GRAND MARAIS — Jurors in one of Minnesota’s smallest counties will head to the courthouse next week to hear a case involving two men who have attracted international attention.
On the docket at the Cook County Courthouse is a trial in a lawsuit filed against Warren Jeffs, the infamous leader of a polygamous Mormon sect who is serving a life sentence for child sexual assault. Also named is his younger brother, Seth Jeffs.
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The lawsuit, filed nearly two years ago, stems from Seth’s controversial purchase and sale of a 40-acre property near Grand Marais several years ago. Plans to build on the site never materialized, but his presence in the remote community attracted significant public outcry.
The plaintiff in the case is Elissa Wall, a former member of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, who was forced to marry her cousin at 14 and has spoken out about physical, sexual and emotional abuse suffered in the offshoot sect that she described as a cult.
In 2017, Wall won a $10 million judgment against Warren Jeffs in a Utah court — a sum she has yet to collect from the self-proclaimed prophet who allegedly continues to exert control over the church from a Texas prison cell.
The plaintiff claims in the lawsuit that Seth Jeffs, now 52, obtained the money necessary to purchase the Cook County property from his brother, and argues that she should stand to receive $130,000 — the sum he sold it for in 2023 — to collect against the outstanding judgment.
“In order to conceal their actions, the FLDS and its members, including Warren and Seth Jeffs, operate almost exclusively in cash transactions,” Wall said in an affidavit filed in the case. “Upon information and belief, Seth Jeffs acts as a conduit for funds from Warren Jeffs and his agents.”
But William Paul, the Duluth attorney representing Seth Jeffs, has called the case “weak and frivolous” and said the plaintiff “has not provided to date a scintilla of evidence” that Warren Jeffs had anything to do with the Cook County transaction.
Further, the attorney said he can establish that Seth Jeffs and his company, Emerald Industries, LLC, earned the funds from construction work he was hired to do at a Lutsen cabin.
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“Claims that Seth Jeffs has received money from his incarcerated brother, who’s been incarcerated from 2006, have absolutely no merit,” Paul told the News Tribune, “and we are confident of prevailing at the time of the jury trial.”
Twenty-year legal saga
Warren Jeffs, who inherited control of the FLDS Church after the death of his father in 2002, has faced many allegations of child sexual assault and the arranging of illegal marriages between adult men and underage girls within the community based at the Utah-Arizona border.
The sect, which still practices polygamy despite the mainstream Mormon church banning it in 1890, is also known for its strict dress code and intense secrecy. Warren Jeffs reportedly married as many as 78 wives, some underage, and has more than 60 children.
He first entered the national spotlight around 2004, when his nephew sued him and authored a book about his experience in the sect. In the following years, he was charged in Utah and Arizona with sexual assault and conspiracy related to Wall’s arranged marriage and other crimes.
A national manhunt ensued, and he was placed on the FBI’s "Ten Most Wanted" list alongside Osama bin Laden before he was eventually apprehended in August 2006.
Seth Jeffs was also arrested in Colorado in 2005 on a charge of harboring his fugitive brother. He later pleaded guilty in federal court and was sentenced to three years of probation.
Wall testified in Warren Jeffs’ highly publicized trial and he was found guilty, receiving a 10-year prison term before the Utah Supreme Court overturned the verdict due to flawed jury instructions.
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He was subsequently extradited to Texas to face more serious charges, and was convicted in 2011 of raping two children, 15 and 12. He was handed a life sentence, plus 20 years, and he remains incarcerated in Palestine, Texas.
Seth Jeffs, meanwhile, had another run-in with the law in 2016, when he and 10 other church members Then the leader of an FLDS compound in South Dakota, he later pleaded guilty and was sentenced to the six months he had already served in jail.
Wall authored a book, “Stolen Innocence," about her life, and the sect in recent years has been profiled in documentary miniseries on Peacock, Netflix and Discovery+.
Cook County plans scuttled
Seth Jeffs’ arrival in Cook County in 2018 was not welcomed by residents. He paid $54,000 for the land, 932 Pike Lake Road, about 10 miles west of Grand Marais, and
But in May 2019, who monitor the FLDS Church, landscaping work was
Jeffs, in filings in the ongoing lawsuit, said he completed approximately $400,000 worth of work for a couple at their Lutsen cabin. He said he purchased the land with the intention of building his own family residence because “demand was high for construction” and he wanted to live in the area.
However, he indicated he later abandoned those plans because he “was not able to get any work because of negative publicity.”
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Jeffs closed on the $130,000 sale in August 2023 — just hours before Wall obtained an emergency order from the court in an attempt to prevent the sale. Approximately $60,000 in proceeds remain frozen in Jeffs’ bank account, by court order, pending resolution of the lawsuit.
Wall and her representatives claim Seth Jeffs’ company is one of many that make up a “loosely knit, shadow organization” controlled by Warren Jeffs after the church lost control of its financial arm due to a series of lawsuits.
Wall plans to testify, as does private investigator Sam Brower, who has spent 20 years tracking the Jeffs brothers and the FLDS and has been a consultant and witness for the FBI and other state and federal agencies.
"I have information that leads me to believe that Seth Jeffs and other FLDS leaders were required to locate and acquire properties around the country that were referred to by Warren Jeffs as 'places of hiding' and 'places of refuge,'" Brower said in an affidavit, calling Seth Jeffs a “devoted brother and leader” and a “trusted courier.”
Warren Jeffs, 69, was served with the lawsuit in prison but has not responded to it and has been ruled in default.
Wall and her Grand Marais attorneys, Richard Furlong and Tyson Smith, declined to comment for this story, as did Brower, citing the approaching trial.
Judge orders case to proceed
Paul, the attorney representing Seth Jeffs, sought to have the case dismissed. He said the plaintiff is attempting to shift the burden of proof by making his client establish where he got the money.
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Nonetheless, Jeffs has asserted in a court filing: “I purchased the property with my own money from work I had done, primarily home construction.” And his defense has submitted a copy of a $62,000 check he received for the Lutsen work shortly before purchasing the property, along with other work orders.
Judge Nicole Hopps, however, said there are material issues of fact to be decided by a jury. She noted Wall’s affidavit, which “credibly states that Seth Jeffs was not employed for several years during the underlying case and judgment and admitted to being a middle-man for Warren Jeffs to obfuscate assets.”
Seth Jeffs has acknowledged not having a paying job from 2007 to 2016, with any bills covered by the church. Wall’s attorneys have also cited old ledgers from the church showing cash transfers to him, and questioned the proceeds reported by his company in 2018.
In a pretrial order, Hopps ruled that evidence of Jeffs’ religious affiliation is admissible, but specific practices such as polygamy are not. She said the jury can hear about his fraud case, but his conviction for harboring his brother is too old to be admitted under court rules.
The trial is slated to begin Tuesday and may continue through the end of the week.
Seth Jeffs is now living in Menomonie, Wisconsin, according to court documents.
He stated in a deposition that he didn’t have any contact with his brother from 2016 until 2023, but started writing monthly letters to prison to “let him know now how we're doing as a family, and expressing our love and appreciation for him.” He said he never received a response.
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As for his prophet brother’s “revelations,” he said he continues to follow “as well as I possibly can.”
The Trust Project
