DNA Expert Qualifies In Yearning for Zion Ranch Case

Judge Barbara Walther ruled that DNA expert Amy Smuts, a forensic analyst at a respected DNA lab, is qualified to testify about paternity tests indicating a nearly 100 percent probability defendant Raymond Merril Jessop fathered a child with a 16-year-old in November 2004 at the Yearning for Zion Ranch.  The DNA evidence is central to the prosecution’s mission to prove Jessop sexually assaulted an underage girl he’d taken as a “purported wife.” Prosecutors allege Jessop had one legal wife and eight “purported wives.”

Jessop, 38, and 11 other members of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints face criminal charges. Jessop is the first to go to trial, and evidence seized during a historic April 2008 raid at the YFZ Ranch is expected to weigh heavily in the prosecution’s mission to prove those charges.

Source gosanangelo.com.