Thomas Green : Bigamist gets 5-year term; both DA, defense unhappy

PROVO, Utah -- After his five current wives made desperate pleas to keep him out of prison, Thomas A. Green was sentenced Friday to a relatively light term, five years, for his conviction in June on four counts of bigamy and one count of criminal non-support.

The sentence was half as long as David Leavitt, the Juab County prosecutor, had sought and a fifth of the 25 years Green could have received under state sentencing guidelines -- five years on each charge.

But Judge Guy Burningham, who presided over Green's trial, said he was convinced by a $20,000 check Green gave the court Friday as a down payment on $78,868 he owes the state for helping to support his wives, three of whom are pregnant, and their 26 children living with them.

The sentence seemed to displease both sides. Leavitt left the courtroom without speaking to reporters, and the various Greens, some of them weeping as they had in court, affirmed their belief that their husband was unfairly prosecuted and made subject to laws that they, as polygamists, believed to be wrong.
(...)

The sentencing hearing, like the trial in June, focused on two major elements. The first was Utah law, which outlawed plural marriages in 1896 as a condition of statehood. The second was Green's eagerness to speak publicly about his choice of religion -- Mormon Fundamentalism, which the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints contends does not exist -- and the polygamous life as taught by his church.
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In pronouncing the sentence, Burningham told Green that he had the right to believe what he wanted but that the state had the right to intercede when those beliefs violated the law. ``Religious beliefs,'' the judge told Green, ``are not a defense for a criminal act.''
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Commentary:
Mormonism, which theologically is a cult of Christianity, is a religion built on the fantasies of its founder, Joseph Smith. Its doctrines change according to the whims of its current leaders, who consider themselves to be prophets and apostles. To justify the changes, they suggest God changes his mind.

For an overview of Mormonism's doctrinal changes, see the online book, The Changing World of Mormonism

. Chapter 9

discusses the issue of Plural Marriage.