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State Seizes 6 Youngsters After Raid

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The Associated Press

Published: September 22, 2008

FOUKE, Ark. - A decade after losing his children to an evangelical ministry, Anthony Justin Lane felt a spark of hope when he heard about a weekend raid on the compound, where authorities suspect children are being abused or forced into pornography.

The 34-year-old made his way to tiny Fouke from his roofing job in nearby Texarkana on Sunday to find out anything about his children, who stayed behind at the Tony Alamo Christian Ministries with his longtime girlfriend after he was kicked out for asking too many questions.

"I keep laying it in the Lord's hands and hoping he'll have mercy on my children and protect them," said Lane, once a witness to what he says was a marriage between a 13-year-old girl and a man of about 40.

Authorities did say six minors were temporarily placed in state custody after Saturday's raid at the ministry, run by Tony Alamo, who told The Associated Press that "consent is puberty" when it comes to sex with girls. Lane didn't know whether his children - daughters ages 11 and 13 and a son age 9 - were among those seized by the state.

The six children will be held by the Arkansas Department of Human Services as investigators interview them, a state police spokesman said.

The raid involved more than 100 federal and state authorities. Officials said the two-year probe into child pornography and abuse allegations focused on Alamo, a convicted tax evader, and his ministry, described by the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors extremist groups, as a cult opposing homosexuality, Catholicism and the government.

U.S. Attorney Bob Balfe would not say whether an arrest warrant had been issued for Alamo or other members of his church but had said before the raid that he expected a warrant to be issued for the 74-year-old leader.

Alamo claimed in a telephone interview with the AP on Saturday that the investigation was part of a federal push to legalize same-sex marriage while outlawing polygamy.

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