The FLDS community of Bountiful, B.C., is the “polygamy capital of Canada” – that country’s “dirty secret” where underage marriages and child abuse have gone untouched, according to author and Vancouver Sun columnist Daphne Bramham, who has written extensively about the sect. One ex-member says the number in Boundary County could approach 300. The move into North Idaho by FLDS members began in 2003 after a leadership split in the Canadian community.īy conservative estimates, there are at least a half-dozen polygamous families – about 100 men, women and children – living in Boundary County, even though polygamy is banned by the Idaho Constitution. Two FLDS schools, with some students from Boundary County, get almost $1 million a year from the Canadian government. Their polygamist sect has been living in the southeast corner of British Columbia for almost 60 years without legal challenge by Canadian authorities. They are scheduled to enter not-guilty pleas this week in Creston. Winston Blackmore, 52, and James Oler, 44, who now head factions of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints in Canada, face prison terms if convicted of violating that country’s polygamy laws. The arrests in Canada last month of two fundamentalist Mormon leaders are bringing renewed interest to their polygamous communities near Creston, B.C., and loyal followers living just across the border in Idaho’s Boundary County. In the scenic international border region where Idaho’s Panhandle meets British Columbia, polygamy is a way of life for hundreds – the open secret that’s gone untouched by authorities until now.

Winston blackmore arrested