All language subtitles for D.o.t.C.S01E01.Blood.Atonement.1080p.DSNP.WEB-DL.DDP5.1.H.264-MADSKY_track5_[eng]

[♪ suspenseful music playing]

I was 13 years old the day
I escaped my father's cult,

a violent polygamist cult.

[music continues]

My hands are sweating now
just talking about it.

Um, I'm shaking.

[exhales]

There was a little phone
in the hallway.

And I quietly
called my sister.

The last thing I heard her say
was "start walking."

I walked out of the house with
just the clothes on my back.

It was very frightening
because I knew

if somebody saw me,
that was the end.

[♪ dramatic music]

I felt like I had one chance,

one chance to get out of there.

[music continues]

I didn't see Anna
for three years.

I was fully convinced that
we were God's chosen people.

And even losing my sister
could not shake my faith.

Our father, Ervil LeBaron,
was the leader

of a fundamentalist
Mormon religious cult.

It blows my mind.

I sit and think,
this is impossible.

And yet it did happen.

If-if I hadn't lived through it,

I don't know
if I could believe it.

Our family was killing people...

Because of our father.

For many of you, Ervil LeBaron
is probably an enigma.

Who is he,
and why should we even care?

[reporter 1]
Ervil LeBaron, self-styled

prophet and patriarch.

[reporter 2] Ervil LeBaron
believed in the use of force

to govern members
of his sect of polygamists.

Our dad controlled everything.

The adults obeyed.

The children,
of course, had to obey.

[reporter 3] LeBaron
and his polygamist

fanatic cult are suspects
in a string of slayings.

[reporter 4] Ervil came to be
known as the Mormon Manson.

Our father is responsible for
the deaths of over 30 people.

[reporter 5]
The killings escalated

into a reign of terror.

[reporter 6]
He's claimed he has the right

to kill anyone he wishes

upon orders from God.

[♪ theme music]

[♪ suspenseful music]

We were born good.

Goodness was in us.

And that had to be suppressed
for a while.

When I think about my siblings,

um, everything
they've had to overcome,

all the sons and daughters
of Ervil LeBaron

that survived have
had to pick up the pieces,

the shattered pieces
of their life,

and put the pieces
back together.

Hi!

Many of my siblings are
afraid to tell their stories,

and I don't blame them.

[Celia] We're afraid.

We're doing this afraid,

afraid of the judgment

that we could get from the world

because of having been
raised in those beliefs

and who our father was.

[sighs] I love you.

[Anna] I'm so glad to see you.

I am ready now
to step forward and show

what it is like to be a LeBaron.

[♪ suspenseful music]

[Celia] Okay. Don't be looking
at my cards, Faye.

[Faye] I'm gonna beat you,
don't worry.

You win because you cheat.
We already know this.

I do... No, we...
No, I don't cheat.

This is an established fact.

[Faye]
That is a lie. I do not cheat.

Celia and I were
the most devout.

[Anna] Well, you're still
the most devout.

I always wanted to do
what was right, honey.

I never would do something
that I knew was wrong.

Oh, I was a very
devout true believer.

I thought with all my heart

that I was doing what was right.

And that I thought we were the
only true church on the Earth.

Yes, I was totally devout.

I would never think
of not following instructions.

You wanted to be good,
but did you

always believe in the doctrine

that was being taught
and that was the true church?

- [Faye] I totally believed it.
- You always believed that too?

Yep. And in fact,
I am more devout than you.

You probably are.

Because my very first
actual romantic kiss

was with the man I married.

[Faye] Celia takes the cake.

On the other end
of the spectrum...

[laughter]

Was me, who never believed.

I was born into a cult, and...

that's all I ever knew till...

till I was about 16.

I mean, we were trained to obey
and demanded to obey.

And I got beaten a lot
because I didn't.

All my siblings... were raised
from birth with this very,

very closed-minded way
of thinking.

We were indoctrinated
from birth.

And it was absolute
brainwashing.

Our father is God's
mouthpiece here on Earth.

My dad could convince people
of just about anything.

And did.

We were supposed to be special.

We were supposed to be
the chosen ones.

If we were so chosen,
why were we suffering so badly?

[♪ instrumental music]

Our dad had thirteen wives
and fathered...

- Supposedly.
- Thirt... Fourteen!

It's fourteen,
we counted finally.

I actually don't know how many
brothers and sisters I have,

and it depends on
how you count.

Um...

What was the question again?

Oh, gosh.

51 children.

52 kids?

I say 51.

- No. 55 total.
- Of our father.

It's impossible,
somebody just needs to count,

and I've never taken
the time to count.

We just say
over 50 children because

nobody really knows
the exact number.

People will come up
with different numbers

depending on
different circumstances.

Polygamous math is hard.

[♪ instrumental music]

[Anna] All of Ervil's followers,
his children,

his wives... were just pawns.

He used them and groomed them
to kill for him.

He was a wanted man.

[Anna] How many people
in America can say

their house has been raided
by the FBI multiple times?

We're not proud of this fact,
by the way, just to be clear.

No, but it's,
it's part of our story.

It's part of the reason
why we're sitting here.

Because this was our life.
This was what we lived.

My only recollections
of life as a child...

it was being on the run
from the law.

Of course, I didn't know
we were on the run from the law.

My father, Ervil,
led his children...

down a very destructive path...

that I don't think...
naturally...

any one of us
would have gone down.

Really good people
were led to do terrible things.

[reporter 7] Police are
still looking for two women

who murdered
a Utah polygamist leader.

[reporter 8] It's a history
of family violence,

vicious killing,
murders in the name of God.

In order to understand
our family history,

you do have to go back
to Mexico.

I was born in Colonia LeBaron,
Chihuahua, Mexico.

[indistinct chatter]

My mother went
into labor with me.

She called the midwife.

She took the mattress
off of the floor

and put it
on the kitchen table.

Celia was born
on the kitchen table.

[♪ instrumental music]

[Celia] In this house,
there was no running water.

In order to get water,

we had to pump it
out of a well.

And we would have
a big galvanized tub

that we would bathe in
once a week.

She would start
with the little kids

and go up and bathe us all in,

I think, the same water.

It was very primitive.
We didn't have a lot.

We never wore shoes.
We didn't have electricity.

The closest town to the colony
was, like, an hour away.

The colony was very isolated.

We didn't leave it hardly ever.

I don't ever remember thinking,
"Oh, I've got a horrible life,"

or anything like that.

I just thought
I was serving God.

[Celia] My father, Ervil,

along with his brother,
Uncle Joel,

they established
the Church of the Firstborn

of the Fulness of Times.

[Anna]
They were establishing Zion,

a gathering place for people

who wanted to practice
the law of plural marriage

because polygamy
is illegal in America.

The original teachings
of Joseph Smith,

there's the terrestrial...

- No. [laughs]
- The telestial...

- Terrestrial, and celestial.
- She never knew the religion.

- I knew enough.
- [Celia] No, we--

Okay, we'll let her explain it
since she knows so much more.

Yes. There's also, uh,
three degrees of glory,

which is telestial, terrestrial,
and celestial.

And in order to attain
the celestial level in heaven,

you had to live plural marriage.

If you were just
a monogamous husband and wife,

you could not attain celestial
glory in the afterlife.

[Lindsay] So there was sort of
an excitement in their doctrine.

It wasn't just,
live the tenets of Mormonism,

but follow Joel and Ervil,

and they're going to unite
the entire house of God

because Jesus is coming soon.

Joel was what they call
the One Mighty and Strong.

In the Book of Mormon,
they talk about

the One Mighty and Strong.

The man who was
going to save the world.

[Celia]
And Joel was given the mantle

from his father originally,
and Ervil accepted him.

[Lindsay] Joel is gonna be
the head of the church.

Ervil is gonna be
in the supporting role.

And together,
they're gonna usher in

the second coming of Jesus.

Uncle Joel and Ervil,
they're very close in age,

and they loved each other.

They had a tight brotherhood
between them.

I was born
in Chihuahua, Mexico,

south of the El Paso border
in the LeBaron colony.

[♪ folksy music]

I'm the daughter
of Verlan LeBaron...

Brother of Joel and Ervil.

He was the baby of the family.

My father ended up
fathering 58 children

with eight of his ten wives.

Verlan was the third most
powerful person in the church

behind Joel and Ervil.

He was there to support them

in building up
the Kingdom of God.

Uncle Joel, the prophet,
was more revered than Jesus.

We all just adored him.

Joel is sort of laid back.
He's quiet. He listens.

Ervil's the opposite
of all of those things.

[Celia]
Ervil was the big talker.

He knew scripture
inside and out.

He was highly intelligent,
charismatic.

Ervil is really handsome.

They call it
Hollywood good looks.

And people that met him
said he had a way about him,

this sort of confidence

and this swagger
when he would talk.

[Anna] Ervil was going out
and preaching and teaching

and bringing people
to the colony

so that they could settle
this arid desert land.

Every time Ervil
would convert somebody,

that's another person
who can earn money

and pay their tithes.

I was born and raised
in Mormon fundamentalist cult.

My mother was Ervil
and Joel LeBaron's sister.

My father
was a mainstream Mormon,

and he was converted,
moved to Colonia LeBarón.

His money, a lot of it
was going to help support,

especially,
Uncle Ervil's family,

and that's how
faithful my father was.

My Uncle Ervil,
I saw him convert people.

He knew
how to read people's eyes.

And he studied
till he saw that snap

that showed that
they had been converted.

He was really busy at the time

building his brother
Joel's church,

but little by little,

the more money
that was brought in,

the more Uncle Ervil
enjoyed his power.

[Donna]
He had this real nice gold car.

My mom and a bunch of people,
they used to refer to it

as the Golden Calf.

I never saw him
work a day in his life.

A lot of people had
a big problem with the fact

that Ervil wasn't working
and lifting a finger

to support
his always-growing family.

It was creating this
very untenable situation.

Uncle Ervil,
he started having

all kinds of
revelations and claims.

We had a prophet.

You would think the prophet
should be the one

having the revelations,

but Ervil's having revelations

for everybody...

who to marry,

predicting the end
of the world,

all kinds of crazy stuff.

[Stephany] He started ranting
hellfire damnation.

This was not
what Joel was teaching.

Uncle Ervil was
learning more and more

how to control his flock.

[♪ instrumental music]

[Celia] My mother,
Anna Mae, was living

with her husband, Nephi.

And there was a preacher
in town.

He came to the home.

And that first evening
she heard him speak,

she was smitten
by this tall, handsome,

highly intelligent man.

Anna Mae left Nephi
without a word of warning.

This was the first time
that Ervil

took another man's wife
as his own,

but it was not the last.

My mom had 12 children,
um, 7 of them with Ervil.

My mom married my stepdad
Ervil when I was two years old

'cause Ervil had
the power to separate people

if they weren't married
to the right person.

So in order
to make my dad happy,

'cause he was
still in the church,

um, Ervil says, "Okay, I'll
give you, uh, two other wives."

"And I'll give them
to you for wives

because I took your wife."

Everybody hated that Ervil
wanted all the wives.

Ervil has now stolen
another man's wife.

And this really causes a sort
of friction in the community.

[Celia] Joel always
wanted to believe

that Ervil would get
back in line.

It's the people
that were following Joel

who wanted him
to rein Ervil in.

And Ervil wouldn't
be reined in.

[Lindsay] So Joel,
he tells his brother,

you're out of control.
You're excommunicated.

[Scott] There's so much
tension going on.

And this rift between
Joel and Ervil

is getting so wide
that finally, Joel,

he decides
he's just gonna go elsewhere.

Joel and his
younger brother Verlan

continue to run the church

out of a town called
Los Molinos in Mexico.

We had then
what was called the Joelites

and the Ervilites.

My father, Ervil,
starts his own church.

And he calls it
the Church of the Lamb of God.

Joel's church,
the Church of the Firstborn,

had close to 1,000 followers.

And when Ervil
is excommunicated,

he takes only about
125 followers.

Ervil wanted
all of Joel's followers

to bend the knee to him
and give him their tithe money.

[Celia] Ervil decides that Joel
is then a false prophet

and that Ervil is actually

the true Prophet
of God on Earth.

And you can only have
one true Prophet on the Earth.

We have a very,
very serious problem.

[♪ intense music]

[Lindsay]
There's an old Mormon doctrine

called Blood Atonement
that the mainstream church

no longer adheres to.

Ervil loved this idea.
He was obsessed with it.

And he decided to incorporate
it into his practices.

He taught the law of
Blood Atonement just as it was.

- Yes.
- Hold on.

Blood Atonement is
the taking of someone's life

so that their blood
can hit the ground

and cry to God for atonement.

Meaning they have to be killed.

[Stephany] Uncle Ervil started
saying comments like, well,

"Some of your husbands, if they
don't start getting behind me

and doing what they should
and paying their tithing,

they are going to be pushing up
carrots in the garden."

It set off, uh,
an intuition in my mind

that pretty soon, Uncle Ervil
was going to actually

start killing people.

[Lindsay] He starts bringing in
guns to the community.

They start practicing
military drills.

He starts training children
on how to shoot machine guns.

[Scott] Ervil's building
his own little militia.

And Dan Jordan is kind of his
drill sergeant or his general.

And he's-he's creating
this little shock troop

of-of soldiers
to do his bidding for him.

[Celia] Dan was part
of Ervil's inner circle

from the very beginning.

He was, uh, very impatient,
very brutal.

He was a taskmaster.

In my opinion, Dan Jordan was
a pretty despicable human being.

He treated us horribly.

And he did things
to me and my family

and my siblings
that are unconscionable.

[Faye] Ervil would promise his
daughters to different people

that he wanted to impress
and to come into the fold.

And-and I think
be loyal to him.

When I was 15,
my mom came and told me that

Ervil had a revelation
that I was supposed to marry

Dan Jordan.
And he was 42.

I was a virgin.
I was very scared.

He already had wives.

But I knew I had to do it.

I had to marry him with
one of my other stepsisters.

We were both being married
the same night,

so I'm like, "Oh, maybe at least
I don't have to

spend the first night with him."

Dan decided that
he was going to flip a coin

to see who would spend
the first night with him.

And in my heart, I'm like, "Oh,
my gosh, I hope it's not me."

"I hope it's not me."

Then, thank goodness,
it landed on not mine.

But I ended up having
four children with him.

I've had several
polygamous relationships.

I still believe
in the principle, let's say.

I think it's going to be
lived in another time.

I think God is a polygamist.

[♪ instrumental music]

From the time
we were little kids,

we were told that
Ervil was a prophet.

He would get revelations.

And we didn't question
what Ervil said.

If he said it, we did it.

They feel like
they are fighting God's war.

He raised us to be like him.

He raised us all
with a gun in our hands

from the time
we were very young.

[Donna] Ervil and Dan went off
the deep end together.

They had already made
some serious threats.

They were just feeding each
other with all this hate.

One day, all of us
Church of the Firstborners

of the Fulness of Times
were gathered

at our weekly Sunday school...

[♪ tense music]

When all of the sudden,
in walks Dan Jordan.

And one of the adults
whispered to the next,

he's got a gun on him.

[Celia] Joel and Verlan,
his brothers,

were saying,
Ervil, he talks big.

Um, his bark is bigger
than his bite.

And his followers were growing
more and more afraid,

saying it sounds like
they might.

[Lindsay]
So Ervil tells his followers,

listen, they're not
following me.

And if they're not
following me,

they're being wicked.
And what do we do to the wicked?

The scriptures say
we kill them.

And that's what
we're gonna do.

[♪ tense music]

[Lindsay] Joel LeBaron
is in Ensenada, Mexico.

Joel is lured away
by Dan Jordan

and another follower of Ervil
to an abandoned shack.

And now the plan is working.

Joel is alone.

And he has no idea
what's gonna happen next.

[♪ intense music]

Dan and his henchman,

they took a chair leg
and beat Joel senseless.

And then Dan
puts a gun in his mouth

and pulled the trigger.

[gunshot]

And this is
the ultimate betrayal.

Joel has been assassinated

by the people
he once trusted the most.

[♪ instrumental music]

We were just in shock
and devastated.

This was our prophet,
someone that we loved,

that we, uh, you know, revered.

From that moment on,
it was like,

if he's capable of
murdering his own brother,

he'll kill anyone
and all of us.

[♪ suspenseful music]

Ervil LeBaron
lived in this house.

He was second in command

of the Church of the Firstborn.

Now he's become its scourge.

[reporter 9] Joel, who emerged
as head of their church,

was murdered.

And Ervil became a fugitive,

charged with being
behind the murder of Joel.

And what started Ervil
on the move

from missionary
to accused murderer.

[reporter 10] Ervil LeBaron
and his brother Joel

split over
their religious philosophy.

[reporter 11] The church,
a peace-loving offshoot

of Mormonism,
was founded by Joel LeBaron.

[reporter 12] A church
that was based in Mexico

where there were no laws
governing polygamy.

Let me read
from the official police report

about what happened.

"Joel F. LeBaron was attacked

in an empty home,
hit over the bridge of the nose

with a chair leg,

and shot through the head
on the ground

by Daniel B. Jordan."

[reporter 13]
Today, Joel is dead,

murdered at Ervil's command.

Cain versus Abel,

and now the LeBarons
against one another.

[♪ instrumental music]

Here's what
I'm curious about is,

did you know any of this
was going on?

No, I always felt very blessed
'cause I had no idea

any of it was going on.

So you didn't know that people
were being blood atoned?

[Faye] No, I had no idea people
were being blood atoned.

You were married to Dan,
but you didn't know he had--

[Faye] I didn't know,
he never talked to me

about murdering anybody.

I never knew any of this
stuff was taking place.

I never dreamed that
he would kill someone.

I did not even know
he had anything to do with it.

- Faye--
- I heard that it wasn't him.

But I will say
that the whole time

our father was carrying out
blood atonements...

- Dan was right there beside him.
- [Faye] Oh, yeah.

I'm sure he knew about them.
He was his right hand man.

He would have had
to know about it.

He'd have had to
know everything.

[Faye] I generally
was a very obedient wife.

And Dan yelled
and screamed at everybody

when they weren't doing
what they were supposed to.

That's how cults work.
They work by fear and control.

And that's the way it was,
they controlled everything

and we just went
right along with it.

Members of Joel's church
had told the authorities

that it was Ervil
behind the attacks.

We heard that
one of Joel's followers

saw Dan Jordan with Joel
shortly before he was killed.

[Lindsay] Baja Police
start asking questions,

investigating,
searching for Ervil.

This fear and this terror
of this crazy Mormon prophet

is compounded by the fact that

they don't know
where Ervil is.

They can't find him.

Meanwhile, Dan Jordan
and the other assailant

are nowhere to be found.

Ervil was sort of like
Pablo Escobar.

I'm gonna move a lot
and move to different places.

I'm not gonna let people know,
I'm just gonna show up

and keep moving
and moving and moving.

And I think that's
one of the reasons he had

a couple places in Mexico
and several places in, um,

uh, in the States
that he could go to.

I believe Ervil was
both paranoid and smart.

It's smart to keep
moving around.

If they can't fix you,
they can't find you.

[♪ instrumental music]

One of the houses we lived in
had a little crawlspace door.

No, no, no. That was the house
we lived in for, like, a month.

But we only lived there maybe

a couple of weeks,
and then we got loaded up.

And it was pitch black.
It was middle of the night.

Middle of the night, get in
the car, and then drive...

- 'Cause Ervil had a revelation!
- [Anna] Oh, my gosh.

They were trying to take
his children from him.

- Right.
- Yeah, yeah.

[♪ tense music]

[Celia] Our father would get
an inspiration or a revelation

and move people around like,
like chess pieces.

[♪ instrumental music]

[Anna] My mom would come
and go a lot.

That was normal for us
for people to leave and be gone

and then come back,
and then they were here again.

We probably lived
at 10 or 15 different houses

by the time
I was ten years old.

We lived in homes
in California,

in Houston, in Mexico, Dallas...

- Denver.
- In Oklahoma, in Denver.

We never got to feel
settled anywhere.

You'd imagine
if you're gonna move

with your child, you're gonna
kind of talk to them

in advance and
let them kind of prepare for it.

There was none of that in our,
growing up.

[♪ instrumental music]

[Celia] As children, we didn't
understand what was going on.

We just knew we had to
move all the time.

Now as adults,
we look back on it,

and we understand it's because

we were on the run
from the FBI.

[♪ suspenseful music]

[Anna] We were awakened up

in the middle of the night
one night,

told not to ask any questions.

It was all hush-hush,
urgent tones, and scary.

We were just told...

[whispering]
"Quickly, put on your shoes.

Don't ask any questions."

We are told
to gather your things.

[Celia] And it was time
to move again.

And you don't know exactly
where or exactly why.

[Anna] We walk outside.

And there's this truck.

And we're confused.

An older brother of ours
was the one who was in charge

of getting all these kids
into the back of this truck.

And he's like,
"Shut up and get in.

We're doing this
for God's Kingdom."

You don't argue.
You just do what you're told.

[Celia] And then the door
rumbled closed.

[Anna] And we're left
in pitch black.

We arrive in the morning.

[Celia] We were in Denver.

We moved into a green house.

In total, there were
3 wives and 20 children

that lived
in a 1500 square foot home.

We couldn't have
the landlords know.

Or nosy neighbors...

- [Celia] Yeah.
- [Anna] Reporting us.

We were in hiding.

We were not allowed
to play outside.

We had to stay indoors.

Everything was secret.

We were taught
a distrust for police,

for FBI,
for any kind of authority.

They were instruments of Satan.

If they were to ask us
any questions,

we were literally trained
to say, "I don't know."

What is your name?
"I don't know."

Are you hungry?
"I don't know."

Where did your dad go?
"I don't know."

So we were taught to conceal

the polygamous lifestyle
that we lived.

So do you remember
how many people

we had living in that house
at the time?

- A lot.
- So we had three wives...

And we had
all of their children.

- There were 20 children.
- [Hyrum] Wow.

And three women living
in a 1500 square foot house.

I drove by that house.

I drove past it,
and I was like, "Oh, wow.

That's the one that had the
little dark room in the back

where they hid all the guns."

Which dark room in the back
with all the guns?

- [Celia] What?
- Yeah, so they wouldn't want--

He's the only one
that remembers.

What dark room
with all the guns?

What?

[Lindsay] Just four months
after the murder

of Joel LeBaron,

Ervil takes matters
into his own hands.

With the confidence only

the One Mighty and Strong
would have,

he walks into the police
station in Ensenada,

and demands the charges
against him be dropped.

Ervil sat in jail for about
a year... awaiting trial.

When Ervil was in jail
for murdering

his brother Joel,
my Uncle Joel,

my mother would take
Ervil food.

[indistinct chatter]

There was a guard
outside the door,

a bunk bed in his cell...

A blanket thrown
over the top bunk

to shield the bottom bunk.

And... I guess they got it on,

and I was conceived
in an Ensenada jail.

[♪ instrumental music]

[Scott] Ervil is put on trial.

He's found guilty of being

the intellectual author
of the murder.

He sentenced to 12 years
in prison in Mexico.

And then the next day,
he's released

by a higher court
on a technicality...

a supposed technicality.

So he walks.

Bribery was a big thing
in Mexico.

That's, it was a way of life.

And Uncle Ervil
played that well.

He had grown up knowing how to
manipulate and bribe people.

[Donna] It was very,
very disheartening

that he had been
released from jail.

It made his followers probably
think, yeah, God's behind this.

Certainly in Ervil's mind
and probably in the minds

of his followers, the fact that
he was able to beat this charge

and-and walk away,
it was just further proof

that he was the One Mighty
and Strong Prophet.

Because not many people
can get away with murder.

[Lindsay] Ervil is just
getting warmed up.

He is developing more power,
more money, more women,

more guns, more followers.

So after Joel,
our prophet was murdered,

my father, Verlan LeBaron,

was left as president
of the church.

We lived in Los Molinos
at the time.

Verlan knew that
taking Joel's place

would put him
in a position of danger.

He knew that
he was a threat to Ervil.

He knows he's in the crosshairs
of Ervil and Ervil's gunmen.

Ervil's desperate,
desperate to kill Verlan.

[Donna] My dad wasn't safe
anymore. None of us were safe.

We were sitting ducks

if they wanted to come in
and murder us.

[Lindsay] So it's a quiet night
the day after Christmas.

Los Molinos seems quiet.
The desert is quiet.

[♪ intense music]

When it's interrupted
by the shrieks

and terror of an explosion.

[screaming]

The tower is on fire.
It bursts into flames.

[Donna] All the people
in town started running

to help put the fire out.

Once everyone gathered there,
they opened fire.

And then they proceeded
to go through town

shooting at every house
they passed,

filling the homes with bullets,

and throwing Molotov cocktail
bombs on top of the roofs.

[glass shattering]

[screaming]

[Lindsay]
Women and children, mothers

with their nursing babies

are running
from burning buildings

and being picked off
with guns.

People are screaming,
running in terror.

They don't know where
the violence is coming from.

They're firing on their family
members, their relatives.

These are people
they had known and loved

and gone to church with.

[Lindsay]
24 homes had been burned down.

The place had been firebombed.

People were injured
by gunfire.

Two were dead.

This was just a bloody,
terrible massacre.

There was a big shootout
down near Ensenada, Mexico.

There was a split-off
polygamist group.

[reporter 14] Every home
in the village was firebombed

or simply burned.
Two men died.

Nineteen other people
were critically injured.

The Los Molinos raid
was just Ervil

getting back at...
at Joel's followers.

Verlan was supposed
to be there, but he was not.

He kept moving around
'cause he knew

Ervil was trying to kill him.

They caught everybody
off guard.

I mean, they took it
to the next level

of trying to burn us down
and kill people.

None of these murders happened
without Ervil's say-so.

But he always made sure
to be physically

well away from them.

[♪ suspenseful music]

This is part of
his brilliance...

as a criminal mastermind,
really.

He had his followers,
his young men and women,

carry out the attack.

And he was nowhere in the area.

[♪ folksy music]

[Anna]
We were living in Denver.

We had a revolving door
of other sister wives,

older siblings tending us.

Two people that we really
loved were Rena and Ramona.

Ramona was our oldest sister
from our mother.

And she was like
a second mama to me.

[Celia] Ramona was married

to Dan Jordan.

She married him
when she was 17.

She had a little bit
of a rebellious streak in her.

I remember a tomato plant
that she grew,

and it actually was pot, so.

[both laugh]

Rena Chynoweth was

Ervil's youngest wife.

She was his 13th wife.

Rena was maybe 16.

She was still a teenager
when she married Ervil.

We had no way of
knowing how much darkness

she had already endured
by the time she was 16.

Well, he'd been after me
since I was about 12 years old.

Of course, they start early,
pursuing the girls

at a very young age
in polygamous societies.

He wasn't the only one,
but he was very persistent.

I didn't want anything
to do with him in that respect.

I-I felt respect for him
as a leader and as a prophet,

but I didn't want
anything to do with him.

I did not want to marry him.

When you're 12 years old,
you're pretty impressionable,

especially when this big,
tall, important man comes up

and says,
you're supposed to be my wife,

and God has told me so.

And so for a year
or so there, I...

I believed him.

And during that time,
he sexually molested me.

Later on, I, I rebelled
against the idea

that I was
going to marry this man.

And, uh, but by the time
I was 16, this was...

the division of the church
had already taken place.

Um, when I was 16,
he forced me to marry him.

[♪ tense music]

Of course, that was
a revelation from Ervil

that Rena had to marry him.

So conveniently,
that's the revelation he got.

The only way
you can actually make sure

that these girls will be
compliant to marry old men

is to get them before
they're fully sexually mature,

and to get them
before they actually

have a mind of their own.

- It was creepy old men...
- It was.

Marrying very young,
underage girls for sex.

Yeah.

Ramona was also coerced
into marrying Dan Jordan.

Ervil wasn't just grooming

Rena and Ramona
to become wives.

He was grooming them
to become killers for God.

[Scott] In his campaign to try
to kill his brother Verlan,

Ervil settled on this new idea.

He was keeping the paranoia
going.

We have to buy weapons
and we have to get ready to

fulfill these prophecies.

Ervil announced
that God had told him

there was another
couple of people

that had to be eliminated.

And, uh, that's when I first
heard the name Rulon Allred.

I had never heard
of the man before.

Ervil explained
that he was the leader

of a rival polygamist group,

that this man was leading
his people astray,

and God wanted him
out of the way.

My father was perceived
to be a prophet of God.

He felt that
he was representing the Lord

to his family
and to his followers.

He had 48 children
with his 7 wives.

He was also
a naturopathic physician.

Even though polygamy was
illegal in the United States

at that time, there were still
fundamentalist prophets

who had large followings,
like Rulon Allred,

who was running his church
out of Salt Lake City.

[Scott] Rulon Allred, even
though he lived very modestly,

a lot of money was coming in
to Allred's church.

And I think that,
that Ervil was...

cast a covetous eye
to that money.

Cast a covetous eye to
the size of, uh, Allred's flock.

There was some jealousy
there because my father was

a very respected,
influential person

and had a huge following.

And Ervil wanted that
devotion for himself.

To Ervil's belief,
he was the only prophet.

Anyone else who said they were
was a false prophet.

Ervil's gonna
take over the world.

[Scott] Once Ervil decided
he had to kill Rulon,

he called together
his top lieutenants.

And they had a meeting
where Ervil announced

he'd had
a new divine revelation.

He commanded people
to be executed

and-or threatened
to execute anyone

that didn't agree with him.

It got pretty scary.

He said we need two women.

Who do you think we should send?

[Lindsay] According to Rena,
Ervil makes two women,

his wife Rena Chynoweth

and his stepdaughter
Ramona Marston,

go kill Rulon Allred.

In our cult,
you had to do what Ervil said

because if you didn't,
it put a target on your back.

You were in danger
for your own life.

I was shaking really bad

because I was thinking ahead of
what

I was supposed to do that day.

And I remember
just being absolutely terrified.

I was motivated to do what he
wanted done

because I didn't want to

be punished.

And I...

did what I was supposed to do.

[♪ theme music]