Samuel Bateman
Samuel Rappylee Bateman is an American convicted sex offender who led a small polygamous splinter sect of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS) based in Colorado City, Arizona and Hildale, Utah — an area known as Short Creek. Self-styled as a prophet and successor to imprisoned FLDS leader Warren Jeffs, Bateman assembled more than 20 "spiritual wives" between 2019 and 2022, at least 10 of whom were minors, with victims as young as nine years old. He was arrested in 2022, pleaded guilty in April 2024, and was sentenced in December 2024 to 50 years in federal prison.
AI overview
Samuel Bateman is an American man convicted of leading a polygamous religious sect affiliated with the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, where he took multiple wives including at least 10 minors as young as nine years old between 2019 and 2022. He was sentenced to 50 years in federal prison in December 2024 after pleading guilty to the charges, representing a significant prosecution of abuse within an extremist religious community.
AI-generated from the Wikipedia summary — may contain errors.
Person · Open Library
- Born
- 1976-01-01
- Works
- 1
Top works
- 10 Years of Research at the Institute for Research on Exceptional Children
via Open Library + Wikidata
Music · MusicBrainz
- Type
- Person
- Gender
- Male
- Origin
- United Kingdom
~8 min read
Article
Samuel Rappylee Bateman (born c. 1976) is an American convicted sex offender who led a small polygamous splinter sect of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS) based in Short Creek, Arizona. Self-styled as a prophet of and successor to imprisoned FLDS leader Warren Jeffs, Bateman assembled more than 20 "spiritual wives" between 2019 and 2022. At least 10 of these wives were minors, with some victims as young as nine years old. He was arrested in 2022, pleaded guilty in April 2024, and was sentenced in December 2024 to 50 years in federal prison.
His case was the subject of the 2026 Netflix documentary series Trust Me: The False Prophet, directed by Rachel Dretzin.