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LEHI, Utah (AP) -- An online petition is calling for Texas authorities to release the children and women who were taken from a polygamist sect in a raid this month.
Petition organizers say they have more than 1,000 online signatures.
The Utah man who organized the petition says he doesn't agree with the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints and its practices. But he says the church members still have civil rights, which he believes were violated by Texas authorities.
Some 416 children from the FLDS-owned Yearning for Zion ranch were placed in state custody after during a weeklong raid that began April 3.
Authorities have also confiscated the cell phones of the FLDS women staying with the kids, preventing them any contact with family or legal representation.
On Friday, a judge ordered the kids to remain in custody and said parents and children will under go genetic testing in order to identify familial relationships.
Connor Boyack, of Lehi, drafted his "Free the Innocent FLDS" petition April 15, circulating it among friends and family. Interest quickly mushroomed because so many people shared concern over the violation of civil rights, Boyack said. "If there's any cases of abuse, specific cases, those should be investigated and handled," Boyack said Sunday. "What troubles me and the main reasons that I started the petition was because based on one anonymous phone call 416 children were essentially legally kidnapped."
Child welfare officials have said all the children were removed because investigators determined there was a pattern of abuse on the ranch that left all minors at risk.
Boyack said he also bristled at court testimony from a state expert that said children at the ranch were living in an environment that would cause them to commit future abuses. "That really troubled me," said Boyack. "The kids haven't done anything yet."
Having first collected the signatures online, Boyack will soon be sending a copy of the petition to Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Sen. Hutchinson, Sen. Cornyn, and Commissioner Cockerell of the Department of Family Services.
Boyack hopes the petition will have an effect on the recent decision by Judge Barbara Walther to keep all 416 children in state custody.
The petition has been signed by people from California, New York and nearly every state in between. There are also singnatures from Alaska, Canada and Brazil.
To sign the petition, click the related link.
(Copyright 2008 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
