The Cochise County Attorney’s Office is looking into whether local members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints violated state law by not contacting law enforcement even though they knew a church member was engaging in ongoing sexual behavior with his children, including an infant, the Arizona Daily Independent has learned.

A former youth leader for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, was sentenced this week for possession of child pornography. He was also known to support Tim Ballard and his Operation Underground Railroad, which fights against child sex trafficking. Erick Allen Mosteller, 58, was convicted after pleading guilty to two second-degree felony charges of child sexual exploitation. He was sentenced to 250 days in jail, and up to four years of probation. He was originally charged with 10 counts of sexual exploitation of a child, which was shortened to two counts with the plea deal.  According...

“The polygamists, under Warren Jeffs’s leadership, had about 10,000 followers at the time of his sentencing and were based in an isolated town on the Utah-Arizona border, where many FLDS members still live and practice their faith. The jury heard that he personally had about 78 wives, including 12 whom he married when they were 16, and 12 he married aged 15 or younger.”

Four women, now adults, cried as they detailed how painful it was to watch Carl Matthew Johnson, now 78, live a joyful life while they kept abuse that happened when they were little girls secret for decades. He was arrested last year on charges of abuse dating to the 1980s and 1990s, some of it while he was mayor of West Bountiful, which he led from 1990 until 1997. Johnson pleaded guilty in January to four counts of sexual abuse of a child in a plea deal that resulted in several other charges being dismissed. The judge gave him...

A Sunset man is suing the Boy Scouts of America and the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, alleging sexual abuse by staff members. “I told myself, just hold these cards to your chest one day," said Van Medeiros. "One day, maybe you’ll be able to put them on the table."

Last month, the attorney general of Illinois released the results of a years-long investigation into child sexual abuse by Catholic clergy, revealing 348 more abusers in the state than the church had previously disclosed — and nearly 2,000 child victims.