Warren Jeffs back in Arizona jail, official says

LAS VEGAS " Polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs was back in an Arizona jail cell Thursday, amid lingering questions about what prompted his hospitalization in Las Vegas for treatment of a "weakened state of health," a sheriff's official said.

"I can confirm he is in our custody at the Mohave County Jail," Trish Carter, spokeswoman for Mohave County Sheriff Tom Sheahan, told The Associated Press.

Carter said the 52-year-old leader of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints was returned Wednesday to the Kingman, Ariz., jail where Carter said he had been found conscious but in a "weakened state of health, acting in a convulsive manner, shaking, and running a fever" on Tuesday.

"The obvious question now is what the problem was," said Carter, who said jailers weren't told Jeffs' medical diagnosis but did not believe his condition was life-threatening.

Jeffs was first treated at Kingman Regional Medical Center, and then flown by medical helicopter about 100 miles to Las Vegas, where he was hospitalized under heavy guard. A hospital spokesman said no patient had been listed under Jeffs' name.

Jeffs has been in custody since his August 2006 arrest outside Las Vegas. He had been on the run for more than a year, and made the FBI's Most Wanted List before his capture.

Utah court documents show Jeffs lost 30 pounds in jail awaiting his 2007 trial in St. George, Utah, and that he was hospitalized for treatment of a self-imposed fast, dehydration and sleep deprivation.

A clinical social worker who interviewed Jeffs in April 2007 reported Jeffs attempted to hang himself in January 2007 at the Washington County jail, and was seen several days later throwing himself against walls and banging his head.

Records show Jeffs was treated in a Utah prison infirmary in February 2007 for health problems attributed to refusing to eat. Utah authorities say the 6-foot-3 Jeffs weighed 145 pounds when he was moved Feb. 26 to Arizona.

Jeffs was convicted by a Utah jury of two counts of first-degree felony rape as an accomplice. He was sentenced to two consecutive terms of five years to life in prison for his role in the 2001 marriage of a 14-year-old follower to her 19-year-old cousin.

Jeffs is charged in Arizona as an accomplice with four counts of sexual conduct with a minor stemming from marriages he allegedly arranged between underage girls and older men.

Four counts of incest as an accomplice were dropped last month after Mohave County Superior Court Judge Steven Conn found Arizona's incest law does not apply to the arranged marriages of teenage girls and their older male relatives.

Carter said Jeffs has been in protective custody at the Mohave County Jail " alone in his cell 23 hours a day, and allowed one hour of recreation segregated from other inmates.

Jeffs was named in 2002 as the president, or prophet, of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, an insular sect with nearly 6,000 followers that practices polygamy in arranged marriages that have sometimes involved underage girls.

Many FLDS members live in the twin border towns of Colorado City, Ariz., and Hildale, Utah, about 160 miles northeast of Las Vegas. Another FLDS ranch was raided in west Texas in April, setting off a lengthy legal battle over the custody of hundreds of children.