Hana Gartner: CLEARLY THIS IS NOT THE SAME PLACE IT WAS WHEN WE SAT DOWN AND SPOKE THREE YEARS AGO. IT'S CHANGED A LOT.

Winston Blackmore: Has it already been three years?

Hana Gartner: IT'S BEEN THREE YEARS.

Winston Blackmore: Three years since we sat down. Well, you know, to my thinking, I don't, I don't know how I – feeling different than I did three years ago.

Hana Gartner: WELL IN THIS ENVIRONMENT? I MEAN HOW WOULD YOU – HOW WOULD YOU CHARACTERIZE THE CHANGES THAT HAPPENED HERE IN BOUNTIFUL IN THE LAST THREE YEARS?

Winston Blackmore: You know, being here, you don't really look at the changes. I don't really look at the changes, other than if you're referring to the community structure, like it's a different environment as far as we don't have any involvement with the other people that have gone a different way. But as far as our own structure goes, we still have the same, you know, we're strange people doing strange – the same strange things.

Hana Gartner: WHAT DOES THE PROPHET HAVE AGAINST YOU?

Winston Blackmore: In the first place, Warren's not a prophet in my view. If he was, then his predictions would have come to pass. And, but as far as – as far as – I just do not –

Hana Gartner: SO YOU DON'T THINK HE IS GOD'S REPRESENTATIVE ON EARTH, HE IS NOT THE PROPHET?

Once the most powerful man in Bountiful, Winston Blackmore is rumoured to have 26 wives and some 80 children. He sat down for an exclusive interview with the fifth estate's Hana Gartner three years ago. At the time he portrayed Bountiful as an idyllic, peaceful community.

Since then much has changed. Blackmore sees Warren Jeffs, head of the FLDS in the U.S. and wanted by the FBI for sexual misconduct, as a false prophet who is giving polygamy a bad name. For his lack of devotion, Blackmore was excommunicated and stripped of his title of the Bishop of Bountiful. Two of his wives who were loyal to Jeffs left him.

Hana Gartner: BUT HIS FATHER WAS A PROPHET. YOU BELIEVED HE WAS THE PROPHET.

Winston Blackmore: I certainly do. His father was the head of our church and he was the person that we upheld as being a, the most inspired person among us.

Hana Gartner: SO HE, IN HIS WISDOM, PASSED THE TORCH TO, TO HIS SON, WHO –

Winston Blackmore: At least that's what Warren claims. But you know, his father had a debilitating stroke in 1998 and I was there on several occasions when Warren said to all of us, Father has been reduced to the capacity of a child. And we do not need to take advantage of him and we need to make sure that we are not going to take advantage of his mental capacity, and he basically went from there and decided to take our people, our church and our people, down a road that we have not gone before. And that became a problem to a lot of us, not just me. Lots of people.

Hana Gartner: SO YOU THINK HE STOLE THE TITLE? IS A SELF-APPOINTED PROPHET?

Winston Blackmore: I think that he would probably like that statement because he, you know, he definitely took possession of his father. He only allowed a handful of us to even get close to his father in his diminished capacity. I was one of them and everyone else, he has literally cut off and disposed of as well. So there was myself, there was Alan Steed, there was Ron Roebuck. There was Leroy Jeffs, Warren's older brother.

And these other people, Warren has totally disposed of them because they all saw the same thing I saw. Oh and of myself of course. We saw that his father was not making the decisions. He was.
And it would be fine, you know my – I don't know whether you're interested in this, in my views on that, but inasmuch as we're just having a conversation, what I witnessed him, him do is you know, he was definitely interested in, in – he held grudges.

Hana Gartner: AND HE EXCOMMUNICATED YOU.

Oh yes.

Hana Gartner: BUT THIS IS SERIOUS, ISN'T IT, IN THIS COMMUNITY? THAT MEANS, THAT MEANS YOU'RE DAMNED IN HELL FOR ALL ETERNITY?

Winston Blackmore:Not when somebody like he, he does it. You know, I'll tell you the advantage that I had, if I had any advantage. And that is, is that not only was I seeing what was happening, I was telling my own family.

My family basically, I mean I struggled, trying to figure out how to explain to my family and a few other people that this is what is happening here. And very soon, those who started to see the signs of it, who could recognize that there really was something going on that didn't have anything at all to do with religious.

You know, let me tell you something about Mormonism. Mormonism basically, fundamentally is supposed to be Christian, and if you have someone who pretends to be the president of a Mormon fundamentalist believing people who is neither Christian nor Mormon in the things that he does, then everyone should be able to spot that.

Hana Gartner: BUT TELL ME, IF YOU ARE 100% SURE THIS MAN IS NOT THE PROPHET, WARREN JEFFS IS NOT THE PROPHET, HOW DO YOU KNOW WHO IS?

Winston Blackmore: Well, one thing that I know of and that's who isn't. You know, by their fruits ye shall know them. And he certainly had no indication. I mean you can go look in the book of Matthew in the Bible and he basically points out, you know, by their fruits ye shall know them. And, and this guy, if he's going to make predictions that don't happen, well then you know, if you're going to have a prophet, you should at least have one with predictions that do happen.

Hana Gartner: SO WHY ARE PEOPLE FOLLOWING HIM?

Winston Blackmore: And one of the biggest reasons is – the reasons why a lot of the men are is their wives would leave them in a second. You know, if, if they didn't follow Warren.

Hana Gartner: WHY, WHAT KIND OF POWER DOES HE HAVE OVER THE LADIES?

Winston Blackmore: A good question, but he does. If he told those – if he told, told the women to leave their husband, they do, and they don't even ask any questions why.

Hana Gartner: HE THREW A LOT OF MEN OUT, RIGHT?

Winston Blackmore: Yeah, he did. He told their wives to leave them and they left. And in one week's time, they were someone else's wives.

Hana Gartner: WHAT A MESS.

Winston Blackmore: Yeah, it is a mess.

Hana Gartner: YOU HAVE DENIED THAT BOUNTIFUL IS A CULT, BUT DO YOU THINK WARREN JEFFS IS RUNNING A CULT?

Winston Blackmore: Well, I looked at the definition of a cult and I think there's 9 points that you could actually – that you do a little acid test of these 9 points. And if you decide you're a cult if, if you're – if you, if you can say yes to all these things, then you're dealing with a cult. And in his situation, I mean I wish, I wish that from what I know of the way that he runs and outfit that, that he didn't have so many of those things that they did.

Hana Gartner: BUT ARE YOU AFRAID? I MEAN YOU INTRODUCED THIS WHOLE NOTION OF VIOLENCE, THREATS AGAINST YOUR LIFE. PEOPLE ARE WORRIED THAT THERE IS GOING TO BE SOME KIND OF A SHOWDOWN IN TEXAS AT WARREN JEFF'S COMPOUND. WHEN IT COMES TO DEEP-HELD RELIGIOUS BELIEF AND DIVISION, WE JUST LOOK AROUND THE WORLD WHAT PEOPLE CAN BE REDUCED TO.

Winston Blackmore: Oh, yeah.

Hana Gartner: DON'T YOU WORRY – WHY COULDN'T THAT HAPPEN HERE?

Winston Blackmore: If you looked at what – again I'll come back to the my answer. If you look to what we have been reduced to, I don't know whether you've ever been to Colorado City? I mean if you were in Colorado City a few years ago, you would find a place that was just a-buzz with things happening. You go there now and it's, it's a lonely place.

Hana Gartner: SO WHAT ARE YOUR WORST FEARS?

Winston Blackmore: Mine? Um… I don't know. I'm still really concerned about the families, the family units that are together there and then the disruption of those families will quit. My, I guess my worst fear and why I would not want to even be seen talking to some of my relatives is that they would immediately lose their family. And it can happen so fast.

Hana Gartner: BUT THEY LOSE THEIR FAMILY WHICHEVER WAY THEY CHOOSE.

Winston Blackmore: Well, lots of them still can hang on there and there's many that are hanging on and I would, I'd go out of my way not to be seen with them just to protect them. Because one day, this has got to come to an end. I mean in this country, in the United States and Canada, I mean it's, this guy's time has got to be running out before more people realize that: hey, you know we do not have – We don't have a prophet here in the first place because I think a prophet should have some predictions that come true. And if he's going to make predictions, they should ought to happen.

Hana Gartner: DO YOU HAVE A PREDICTION?

Winston Blackmore: Yeah, I have. I used to make this annual prediction and I did it for years and years on my, in my newsletter. And then the next year, we would look and see if these predictions came true.

Hana Gartner: SO WHAT'S YOUR PREDICTION –

Winston Blackmore: But my, but I, I mean I predicted that this will, was going to happen in our church back in the days. And so I've quit making those predictions. [laughs] And I did because it was so heart-wrenching to actually – I mean it wasn't anything prophetic really. It was just seeing you know I had a different view of things than everybody else did.
And when you actually are dealing with a person who is elevating himself to the control position of our people, who actually has no compassion for people, no interest in anything other than himself, it's not hard to tell that something is going to run amok here.

Hana Gartner: SO HOW DOES SOMEBODY LIKE THIS HAVE SO MUCH POWER?

Winston Blackmore: He rose through fear. He –

Hana Gartner: IT'S NOT ABOUT GOD? IT'S NOT ABOUT RELIGION?

Winston Blackmore: No, it's about fear. People are afraid. They're afraid not to do what he says. You know I can tell you, knowing thousands and thousands and thousands of people – thousands that are still with him – those people are giving their thousand dollars and privately they don't want to. There's people who are there and complying and standing and bowing and scraping because if they don't, their family will turn them in. They have sons and they have daughters that would turn them in and there's parents that'll turn their children in.

Hana Gartner: WELL, BUT YOU KNOW PEOPLE ARE LISTENING AND LOOKING IN AND WHAT IT'S SHOWING THAT THIS SYSTEM IS, HAS BECOME CORRUPT, IS BREAKING DOWN, IS NOT WORKING.

Winston Blackmore: Oh, certainly it is not working. But it's not working not because of polygamy. It's not working because the ministry has forsaken the fundamentals of our faith. They're not working – don't blame polygamy on that. And that's what too many stories are all about. But the story isn't about that. The story is basically we literally betrayed the trust of our people.

And we – I'll include myself in as one of the signers of 1998 and changing our most sacred trust as trustees of the United Effort Plan, taking that thing and turning it into an instrument that was, belonged to one person so that that one person could arbitrarily decide who could be there and who couldn't.

Hana Gartner: YOU HAVE GUILT FOR THAT? YOU CARRY THAT?

Winston Blackmore: I think you could probably call it that. I wish for all the world that my name was not on there. I didn't want it to be on there to begin with and I wish it wasn't on there. And yet at the end of the day, I am so thankful –

Hana Gartner: SO IN PART YOU WERE A CREATOR OF WARREN JEFFS?

Winston Blackmore: No, I wasn't a creator, I was a witness to Warren Jeffs. I never created him because he was orchestrating that probably for his you know the next chess move up the road, which is himself, eh?

He was thinking ahead for himself, I'm sure. But at the end of the day, what's done is done and all I can do is conscientiously and physically object to what I you know to what I do not believe in and that's just what I've done. I've objected to it and I have to let people decide to be themselves.

Winston Blackmore: My ministry is still big. In fact, it's bigger than it was before because now it's global. It includes –

Hana Gartner: YOUR PULPIT IS ON THE COMPUTER.

Winston Blackmore: It includes people –

Hana Gartner: A VIRTUAL PULPIT.

Winston Blackmore: In Kenya and it includes people in old Mexico and you know it's includes people all over the place. –

Hana Gartner: SO YOU'RE SPREADING YOUR WORD, YOUR BRAND OF THE WORD AROUND –

Winston Blackmore: No. Actually, my brand of the word is basically, why it appeals to anyone is because it has to do still with the fundamentals. Like I don't reinterpret the scriptures. I just basically, what was valuable to us in the beginning. And it's amazing how many people and where they are. They're all over the place.

There's far more fundamentalists than I ever knew existed. [laughs] So it's true. You know there's 100,000 polygamists living in Paris.

Hana Gartner: I HAD NO IDEA.

Winston Blackmore: Yeah there is. And of the 1,125 cultures in the world, identified cultures, 875 of them are polygamists. That's they're fundamentally polygamists. And yet there's considered four million practicing polygamists in Europe, four million. In the United Kingdom, including France and but Paris itself has 100,000. It's still, polygamy is still legal in Mexico. It's you know and that's not very far away. And so there's you know it is as a culture, I mean the people in Kenya, they're a, you know their old roots are polygamous and dated in antiquity.

You know and so it's been really fun to communicate with them and see how their struggles are and all they need is a word of encouragement. So I'm enjoying that part of it. So I really you know I found a different niche for myself and it's just in that part. I'd like to full-time do that. If I could figure out how to get funded, then that's what I'd do. [laughs]

Hana Gartner: BUT .. IS THERE NOT A FEAR IN SOME PEOPLE'S MINDS THAT IT WILL CHANGE THE FACE OF THIS POLYGAMOUS COMMUNITY? WARREN JEFFS HAS CHANGED YOU AND HOW YOU WORK. THE TIMES, THE FACT THAT YOU'RE ON THE COMPUTER. THERE WAS A TIME YOU WERE A VERY CLOSED SOCIETY. THE MORE OUTSIDE INFLUENCES, AREN'T YOU WORRIED THAT –

Winston Blackmore: I don't have the same things pressuring me that pressured polygamists in you know at the turn of the century. They were still being hunted and put in jail all the way up through the 44s. Utah had a raid on our people in 1944. They had another aid in 1953. They arrested the mothers and the men, they hauled off the women and the children.

In you know in our country, I remember a time when we had the RCMP sitting up there on the hill trying to count how many kids there were down there. And to us, to children, it was still somewhat of a game. I mean we let them count us five times you know and there was always five times more than there really was because to us we weren't afraid of that.

I wasn't afraid of that. I wasn't afraid of it now and I wasn't afraid of it then. And today you know the openness that I live in my family and you know apart from the details – Some of the details that I obviously don't even know, you know apart from that, then I don't have the same kind of fear. There's not the same kind of curtain and we have got – We have dismissed Warren's fear from our society and so maybe that's why we're more relaxed. But he has no control over –

Hana Gartner: HE STILL FEELS PERSECUTED.

Winston Blackmore: Oh, I imagine he does but I think he likes that. He kind of thrives on persecution and spying and that somewhat. But you're talking about our openness – we don't have to hide like we had to hide. And sure, in 1991 the attorney general you know they went to great lengths to try to decide whether or not they were going to prosecute us. In 2004 they launched some sort of an investigation into our life which is still ongoing.

And that I don't know what they're really going to find. But if they can prosecute somebody who's born into our faith, who lives their faith, who's open about it, who's not interested in you know damaging people – Then I suppose (sounds like) they better. So because at the end of the day, I'm not going to hide from them and I'm you know I live my life open and in public and I come and go and I just literally, that's the way I'm going to live my life. So I'm not hiding from them. And you know if that presents a softer side of life, maybe it presents a more real side of the way that some of us have lived our lives.

Hana Gartner: TELL ME ABOUT JIMMY OLER.

Winston Blackmore: He's my oldest sister's – my oldest sibling's son, oldest son. And he's a really decent person. So –

Hana Gartner: BUT HE REPRESENTS NOW EVERYTHING THAT YOU'RE AGAINST.

Winston Blackmore: But still he has every right in the world to do that. He's committed to Warren and his program. Jim's just the perfect, perfect person for Warren's program.

Hana Gartner: BUT HE'S TAKING PEOPLE IN THE WRONG DIRECTION, YOU FEEL.

Winston Blackmore: No, no, he's not taking people anywhere. He's just doing what he's told. So I don't think that he can make any decisions. I think Warren has to make all his decisions for him. So I, Jim's just a guy who's willing to do what he's told.

Hana Gartner: IT'S SO HARD TO GET YOUR MIND AROUND THIS COMMUNITY. I MEAN YOU HAVE AN EX-WIFE WHO WAS MARRIED TO YOU, YOU WERE THE BISHOP OF BOUNTIFUL, HER BROTHER IS NOW THE BISHOP OF BOUNTIFUL FOR WARREN JEFFS. IT'S –

Winston Blackmore: Yeah, it is hard. [laughs] I mean Jimmy's sister Jane is you know I knew her – she didn't want to take sides in this issue against her family. Her family was split right in two. And she didn't want to take any sides, sides against her family and you know to do one or the other. And I respect that. She hopefully you know has gained herself some access to some of her family members that she never would have had if she would have stayed with me.

And you know that's understandable to me. But you know I will say about Jimmy that you know his, he's a really decent person. But the kind who is perfectly willing to perform his duties as he's directed to do. I was never that way. I could have never fit into that program, not in any way. So it, I didn't like it, it wasn't to my liking. I couldn't make myself feel like that there was anything good about it.

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