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On November 14, 2008, a hearing will be held in Judge Denise Lindberg’s court in St. George, Utah, to determine whether court-appointed fiduciary Bruce Wisan can proceed with his contemplated sale of 711 acres of UEP land known as Berry Knoll Farms for $3 million. Wisan claims that the trust is out of money and that he and his attorney firm are currently owed in excess of $1 million and have not been paid in over a year. The proposed sale of this land is just the latest piece of evidence showing that the man appointed to protect the assets of the UEP is destroying the very entity he should be preserving.

 

For his “services” Wisan currently is charging $235 per hour and his attorneys from $210 to $275 per hour. He and his attorney firm have cost the UEP an average of $85,000 per month in fees alone since his appointment as special fiduciary in May of 2005. This, however, is only the beginning of the depletion of UEP assets.

 

On September 20, 2005, Mr. Wisan asked the court to approve a Settlement Agreement which allowed the sale of 436 acres of land in Apple Valley, Utah, to Advantum, Inc., for $2 million. In February of 2007, Wisan sold the Western Precision Building in Hildale to Northwest Land Company for $1.65 million. 

 

In a previous article I discussed how Wisan practiced fraud upon the court to obtain an $8.8 million default judgment against the former trustees of the UEP. Named as one of the defendants in the suit that resulted in this judgment was the Corporation of the Presiding Bishop, which held the title to Harker Farms. Parley Harker, a faithful FLDS member who founded Harker Farms, had fervently desired before his death to consecrate his property to the UEP. Since the UEP did not accept any property encumbered by debt, the Corporation of the Presiding Bishop was created to hold the title to Harker Farms until a few remaining debts were cleared, at which time the property would be transferred to the UEP. Mr. Wisan seized Harker Farms to satisfy part of the default judgment and had the property sold at sheriff’s auction in June and September of 2007 for $4.3 million, the purchaser of the property being Mr. Wisan himself.

 

Thus Mr. Wisan already has sold UEP assets for a total of $7.95 million. The proposed sale of Berry Knoll Farms would bring this total to $10.95 million. Not one dime of this money has been used to provide for the needs of UEP beneficiaries. Mr. Wisan now claims that the trust has no funds. What happened to the $7.95 million already realized from these sales?

 

The draining of UEP assets becomes even more serious when we consider the actual value of the property Wisan has sold and proposes to sell. The Western Precision Building actually was worth about $6 million. Shortly before Wisan’s takeover of Harker Farms, the previous managers inventoried the assets of the operation at $9,589,138. The Salt Lake Tribune of August 25, 2008, reports the value of the Berry Knoll Farms at as much as $9 million. Accepting the $2 million for the sale of the Apple Valley property as a fair price in 2005, this still would give a total value of $17.6 million for the assets Wisan already has sold and as much as $26.6 million if we include the Berry Knoll Farms. This works out to a loss for the beneficiaries of the UEP of $633,000 a month or $21,100 a day since Mr. Wisan took over as special fiduciary.

 

This figure does not even consider the long-term economic impact of the loss of businesses and jobs resulting from Mr. Wisan’s policies. Western Precision was the major employer in Hildale, Utah, providing about ninety jobs to local residents. The following is a partial listing of other key businesses have either closed their doors entirely or moved to other locations: Cozy Log Homes, Nielson Door and Window, Allco Manufacturing, Bauer Manufacturing, Uzona Electrochem Plating, Cascade Water Systems, and Jessop Farms Feedlot. For years Harker Farms helped supply the needs of UEP beneficiaries by providing the Bishop’s Storehouse with beef, potatoes, carrots, beets, and other garden produce. As farmland and a grazing area for cattle and sheep, the Berry Knoll Farms has been used to supply the Bishop’s Storehouse with hay, beef, mutton, and wool. 

 

More importantly, Berry Knoll itself is the prophesied site of a future temple for the FLDS. Some detractors have claimed that this prophecy is obsolete since the FLDS already have built a temple in Texas. Far from having only a single temple, however, we look forward to the day when temples will dot the entire continent to perform the great work of the Millennium for the salvation of the living and the dead.   It is impossible to attach an exact dollar amount to these losses, but, needless to say, they are significant. 

 

All of this fits in very well with the avowed intention of Bruce Wisan and those supporting him to use the dismantling of the UEP as a means to destroy the FLDS Church. On a listing of fees dated April 22, 2008, the entry for November 11, 2007, is a billing of $343.75 from Wisan’s attorney Jeff Shields for 1.25 hours devoted to a telephone call from Bruce Wisan and subsequent discussion of the call and strategizing how best to proceed in their “sociological and psychological war with the beneficiaries of the Trust.” It is unlikely Wisan and his attorney ever intended this statement to be made public, yet the fact that it slipped through and was posted on their own web site is indisputable evidence of their real purposes and the nature of their private discussions.

 

I have lived in Colorado City for forty-five years, and have consecrated hundreds of thousands of dollars in time, money, and property in a sincere effort to participate in living the United Order, a sacred gospel principle. I don’t feel protected by Mr. Wisan’s management of the UEP—I feel exploited!