Ark. officials seize 6 Alamo compound children

LITTLE ROCK Arkansas child welfare officials seized six more children Wednesday from the Tony Alamo Christian Ministries as authorities in California visited another church compound, officials said.

Julie Munsell, a spokeswoman for the Arkansas Department of Human Services, declined to say where or how the children were taken into state custody.

The children will be placed in state foster homes, pending future court hearings.

All the children will undergo screenings to ensure their mental and physical health, Munsell said.

"I believe they are all in general good health, just like the others were," Munsell told The Associated Press.

With Wednesday's operation, state officials have seized 32 children associated with the jailed evangelist's ministries over stories of alleged beatings and sexual abuse.

Alamo, 74, remains held without bond on charges that violated the Mann Act, a federal law that bans carrying women or girls across state lines for "prostitution or debauchery, or for any other immoral purpose."

Alamo, who has said "consent is puberty" when it comes to sex with young girls, has pleaded not guilty to the federal charges. The evangelist has blamed his prosecution on a federal push to legalize same-sex marriage while outlawing polygamy, as well as a Vatican-led conspiracy and drug-abusing ex-followers.

In California, child welfare officials went to the ministry's compound in Santa Clarita, said Louise Grasmehr, a spokeswoman for the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services. Alamo and his wife Susan were street preachers along Hollywood's Sunset Strip in 1966 before forming a commune near the city just north of Los Angeles.

Grasmehr said no children were taken into state custody during the Wednesday morning visit. She said officials went to the compound after the California Department of Social Services passed along information it received from Arkansas officials.

"Since there were no children there, we left," Grasmehr said.

Civil orders issued in Arkansas to place children in protective custody don't carry legal authority in other states, Munsell has said. That means parents who attend Alamo's churches could spirit their children to other states to avoid them being taken.

On Nov. 18, state officials took 20 children from the ministries, the majority of them found in two vans that were stopped on a state highway near the Texas border.

However, child welfare officials in other states can seize children and conduct their own investigations. Munsell declined to say what information Arkansas has shared with other states.

Alamo is said to have ministries and business operations in a number of states, including Colorado, New Jersey, Oklahoma and Tennessee.

John Wesley Hall Jr., a Little Rock lawyer representing Alamo, said he had not heard about child welfare officials going to the Santa Clarita compound.

The morning after a Sept. 20 raid on Alamo's compound in southwest Arkansas, FBI agents visited the Santa Clarita ministry with child welfare officials but took no children.

"They could have just been there to pay a social visit, who knows?" Hall said.

Since establishing his ministries in Arkansas, Alamo has been a controversial and flamboyant figure, with former President Clinton once likening him to "Roy Orbison on speed."

The Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks hate groups, describes the ministry as a cult that rails against homosexuals, Roman Catholics and the government.

Alamo was convicted of tax-related charges in 1994 and served four years in prison after the IRS said he owed the government $7.9 million.

Prosecutors in that case argued that Alamo was a flight risk and a polygamist who preyed on married women and girls in his congregation.

Alamo faces trial in February on the 10 federal child-abuse charges in Arkansas. Hall has said he may ask a judge for more time to prepare a defense because of the new charges.

Associated Press Writer Thomas Watkins in Los Angeles contributed to this report.