Stolen Innocence - Lisa Pulitzer [169]
Kassandra said that no one suspected there was an ulterior motive behind his desire to hold me until my sister Michelle walked in on him and he dropped me to the floor. As she ran to pick me up, she discovered that I was without my panties and asked me where they were. Even though I was only two, I could speak well enough to answer her question, and told her that the young man had them. The horrible reality hit my sister when she found the panties in the driveway where the man’s car had been parked.
My parents were incensed and Dad immediately telephoned the prophet’s home to alert him to the man’s behavior and that he was intending to press formal charges. He was told that the priesthood would take care of it and was not to go to the authorities because it would cast a bad light on the people. Of course, we heard that the young man’s parents had been informed of the incident, but from all accounts nothing else was ever done.
Rage filled me as Kassandra described how Mom and Dad had assembled those who knew and instructed them never to speak of the incident unless I raised it first. Kassandra recalled that Mom felt that it was better to leave it unmentioned and hope that I was too young to remember it later. I telephoned my father, and I was outraged when he confirmed Kassandra’s story. I couldn’t believe that my family had kept the truth from me, but that was a typical response of FLDS families when unpleasant things occur. I grew even more furious when I learned that there had been other allegations of child sexual abuse and domestic violence lodged against this man later on in his life. Had someone done something to stop him back then, perhaps those other victims would have been spared.
Difficult as this new information was, it shed a new light on so much of my emotional past. Suddenly things that had never made sense to me began to gel in my mind, like why my attacker’s name was always spoken as if it were a curse word and why I’d always had a creepy uncomfortable feeling when I saw him around. I wasn’t sure how this knowledge would have changed my life, but I speculated about whether my severe reaction to Allen’s touch was the subconscious result of this early victimization. I couldn’t help but wonder what might have been different if Mom had only told me about this when I first asked her about man/woman relations in the early days of my marriage.
While this secret was psychologically burdensome, in the end it served to cement my dedication to eliminating the silence that surrounded the sexual practices of the FLDS. It was no mystery to members of the closed community that child abuse was rampant and often went unpunished. The way these crimes were being buried had to stop. I wanted to ensure that the children still living in that community would be safe. From the start, Sherrie and Ally were a major part of this larger purpose behind my agreeing to testify, and now they became even more crucial.
Every night I would pin up an old photograph of my little sisters next to whichever new bed I found myself in to remind myself that I was doing this for a good reason. In the photo, their dresses are bland and floral-patterned, their hair coiffed expertly as good little priesthood girls, but their smiles are radiant—one thing each of them could own. Waking up each morning, I looked at that picture and saw what I was fighting for. People, girls, were still being put in my position, and I needed to stand up and make it right. To fight for those who still hadn’t found their voice. I brought that photograph with me everywhere, knowing that a little piece of Ally and Sherrie would be right in my hands whenever I needed to remember. Those girls were my purpose. I knew I had the strength; I just had to remember it as I moved forward.
The sight of reporters and satellite trucks lining the street in front of St. George’s Fifth Judicial District