FLDS, or the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. Polygamy was the issue that defined us and the reason we'd split from the mainstream Mormon Church. My childhood memories really begin in Salt Lake City. We moved there when I was about five. Even though my parents believed in polygamy, my father had only one wife. He owned a small real estate business that was doing well and decided it made sense to use Salt Lake as a base. We had a lovely house with a porch swing and a landscaped yard and trees. This was a big change from the tiny house in Colorado City with dirt and weeds in the yard and a father who was rarely home. Read more


Escape by Carolyn Jessop
Book Club with Deb Perry Sunshine Coast Daily - Queensland, Australia Originally published November 13, 2007
Thank you to all of you who have given such positive feedback on the Book Club! And there have been some great thoughts on the Thousand Splendid Suns discussion so far. A book I am reading currently - and which I've had a number of people comment on - is "Escape" by Carolyn Jessop. This non fiction book, published by Penguin, is available from all Mary Ryan Book Stores for $32.95. Here's a short synopsis to whet your appetite: Carolyn Jessop was born into a religious cult known as the Fundamentalist Church of the Latter Day Saints, a 10,000-strong community living in Arizona, USA. Aged 18 she was coerced into marriage with a 50-year-old man she barely knew. She became his fourth wife, and had eight children in 15 years. This is the true story of Carolyn Jessop's life in this violent and abusive cult. Children were brainwashed, taught that everyone outside the community was evil, that dinosaurs never existed and men never set foot on the moon. Books were banned. But Carolyn Jessop escaped and just a year later her testimony was central to getting the assets of the cult frozen, and its notorious leader, Warren Jeffs, put on trial. This is her astonishing story. I look forward to your discussion on this book, good or bad! I'll certainly be sharing my thoughts as I read it.


'I shared my husband with 12 other wives'
By Carolyn Jessop YOU Magazine The Daily Mail - London, England Originally published December 21, 2007
Brought up in a closed sect that believes in polygamy as the key to paradise, Carolyn Jessop endured an arranged marriage to a 50-year-old man and had eight children before she found the courage to flee, taking her family with her The moment had come. I had been watching and waiting for months. Now the time was right and I could not afford to fail. The two things that had to happen before I could escape were in place: my husband had gone away on a business trip and my eight children were all at home. The choice was freedom or a life of fear. I called my brother Arthur. 'If I do it tonight, will you help me?' 'Carolyn,' he said, 'I'll do everything I can, but even if I leave right now, the soonest I can be there is five in the morning.' He lived 300 miles away and would have to drive through the night. 'Will you do it?' I tried not to sound as desperate as I felt. 'I'll be there,' he said. Read more


Tales of women's hard fight for freedom
Escape Carolyn Jessop with Laura Palmer A Life in Pieces Richard K Boer
By Jennifer Crocker Tonight Entertainment Guide Independent News and Media - Johannesburg, South Africa Originally published January 25, 2008
For many women life is about trying to escape. It's easy to forget that when your life is working well, but as well to remember that for many, many women life is cruel and arbitrary. Escape and A Life in Pieces both tell the stories of young women trapped in their own nightmares. Here's one scenario: you're 18 years old and, even though you are a member of a fundamentalist sect that generally doesn't encourage young women to go off and study, you have plans to go to college. Then one day you come home and hear that your life course has been changed just ever so slightly and you are about to marry a man who is 32 years older than you and already has a few other wives. Second scenario: you wake up after giving birth to your second child and you have no idea who you are. The situation seems threatening, and when your mother and your husband come into your hospital ward, you don't know who they are. Welcome to the worlds of Carolyn Jessop and "Karen". Read more


Review: 'Escape'
tells the story of a woman's journey away from a cult
By Jodi Butler The Journal-Standard - Freeport, Illinois Originally published Friday, January 25, 2008
The Book Club seemed to enjoy this month's selection for the most part, but often for different reasons. "I liked it because it was disturbing," said one member, who found the story's subject matter of polygamy and abuse harrowing and intriguing. Another disagreed. "I didn't like it because it was disturbing," she said. A third reader had to force herself to read it, but once she got into the story, she liked the book. Yet another reader was bored in the middle of the book, and kept waiting for Carolyn Jessop to escape. A few readers said they would recommend the book. The synopsis "Escape" by Carolyn Jessop (written with help from Laura Palmer) is Jessop's true-life story. Raised in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), she becomes the fourth wife to a 50-year-old stranger, Merril Jessop, when she is just 18. For years she suffers psychological abuse and cruelty, both at his hands and at the hands of his other wives and their older children as they all fight for control, all the while giving birth to eight children of her own. At last, unwilling to endure living on earth with him, let alone the idea of living an eternity with him after death, she plots her escape, and successfully finds a new life with her children. Unequal wives, unequal lives Like most FLDS families, Merril Jessop had a favorite wife, Barbara, but unlike most FLDS families, his favorite wife never changed. "Barbara didn't want Merril to be pleased with any of the other wives," noted a reader. Dominant wife Barbara was so favored by Merril, that often while the other wives had to subsist on tomato sandwiches, she ate steak dinners. And if a wife did get a nice meal with Merril, she "could only eat what he liked." Read more


Escape from the clutches of a cult
ESCAPE by Carolyn Jessop (Penguin, £6.99)
By STEPHANIE CROSS The Daily Mail - London, England Originally published February 1, 2008
Carolyn Jessop was 35 when she made her escape. She was fleeing both her home in Colorado City, Arizona, and the polygamous sect in which she had grown up, the Fundamentalist Church of the Latter Day Saints. At the age of 18, Jessop had been assigned in marriage to a 50-year-old man. She was, at the time, his fourth wife. 'The Choice was Freedom or Fear' — at least, this is the title of Jessop's Preface. In reality, her decision to leave the FLDS was far from clear-cut. Indeed, what makes this incredible memoir so compelling is that it reveals the workings of a brainwashed mind. As a child, Jessop played 'Apocalypse' rather than hide-and-seek. The end of the world was to be welcomed, and all those outside the sect feared. What's more, as the descendant of 'a faithful bloodline' Jessop was FLDS 'royalty': 'I felt like the luckiest little girl to be one of God's elite.' The reality of her early years, however, was unenviable. Realising that her volatile, depressive mother hit her hardest in the afternoons, she would ensure that she was naughtiest at the start of the day. She never told her father about the beatings because they were 'an accepted part of our culture'. Read more


My life with a cult
Born into a polygamous, abusive sect, Carolyn Jessop was married off to a 50-year-old man and bore him eight children before she escaped.
By Torcuil Crichton Sunday Herald - Glasgow, Scotland Originally published February 9, 2008
SOMETIMES COURAGEOUS people don't look as if they have just laid down their armour before entering the room. Sometimes, perfectly normal-looking people carry the most exceptional stories of bravery in through the door with them and for Carolyn Jessop, a small, neat woman in a business suit entering a London hotel lounge, normal was another planet. Jessop, now in her late 30s, grew up in the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter-Day Saints (FLDS), created from a schism in the Mormon Church. Normal for her was being brought up to believe that the world outside her closed community in Colorado City was "evil". Normal was seeing her polygamous father marry three wives. Normal was being coerced, at the age of 18, into a marriage with a 50-year-old man she barely knew and being told that his sexual gratification was the key to her eternal salvation. Normal was becoming the fourth wife of a man who went on to have 12 other wives, and to bear him eight children in 15 years. Normal was a polygamous, delusional theology with complete male dominance and the attendant bitter, paranoid, loveless society that came with it. Read more


Woman learns to be a mother outside FLDS
By Carolyn Jessop The Arizona Republic Originally published Sunday, May 11, 2008
When I fled the FLDS with my eight children in the middle of the night five years ago, I was desperate. Desperate to escape the terror that had engulfed our lives. Desperate to keep my 14-year-old daughter from being married off to an older man. Desperate to make sure we never had to move into the FLDS compound that was being built in Texas. Desperate to get my children into public schools again. I dreamed about what freedom would mean for my children. What I never imagined was the extraordinary gift freedom would give me: I would finally learn what it means to be a mother. I had eight children in 15 years, but I did not know what a miracle it is to be a mother. I had no way of knowing the deep gladness mothering gives. I didn't know because in the FLDS, great emphasis is put on breaking the bonds between a mother and her child. My youngest son, Bryson, was 1 year old when I escaped. He was the first of my eight children with whom I forged a one-on-one relationship. We were able to attach to each other in a way I had never experienced. In an FLDS family, any woman can discipline another woman's children. A wife who is jealous of another wife will routinely target another woman's children for abuse. After Harrison, my seventh child, was diagnosed with spinal neuroblastoma, I was terrified of getting pregnant again. I'd already had three life-threatening pregnancies. I feared dying if I had one more. Merril Jessop, my ex-husband - who is now the most powerful man in the FLDS and running the compound in Texas - said Harrison's cancer was a sign that God was punishing me for my rebellion. He told me it was a waste of time to take Harrison to doctors and said God would heal him if I became more obedient. Read more


Carolyn Jessop's story is a portrait of courage
Viewpoints The Arizona Republic Originally published Sunday, May 11, 2008
Carolyn Jessop took my breath away. I've been a reporter, news producer and author for 30 years. I've listened to a lot of stories since I started out as a freelance radio reporter in Saigon in 1972. But only twice in interviews do I remember trying not to exhale because I knew what I was hearing was that extraordinary. When I was a senior producer for CNN three years ago, I flew out to Salt Lake City to do a piece on the "Lost Boys" of the FLDS, the hundreds of teenagers who'd been kicked out of the cult and told never to return to their families. As I was leaving New York, the executive producer of the broadcast I worked for, NewsNight with Aaron Brown, said, "See if you can find some women to talk to who fled polygamy." Not easy. But I lucked out. Utah's attorney general, Mark Shurtleff, knew about Carolyn Jessop. He said that she had a story to tell and that he'd see if she might be willing to be interviewed. She was. (Later I would learn that when Shurtleff first met with Carolyn to learn more about the FLDS under Warren Jeffs, Shurtleff had scheduled a half-hour meeting but wound up listening for 2½ hours.) But because my interview with Carolyn came together at the last minute, I had no time to do a pre-interview. I was just grateful I had someone willing to sit down in front of a camera. Carolyn came to the hotel with Brian, the man in her life. He sat to one side as she began to tell the story of how she escaped. I listened as she told me how she awakened her eight children in the middle of the night on the pretext that her handicapped son was sick and needed to go to the doctor. She described taking him off his feeding tube and removing him from oxygen. The other wives heard her up and about and called their husband, Merril Jessop, one of the most powerful men in the FLDS. Carolyn heard herself paged on the intercom. She knew she was down to minutes. Read more


Heigl to star in movie based on ex-FLDS member's book
Deseret News Originally published Wednesday, June 11, 2008
"Gray's Anatomy" actress Katherine Heigl will star in a feature film adaptation of Carolyn Jessop's best-selling book "Escape," about her life within the Fundamentalist LDS Church. The Hollywood-industry newspaper Variety reported Tuesday that Heigl will also produce the film. Jessop's book, about her life as the fourth wife of FLDS leader Merrill Jessop and her decision to leave the polygamous sect, has been a huge bestseller. It is not the only film in development about the FLDS Church. Variety previously reported that "Stolen Innocence" would be made into a movie. That book was written by Elissa Wall, the witness in the case against FLDS leader Warren Jeffs.




Read part 1 of the Testimony of Carolyn Jessop given at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on "Crimes Associated with Polygamy: The Need for a Coordinated State and Federal Response" held July 24, 2008



Read part 2 of the Testimony of Carolyn Jessop given at the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on "Crimes Associated with Polygamy: The Need for a Coordinated State and Federal Response" held July 24, 2008



Watch the Good Morning America Show featuring Carolyn Jessop broadcast October 29, 2007



Hear the Interview with Carolyn Jessop by Sandra Haros for KTAR 92.3 FM recorded November 26, 2007 in Phoenix, Arizona



Hear the Interview with Polygamist Wife Carolyn Jessop by Terry Ward for KJZZ 91.5 FM recorded November 27, 2007 in Tempe, Arizona



Watch the Good Morning America Show featuring Carolyn Jessop broadcast October 29, 2007

For more information email:

"Religion" is no excuse for committing child abuse

Site Map