A judge sentenced Samuel Bateman to 24 years Tuesday, on top of the 50 years he's already serving in federal prison.
During a traffic stop in 2022, Flagstaff police discovered three girls between the ages of 11 and 14 held, without seatbelts or ventilation, in a trailer he was towing.
Bateman was pulled over when someone spotted small fingers through a gap.
A jury found him guilty in June of the latest charges of child abuse, after just 40 minutes of deliberation.
Bateman is the self-proclaimed prophet of a sect of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints on the Arizona Strip.
In a statement after the sentencing, Coconino County Attorney Ammon Barker said Bateman will never again be in a position to harm children.
“Today’s sentence is about accountability for the harm done to these young victims,” he wrote. “Protecting children from abuse is some of the most important work we do, and we will continue to do everything we can to hold accountable those who prey on the most vulnerable.”
In 2024, Bateman was sentenced to 50 years in federal prison for coercing girls as young as 9 to perform sex acts, along with conspiracy to kidnap children.
Bateman’s fundamentalist sect practices polygamy in the community of Short Creek on the Arizona-Utah border.
It’s a practice that was once mainstream in the early teachings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints but was abandoned in 1890. Polygamy is now strictly prohibited within the church.
At one point, Bateman claimed to have as many as 20 wives, including at least 10 girls under the age of 18.
He was a top lieutenant of Warren Jeffs, who previously led the fundamentalist sect and is serving a life sentence for sexual assault of children.
