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Polygamous sect leader Samuel Bateman faces sentencing for Arizona child abuse
Already serving 50 years in federal prison, Bateman was convicted in state court after three young girls were found inside an unventilated trailer in 2022.
The short version
- Polygamous sect leader Samuel Bateman is scheduled to be sentenced in Arizona on state child abuse convictions.
- The charges stem from an August 2022 traffic stop where three girls, aged 11 to 14, were found trapped inside an unventilated trailer.
- Bateman is already serving a 50-year federal prison sentence for child sex crimes and kidnapping schemes.
Key facts
- Samuel Bateman is scheduled to be sentenced on Tuesday in Arizona for three state child abuse convictions.[Associated Press]
- The charges arose from an August 2022 traffic stop in Flagstaff, Arizona, where authorities discovered three girls aged 11 to 14 inside an unventilated trailer without air conditioning or seat belts.[Associated Press]
- Each child abuse conviction carries a mandatory state prison sentence of four to eight years, which the judge can order to be served consecutively or concurrently.[Associated Press]
- Bateman is currently serving a 50-year federal sentence for federal sex crimes involving children and planning to kidnap girls from protective custody.[Associated Press]
- Bateman led a small offshoot of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and previously claimed to have over 20 'spiritual wives,' including 10 girls under 18.[Associated Press]
What remains uncertain
- It is undetermined whether the state judge will order the child abuse sentences to run concurrently or consecutively with each other, or relative to Bateman's federal sentence.[Associated Press]