A polygamous sect leader featured in Netflix’s Trust Me: The False Prophet is set to be sentenced Tuesday after three girls were rescued from harrowing conditions inside an unventilated trailer.
Samuel Bateman, 50, is already serving a 50-year federal prison sentence for orchestrating sex involving children. In a separate case, he was convicted of three counts of child abuse stemming from an August 2022 traffic stop in Flagstaff.
Someone had tipped off authorities after seeing small fingers reaching through gaps in the doors of a trailer. Three girls, ages 11 to 14, were found inside the trailer, which had a makeshift toilet, sofa and camping chairs and lacked air conditioning and seat belts.
Each count carries a mandatory sentence between four and eight years. A judge will have discretion to run the counts consecutively or concurrently.
Samuel Bateman’s previous conviction
Bateman, a self-proclaimed prophet, previously claimed to have more than 20 “spiritual wives,” including 10 girls under the age of 18. His small group was an offshoot of the polygamous sect once led by Warren Jeffs.
He is currently serving 50 years in federal prison for coercing girls as young as 9 to submit to sex acts with him and other adults, and for scheming to kidnap girls from protective custody.
In the state case, Bateman admitted he knew the girls were in a hot trailer for hours and that the ventilation wasn’t good but he downplayed the conditions.
Bateman isn’t a lawyer yet represented himself at trial. He claimed he thought the girls had gotten out when they stopped.
He said he was as “shocked as could possibly be” when he learned that they were still inside when he was pulled over.
Federal authorities said Bateman traveled extensively between Arizona, Utah, Colorado and Nebraska as he built an offshoot network of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which historically has been based in the neighboring communities of Colorado City, Arizona, and Hildale, Utah.
He and his followers practiced polygamy, a legacy of the early teachings of the mainstream Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, which abandoned the practice in 1890 and now strictly prohibits it.
Bateman was one of the trusted followers of Jeffs, who previously led the sect and is serving a life sentence in Texas for sexual assault of children.
The influence of the polygamous sect has waned significantly over time in the towns where it has historically been based. In 2017, a court order placed the towns under supervision, excising the church from their governments and shared police department.
The area has since transformed so quickly that the towns were released from court-ordered supervision last summer, almost two years earlier than expected. Practicing sect members are now believed to account for only a small percentage of the towns’ populations.
