Sister Wives’ Brown family fear returning home to Utah due to state laws prohibiting polygamy

They live an unconventional life as a large polygamous family.

And Kody Brown recently returned to his home state of Utah with his four wives, years after the group fled the state due to strict laws that made the practice of polygamy a felony.

During a recent episode of Sister Wives, Kody, Christine, Janelle, Meri and Robyn were back in town for the first time and reflected on the frightening situation they had to flee into the night after the police started to investigate the family.

Janelle, his second wife, recalled how the family had to practically resume their lives in Lehi, Utah after going public about their one family life.

“ Just days after the actual announcement, the Utah Police began investigating us because plural marriage is a crime in Utah, ” Janelle said. “He was liable to a maximum of five years per charge.

Kody first married Meri almost 30 years ago, and soon after their union added a spiritual union with Janelle, followed by Christine. Robyn was the fourth wife added to the family in 2010 and the first wife in almost 16 years.

She admitted that everyone was “very scared to come and arrest us” so they left the state “in the dark of night. We felt like we had been exiled.

After moving their family to Las Vegas, they “ sued the state of Utah, basically saying, ‘Look, this law is unfair,’ Janelle recalls. “We won, so for a year… we were decriminalized. We are no longer criminals.

Over the years (and 14 seasons of the show), the family has grown with 18 children and two grandchildren with another on the way.

“The State of Utah has appealed our winning lawsuit. They toppled him, then they doubled down with a new law, HB 99, “that ‘made it a worse crime for polygamists in Utah,” Kody said.

“A bill was introduced in the Utah Senate, SB 102. What he was going to do was sort of revise this law that was passed a few years ago,” Janelle said in a confessional. “ It essentially ensures that people like our family, who live law-abiding lives but simply choose for religious purposes to cohabit, are no longer criminals. ”

Kody added, “ What I do in my room with another consenting adult is nobody else’s business. So why do they think they can legislate it? It’s naive.

Robyn noted: ‘I think lawmakers believe that decriminalizing this law will ensure that it is free for everyone and there will be more abuse that will occur. And what they don’t realize is that the current law is so strict it scares them so much to go out – and like, a mom, she has a daughter who is abused and she’s so scared to go. to the police because she is afraid they will tear up her family and take her child. So her daughter continues to be abused her whole life, which is like, crazy and horrible.

Before leaving on their return trip to Utah, the group discussed whether they should all drive together as they are rarely in the same place, but they ultimately decided to use one vehicle.

“ I think for me the biggest fear of going back to Utah, if we’re pulled over for a traffic violation, are they going to use it as an opportunity to go after the charge of polygamy for crime? Janelle said. “Because that’s usually how it works – they get you for something else and then they add it. I’m always like, “Don’t talk, Kody, don’t talk.” It’s stupid, but it’s a real fear.

“If you can imagine it, it’s like going to a place where your family is illegal. It’s just overwhelming. It still worries me, ” Robyn said.

“Polygamy right now in Utah is a crime,” Christine said after arriving in Utah and meeting with the Dargers family. “We are sitting with other criminals. We are criminals like them. They could come in and arrest us all.

“Kody, because he has a legal wife and three plural wives, could go to jail from nine to 15 years,” Janelle said. “ Then your probation involves not seeing your kids, not starting the crime again, so basically if you saw your kids again you were violating probation. It brought you into the federal system. It’s just a big mess.