An investigation by Truth & Transparency into the landholdings of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints—commonly referred to as the Mormon Church or LDS Church—has shed light on how expansive and diverse their real estate portfolio is. While the church has never been listed among the largest private landowners in the US, this newly compiled data places them in the top five in terms of acreage and likely number one in terms of market value.

Truth & Transparency’s investigation reveals that, in July 2020, the LDS Church owned 1,754,633 acres across the country with a minimum market value of $15.7 billion. 15,963 parcels across the country have been linked to the Church through public records. Roughly 50 percent of the parcels consist of agricultural zoning. The other half is primarily made up of commercial or religious zoning.

While initially looking into a handful of properties known to be owned by the Utah-based church, a common data point was discovered: a single address that was associated with each property, regardless of the legal entity that owned it. Working under the hypothesis that this single address could be the key to mapping all—or at least a large portion—of the church’s landholdings, Truth & Transparency tapped into a database compiled by Reonomy. A New York City-based technology company, Reonomy is considered a “leading provider of [commercial real estate] insights, empowering top brokerages, financial institutions, and commercial services providers with actionable data and solutions”. Using this common data point, Truth & Transparency uncovered the parcels mentioned above through Reonomy.

In order to obtain the highest level of confidence in the integrity of the data, Truth & Transparency manually verified every property with a market value of at least $20 million and another 1,000 randomly selected samples from the remaining population.

Reonomy’s records do not include properties zoned for single family residences nor do they claim the data is completely comprehensive. For example, the Chicago LDS temple in Glenview, IL does not show up in the query. It is unclear what would preclude properties that share the same common data point to not be included in the query. Furthermore, it is possible that there are other properties in the US that are owned by the church that are not associated with the common address. Thus, the properties found should be considered the Mormon Church’s minimum landholdings in July 2020.

Over the years, there has been some reporting on large portions of the Church’s landholdings. For example, in 2013 Reuters reported that the Mormon Church was set to become the largest private landowner in Florida. In 2017 the Dallas Morning News reported on a commercial property that the Church purchased for $100 million. However, Truth & Transparency is unaware of any attempt to compile all LDS real estate assets across the US before now.

When the data is populated into an interactive map, the largess of the church’s real estate empire can be jarring.

The interactive map and its accompanying data—publicly searchable here— will prove to be  useful tools to those looking to further our reporting. Additionally, the information adds to the growing library of investigative reports that have shed light and knowledge on the church’s assets, something they have tried to keep as quiet as possible over the years according to The Wall Street Journal.

A representative from the LDS Church did not respond to our request for comment before the publication of this article.

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A few caveats to remember when reviewing the map and data:

• This data is based on county records as of July 21, 2020. There are properties purchased in early 2020 and after this date that are not present in the data. For absent properties purchased prior to July 21, 2020, it is likely due to the county records not yet reflecting the change in ownership. An example of this would be the 15,000 acre Texas ranch the Church purchased in early 2020.
• Any properties owned by the LDS Church with “Single Family Residence” zoning designation would be in addition to the properties in this dataset. There are a few properties on the list that would fit the traditional description of “Single Family Residence'', but they are not zoned as such.
• The "Asset Category" designation reflects what the official county records show. Not all counties are perfect in keeping those designations up to date. Some properties may have asset designations that do not accurately reflect their intended or actual use.
• Reonomy cannot guarantee that it captures every property. This means that there are properties (other than single family residences) owned by the LDS Church that don’t show up in the dataset. An example of this would be the Chicago temple. We were unable to determine what caused some properties to not show up in our query results.
• The numbers labeled “Total Assessed Value” and “Total Market Value” are reported by each county. Counties across the country use different methods when calculating these numbers. Furthermore, 2,291 properties have no value assigned to them by their county. These values should be considered a baseline when trying to evaluate the total value of these properties.
• These properties were able to be aggregated due to the common address we discovered that they all share. It is possible that there are properties owned by the LDS church that do not share this address.

Update, April 5, 2022 1:30 pm PST: The original data included an office building in Provo, Utah with a market value of $76 million. This building is next to the church’s City Center temple. When building the temple, the owner of this building, Nu Skin, donated a small portion of the property—0.2 acres—to the church in the form of an easement in order to accommodate construction. For unknown reasons, this caused the entire property to show up in the Reonomy query as being owned by the LDS church. We discovered this discrepancy early on in our investigation, but the property was inadvertently included in the final database and interactive map we published. It has been removed.

The following article discusses sexual abuse and child pornography

Sometime in 2010 or 2011, Paul Adams went to his Mormon bishop and confessed to not only molesting his young daughter, but also videotaping those sexual encounters and distributing them on the internet. What happened next, or rather what didn’t happen next, led to the continued abuse of that young child and the abuse of another daughter born several years later.

News of this case was originally reported by the Arizona Daily Independent in December of 2019, but new documents obtained by Truth & Transparency shed additional light on just how heinous Adams’ crimes were, what local religious leaders knew about those crimes, and when they knew it.

Paul and Leizza Adams were members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, commonly referred to as the Mormon Church, living in the border town of Bisbee, Arizona. On February 8, 2017, the United States Department of Homeland Security’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement was assigned to investigate a tip regarding a video found on the internet containing child pornography. The clip was traced back to Paul, an employee of DHS as a Border Patrol Agent. A search warrant was immediately secured and executed in conjunction with the FBI and local law enforcement from Cochise County.

While the search warrant was being served at the couple’s residence, Paul was arrested and questioned at the Border Patrol station where he was on duty. He confessed to having molested his two daughters, born in 2005 and 2015, over the course of their lives. Court documents show that a number of videos and images involving the two daughters were found inside Adams’ home along with thousands of other pieces of child pornography.

A federal indictment with eight separate counts, all related to sexual abuse and production of child pornography with his daughters, was handed down on March 8, 2017. On December 16 of the same year, while Adams was in custody, but before his case was adjudicated, Adams died by suicide.

During the investigation into Paul, it was discovered that his wife, Leizza, knew about the abuse as far back as 2010 or 2011 and did nothing to stop it from happening. Cochise County charged her for crimes related to enabling and covering up the abuse. Leizza ultimately agreed to plead no contest. She was sentenced to two years in prison and is set to be released in the summer of 2020.

Truth & Transparency was able to obtain public records related to Leizza Adams’ case that not only paint a graphic picture of unspeakable abuse for over 6 years, but also gives a glimpse at real, tangible consequences that can occur when abuse is not reported. During Leizza’s sentencing, two key witnesses testified regarding their knowledge of the abuse.

Shaunice Warr was a Border Patrol Agent with Paul and attended the same Mormon congregation as the Adams family. She was a friend to Leizza through church and was, according to her, Leizza’s best friend. Warr testified that from the time she moved into the area, around 2011, until the time Paul was arrested, she had a strong sense that something was off in the Adams household and that some kind of abuse was happening. These feelings were based on how Leizza and the children acted around Paul and her own observations of Paul at work. Paul had an aggressive personality and had previously been disciplined for engaging in illegal activity with undocumented immigrants and making terroristic threats against the Border Patrol.

Warr did not have any proof or specific knowledge of any abuse, but felt so strongly that she repeatedly encouraged Leizza to leave Paul over the course of several years. According to Warr, Leizza would then quickly change the subject and never disclosed any abuse. When Paul was arrested, Warr immediately went to Leizza, as a friend, to find out what happened. Leizza was evasive at first but eventually admitted to Warr that Paul was sexually abusing their two daughters and that Paul had confessed to their local bishop, possibly as far back as 2010.

ICE Special Agent, Robert Edwards, who described this as one of the worst cases of abuse he has ever seen in his career, testified that he learned about the potential disclosure of the abuse to the bishop from Warr and went, unannounced, to speak with the bishop. John Herrod, a local doctor, was the bishop of the congregation the Adams’ attended from approximately 2004 to 2012 and agreed to talk to Agent Edwards when asked.

Herrod told Edwards that he believed the initial confession from Paul occurred in 2011. During this confession, it was disclosed to the bishop that the Adams daughter, who was six years old at the time, was being sexually abused and that the assaults were being video recorded. Herrod said that over the next 2 years, Paul continued to come and see him on a regular basis and often told him that the abuse was ongoing. Leizza was present during many of these confessions and, according to Herrod, would usually have no reaction to the disclosures. In 2012, a new bishop was installed and Herrod was no longer involved in the matter.When asked why he never called the police, Herrod explicitly stated that he had received instructions from the Mormon Church’s legal team in Salt Lake City not to report the abuse, but continue the one-on-one “counseling sessions” instead.

Kirton McConkie, a large law firm based in Salt Lake City, Utah, was contracted out in 1995 by the Mormon Church to establish a hotline. Bishops around the world were told they must call this hotline for guidance anytime abuse was disclosed.

The Mormon Church’s policy on reporting abuse states that when local laws require the bishop to report, they instruct bishops to do so. In Arizona, clergy are exempt from reporting, which is presumably why Herrod was instructed not to report Paul to the police. Requests for comment from the Mormon Church and Kirton McConkie have gone unanswered.

The new adoptive families of the survivors feel the stated church policy failed. Tuscon attorney, Lynne Cadigan represents three of the Adams children, including the two daughters who were sexually assaulted. She stated “What the parents of the victims want more than anything is for the Mormon Church to change their policy and report all abuse.”

Cadigan, who has spent 35 years representing victims of sex abuse, believes the fact that the bishop knew about ongoing abuse negates the reporting exception as laid out by Arizona Statute. Cadigan also believes that, even if the bishop was not required to report, Shaunice Warr was required to report the abuse. At the time, Warr was a peace officer and, therefore, a mandated reporter. Neither Warr nor Herrod responded to request for comment.

Cadigan tells Truth & Transparency that if the Mormon Church refuses to change their policy they are “considering bringing legal action against the church for the horrific abuse that inflicted upon these children.”

The following documents contain graphic descriptions of child abuse

Paul Adams’ Indictment

Leizza Adams’ Mitigation Hearing containing Warr’s testimony

Leizza Adams’ Sentencing Hearing containing Agent Edwards’ testimony

If you are a survivor a abuse, below are a list of resources that can be utilized in the United  States. If you are not a resident of the US, we encourage you to search  for resources near you.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP)

National Sexual Assault Hotline

In early February 2018, a twenty-year-old man named Benjamin Alyk contacted the Davis County Attorney’s Office in Utah and informed them that he was prepared to confess to having manufactured and distributed child pornography when he was 15 and 16 years old. Alyk met with Brent Baggs, Investigator for Davis County, on February 14, 2018, at the office of his attorney, Todd Sessions.

During this meeting, Alyk confessed to having participated in viewing, manufacturing, and distributing child pornography from the time he was 14 until he was 17. Additionally, he revealed that he confessed to his religious leaders on at least two occasions, including once eight months prior to turning himself in. According to court documents, those leaders “had not made a report to law enforcement.”

The Crime

According to an Affidavit for Search Warrant obtained by Truth & Transparency Benjamin Alyk confessed to having stumbled across a website that acted as an image-sharing community for pedophiles. Alyk told Investigator Baggs that when he was either 14 or 15 years old the security on the site began to increase and, in order to obtain new material, he would be required to share child pornography in order to receive it in return.

This new security development led him to use a Flip Video camera he received for his birthday to capture videos of two children, 4 and 6 years old, going to the bathroom. He claims he made three videos of them and traded them for child pornography before eventually deleting them from his devices.

Some time later, when he was 15 or 16, he received a GoPro camera for Christmas and discovered that he could control it remotely. He set up the camera to secretly record children who were in the care of his mother in her in-home daycare.

With his hidden camera, Alyk says he filmed four different children, ages 4 to 6, changing in and out of their swimsuits and using the bathroom. He traded these videos online for links to child pornography.

Alyk claims to have stopped viewing child pornography at the age of 17 and transitioned to only viewing pornography with participants who were 18 years and older until the time he left on his Mormon mission in October 2016, just one month shy of his 19th birthday.

Confession to Church Leaders

On June 26, 2016, Alyk received a letter from the Mormon Church, officially The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, calling him to serve a two-year mission in the Dominican Republic. The letter indicated he would report to the church’s Missionary Training Center on October 26, 2016.

Sometime in late November or early December of that year, Alyk arrived to the Dominican Republic Santo Domingo West Mission, then presided over by President James Hunter Nuckols. According to the Affidavit for Search Warrant, Alyk confessed to Nuckols in December 2016, sharing with him the same details discussed with Investigator Braggs. Alyk was immediately sent home to Utah.

After coming home, Ayk confessed to his local church leaders and ultimately went before a disciplinary council in June of 2017, eight months before turning himself in to authorities. He was living with his parents. Alyk’s parents had closed down the daycare in February 2017, two months after he had arrived home.

In the Mormon Church, a disciplinary council is an ecclesiastical trial where local authorities determine whether or not a member has committed a sin worthy of discipline. Outcomes of disciplinary councils range from formal probation, to disfellowshipment, to excommunication. It is also possible for a disciplinary council to take no action at all.

In the case of Alyk, as a holder of the Melchizedek Priesthood, the disciplinary council would have been before 15 men; the Stake President ,his two counselors, and the 12 members of the local High Council. It is unclear what the outcome of the disciplinary council was for Alyk, but he tells Investigator Braggs that “the Church had not made a report to law enforcement”. This statement is supported by court documents obtained by Truth & Transparency, indicating that Alyk turned himself in voluntarily sometime close to February 7, 2018.

In Utah, clergy are not required to report sex abuse to authorities if they are made aware of the abuse through the confession of the perpetrator. Utah State Representative Angela Romero recently announced her intent to propose legislation to remove the clergy exemption. Based on the current law in Utah, and what is currently known about this case, the Mormon Church did not violate the law.

The Mormon Church requires that clergy who are made aware of abuse immediately call an internal helpline where they are given legal guidance on what additional steps should be taken. It is unclear if the helpline was used in this case. Requests for comment from the Mormon Church and their outside counsel, Kirton McConkie, have gone unanswered.

The Daycare

The daycare in question was a legally licensed establishment, owned and operated by Alyk’s mother out of the family home. The earliest known date that the business was formalized with the local government is December 23, 2014, when she applied for and received a DBA from the Utah Secretary of State. It is known, however, from Alyk’s confession, that the daycare was in operation at least as far back as 2011, which is the earliest he admits to having watched one of the children use the bathroom while they attended daycare.

Alyk told Investigator Braggs in February 2018 that, up to that point, his parents “have limited knowledge of the case.” Truth & Transparency's attempts to confirm this with Alyk, his mother, and his attorney Todd Sessions have gone unanswered. If true, Alyk would have had to come home to live with his parents after serving only two months of his mission and gone through a church disciplinary council without his parents knowing the true reason for these events.

According to a document filed with the Utah Secretary of State on April 5, 2017, the DBA registration for the daycare was canceled. Additionally, the parent of one of Alyk’s victims, who agreed to speak to Truth &  Transparency on the condition of anonymity, says that sometime in January of 2017 they were informed that the daycare would be closing in March of 2017.

A short time later, they received another notification that the close date would be moved up to February 2017, two months after Alyk came back home to live with his parents and a full year before he ultimately turned himself in. These notifications, according to the source, made no indication that child pornography had been produced in the home or that their child could possibly be a victim.

The victim’s parent says that they were completely unaware of any issues related to illegal activity until being contacted in June 2018 by someone from Davis County. It was then that they were told Alyk had manufactured child pornography in the home and that their child appeared in the videos.

Legal Proceedings

The documents obtained by Truth & Transparency show that sometime close to February 7, 2018, Alyk voluntarily turned himself in to the Davis County Attorney’s Office. About seven days later, on February 14, 2018, Alyk met with Investigator Braggs and confessed to manufacturing and distributing child pornography. On April 5, 2018, a search warrant was issued for all of Alyk’s electronics.

Later that summer, on August 1, 2018, Alyk was charged with eight second degree felonies. Six are for voyeuristic image distribution and two are for sexual exploitation of a minor.

The Davis County Attorney’s Office had it within their discretion to charge Alyk as an adult or a minor. They chose to charge him as a minor. Requests for comment from the Davis County Attorney's Office on what led to that decision have gone unanswered.

According to the Disposition Order, Alyk pleaded guilty to all eight counts on September 6, 2018. During the sentencing, statements were made by the parents of two of the victims, both of Alyk’s parents, and Alyk himself.

The court found that “continuation in the home would be contrary to the welfare of the child and the community” and committed Alyk to secure confinement in the Utah Juvenile Justice System until his 21st birthday, the maximum sentence allowed by juvenile court. However, the sentence came 12 weeks before his 21st birthday and he was promptly released on November 28, 2018.

At the time of this article, Alyk’s entry on Utah’s Sex Offender Registry indicates that he still lives with his parents in the home where the crimes took place.

On April 2, 2019, Sterling Van Wagenen, noted film director and producer, was indicted in Utah on a single count of aggravated sexual abuse of a child. An arrest warrant  was issued on April 4 and Van Wagenen posted bail of $75,000 on April 8. The charge is a first degree felony which, according to the charging document, carries a 15 year minimum sentence and up to life imprisonment if he is convicted.

Van Wagenen has had a long and successful career in film, starting with the co-founding of the Sundance Film Festival with Robert Redford in 1978. In more recent years, Van Wagenen worked on many high profile projects for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, more commonly known as the Mormon Church.

In February, Truth & Transparency published an audio recording in which Van Wagenen admits to sexually molesting a 13 year old boy in 1993. In the audio, Van Wagenen states that he has never engaged in sexual activity with any other minor. The news of this admision led to Van Wagenen resigning from his current position as a film professor at the University of Utah.

Earlier this month, the Truth & Transparency reported that Van Wagenen was under investigation for an instance of sexual abuse. At the time, few details were known. With this new charge, we now know that he was being investigated for sexually abusing a child under 14.

According to the probable cause statement contained in the charging document, Van Wagenen “rubbed” the genital area of a female between the ages of 7 and 9 on two occasions between 2013 and 2015.

Subsequent to the two instances of abuse, Van Wagenen was alone with the child and asked her if the touching made her feel uncomfortable. According to the victim, during this conversation he told her that this was same way he touched his wife. The victim expressed that the touching made her uncomfortable and he told her that he would stop.

According to the court docket, which has been viewed by Truth & Transparency, Van Wagenen made his initial appearance after the warrant was issued on April 8, the day he posted the $75,000 bail. The next scheduled court date is May 2, 2019.

David (not his real name), the young man Van Wagenen molested in 1993 informed Truth & Transparency that he was surprised by the charge. When he met with Van Wagenen last year and discussed his own molestation with him, David left that conversation convinced that Van Wagenen was being honest and sincere in his declaration that he had never had sexual contact with any other minor.

David goes on to say, “More than anything, my heart breaks for the victim in this case and I sincerely hope there are no other victims out there.”

Requests for comment have been sent to Van Wagenen, his attorney, Steven Shapiro, and the Salt Lake County District Attorney’s office. Shapiro declined to comment.

If you are a survivor a abuse, below are a list of resources that can be utilized in the United  States. If you are not a resident of the US, we encourage you to search  for resources near you.

National Sexual Assault Hotline

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP)

A book exploring the life and teachings of Russell M. Nelson, current President of the Mormon Church, underwent a last minute edit before its public release on April 8, 2019. The publisher, Deseret Book, became aware that the book contained a faith promoting story with material inaccuracies.The story was subsequently removed and the book reprinted in time for its scheduled release.

Excerpts from the book, titled Insights from a Prophet’s Life: President Russell M. Nelson, authored by Sheri Dew, were published in an article found in the March/April 2019 issue of LDS Living magazine.

One excerpt, titled, “You Didn’t Read it, Did You?”, tells the story of a young Nelson who was serving as a surgeon in Korea during the Korean War. While serving, he discussed the Book of Mormon with a nurse on staff, Beverly Ashcraft. He gave her copy of the book only for it to be returned a few days later by her husband, Derwin, a fellow surgeon at the base. Derwin did not express much interest in learning more about the book.

According to the story, Nelson pressed and convinced the Ashcrafts to read the entire book. The couple was eventually baptized by Nelson. Derwin died a few years later and Beverley remarried.

Apparently, sometime shortly after Nelson became an Apostle in 1984, he spoke at a Stake Conference in Tennessee. While at this Stake Conference, Nelson was drawn to a woman he saw in the crowd wearing a hat. While he was giving his talk from the pulpit he called her out in the crowd and asked how long she had been a member and who baptized her. She responded that he baptized her in 1951. The woman was Beverly.

The story goes on to describe how Nelson asked Beverly, ”How many people connected with you have come into the Church since I baptized you?” Astonished, she revealed a dream she had the night before in which someone at the conference asked her that very question. Because of the dream she came prepared with a piece of paper in her purse with the answer to the question.

According to Leslie and Katie McKenzie, daughter and granddaughter of Derwin and Beverley (whose name is spelled wrong in the LDS Living article), that is not what happened.

In a phone interview with Truth & Transparency, Leslie and Katie, told the real story behind their mother and grandmother’s conversion, a conversion story that has been a source of pride in their family for nearly seven decades.

Leslie and Katie say that their family have always been proud that their first exposure to Mormonism was through Nelson, the man who would later become President of the Church. They saw him as a spiritual giant, great leader, and the man that changed the legacy of their family forever.

They were aware that Nelson occasionally used the story of Derwin and Beverley as a faith promoting example of missionary work. The story even appeared in a 1984 Ensign article and in Nelson’s biography on lds.org. However, in these versions, there is no mention of Korea, Beverley being a nurse, or a serendipitous encounter at a stake conference in Tennessee.

According to Leslie and Katie, Beverley was never a nurse, she never lived in Korea, and she didn’t know Nelson until her husband introduced her to him.

Derwin met Nelson when the two were working at Walter Reed Army Military Medical Center in Washington D.C.. They were both doctors performing research, Derwin a veterinarian and Nelson a medical doctor. They became friends and Nelson later met Beverley who worked in the same hospital as a transcriptionist. Nelson introduced them to the Mormon Church and baptized them.

There was an encounter in the 1980s at a stake conference. Shortly after Nelson was called to be an Apostle, he traveled to Knoxville to speak at the conference. Leslie and Katie were both living with Beverley in Knoxville at the time. When they heard Nelson was coming to town they made sure to attend.

They remember that Nelson was aware of who Beverley was and knew she was in attendance. He did call her up to the podium during his talk and told everyone about her baptism story and about how there are many members of the church today as a result of her conversion.

There was no dream the night before, there was not a prepared note in her purse, and there was no confusion on the part of Nelson as to who she was. Katie adds that her grandmother ”has never worn a hat to church and did not have a hat on that day.”

Katie was first made aware of this new version of the story in early March when a family member sent her a screenshot of the article. She showed it to her mother and, when she realized that it was part of an upcoming book, immediately reached out to Deseret Book and LDS Living. She sent both companies a document with annotations pointing out the incorrect information.

Katie was eventually contacted by a representative from Deseret Book and another from LDS Living. The representative from Deseret Book thanked her for bringing this to their attention and that since it was so close to the release date they would just remove the story entirely instead of trying to fix it. The representative told Katie that this would require a reprinting of at least some of the books as the final printing process had already begun.

The representative from LDS Living told Katie that portion of the article would not appear in the online version, but did not say whether or not a retraction would be printed in the next issue.

Requests for comment from both Deseret Book and LDS Living have gone unanswered.

When asked why she felt the need to take it upon herself to correct the record, Katie says that her “main concern was the fact that people were reading this account and believing it to be accurate when it isn't.”  Her grandmother is still alive and she is worried about people in her ward reading the story and asking her about it, thus putting her in a position to have to lie or disparage Nelson, a man she loves and reveres.

Leslie and Katie also felt that the story, as it appeared in LDS Living, unfairly painted Derwin in a bad light, making it seem like he was dismissive of his wife and the Book of Mormon that was gifted by Nelson. He is not alive to defend himself and Katie felt it her duty to defend her grandfather from a false narrative.

Leslie and Katie harbor no ill will toward Nelson, nor do they think he owes them an apology. They hope that LDS Living prints a retraction and that better fact checking is done in the future before putting stories like this in books that are meant to be read by millions of people.

Update April 10, 2019: This article originally claimed that Nelson met the Ashcrafts at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland. This has been corrected to the Walter Reed Army Military Medical Center in Washington D.C.. Additionally, the last name of Beverley and Derwin has been corrected from ‘Ashcroft’ to ‘Ashcraft’.

A document received through an open records request by Truth & Transparency from the Sandy Police Department has revealed that Van Wagenen is currently under investigation for a sex offense.

In February, Truth & Transparency released a recording in which Sterling Van Wagenen, a noted executive producer and director of various film projects financed by the Mormon Church, admitted to molesting a 13-year-old boy in 1993.

At the time of the abuse, Van Wagenen confessed his actions to his local ecclesiastical leaders and received a formal disfellowshipment of 2 years. Additionally, Van Wagenen went to the local police and confessed his crime; no charges were filed.

In the recording, Van Wagenen claims this was the only instance of non-consensual sexual contact with another person. New information shows this may not be true.

The document, dated February 21, 2019, does not contain Van Wagenen’s name and the location of the incident is redacted. However, the request yielding the document asked for any recent “initial contact reports” involving Van Wagenen.

Initial contact reports differ from police reports and are always deemed public under Utah’s Government Records Access and Management Act (GRAMA). The amount of data found in them vary from agency to agency. In this particular report, the Sandy PD offers very limited information, only indicating the date, offense, location, priority, and officer assigned to the case.

Further, two other GRAMA requests were submitted by Truth & Transparency requesting all other police reports and investigative files involving the perpetrator. The investigative files were denied by Sandy City’s Chief Administrative Officer, Matthew Huish, saying the investigation is ongoing and the “release of the investigative files can reasonably be expected to interfere with an investigation and enforcement proceedings, and would be irresponsible and contrary to generally accepted practices.”

Because of the denial, the status of and the facts surrounding the incident are unknown. A response concerning the release of the requested police reports is yet to be issued by Sandy City.

Van Wagenen did not respond to a request for comment before the publication of this story.

If you are a survivor a abuse, below are a list of resources that can be utilized in the United  States. If you are not a resident of the US, we encourage you to search  for resources near you.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP)

National Sexual Assault Hotline

While at a sleepover with a friend in 1993, David woke up in the middle of the night to something that would haunt him for the rest of his life. His friend’s dad had his hand down his pants and was rubbing his penis. He jumped up and ran to the bathroom. He was scared and did not know what to do. He spent the rest of the night locked in the bathroom and the next 26 years traumatized by the events of that evening.

The perpetrator was Sterling Van Wagenen, a Mormon film producer and co-founder of the Sundance Film Festival, and, while he made a full confession of the crime to both his religious leader and the police, he never completely faced justice. More importantly, David was never given the resources to properly cope with the trauma and heal.

The Abuse

In an audio recording  obtained by Truth & Transparency, Van Wagenen describes a double life he lived for decades. When asked if he is a pedophile, Van Wagenen denies that label, but admits to multiple extramarital affairs with both men and women. He also admits to one single instance of sex abuse perpetrated on a minor. That minor was David.

David, whose name has been changed at his request, sought closure and reached out to his perpetrator through Van Wagenen’s children in an attempt to broker a one-on-one meeting. Van Wagenen agreed to meet with him in September 2018. David, not knowing what to expect, decided to record the conversation. What ensued was a candid conversation in which Van Wagenen was open about the incident and what he thinks may have led to it.

Van Wagenen admits to having “acted out sexually” on many occasions. He cites being abused as a child by his mother as a contributing factor to this behavior. On the night of the abusive act, he and his wife were arguing. He went downstairs, where the kids were sleeping, and “acted out” by molesting David.

Van Wagenen’s recollection of the details are fuzzy, but David fills them in during the conversation. David says he woke up to Van Wagenen’s touch and, as he realized what was happening, quickly ran to the bathroom, locking himself inside and spending the rest of the night there. David recalls Van Wagenen came to the bathroom door multiple times and urged him to exit. He was unsuccessful and eventually went back upstairs.

David mustered up the courage to tell his parents about the abuse. They went to a mutual friend of Van Wagenen who they knew through their Mormon congregation. This mutual friend informed Van Wagenen that he was going to tell the Stake President, Harold Brown, about the abuse. According to David, the friend, who was a Bishop of a nearby, different congregation at the time, encouraged his parents to let the church handle the situation.

Confession

In the recording Van Wagenen says that he was called into see Brown a few days after the abuse. Brown, was not only David's and Van Wagenen’s ecclesiastical leader, but also the commissioner of LDS Social Services, known today as LDS Family Services, a Mormon-owned non-profit providing members with professional counseling.

Because of this, David seemingly hit the jackpot regarding his chances of finding care and understanding after the traumatic experience. However, that was not the case.

Van Wagenen claims he fully confessed to what he did and that a disciplinary council ensued. The result was a two year disfellowshipment from the Church.

Disfellowshipment is described by the Mormon Church as:

“...the council may take is to disfellowship the member. Disfellowshipment is usually temporary, though not necessarily brief. Disfellowshipped persons retain membership in the Church. They are encouraged to attend public Church meetings, but are not entitled to offer public prayers or to give talks. They may not hold a Church position, take the sacrament, vote in the sustaining of Church officers, hold a temple recommend, or exercise the priesthood. They may, however, pay tithes and offerings and continue to wear temple garments if endowed.”

Brown apparently encouraged Van Wagenen to turn himself in to the police. Van Wagenen told David he confessed to a detective and never heard from the police again. He did not recall being told why he was never charged with a crime, but that he always assumed it was because David's parents declined to press charges.

Police Reports

Truth & Transparency was able to corroborate Van Wagenen’s claim of reporting the incident to police. Via open records requests, two police reports were obtained documenting that Van Wagenen did speak with a detective, claiming to have touched both David's abdomen and penis “over his clothing” and describing the penile contact as a “pat”.

In the report, Detective Steve Jentzsch of the Salt Lake County Sheriff’s Office reported contacting David's father who stated he did not “want to talk about what happened” and that he was “supportive of Mr. Vanwagenen in working out this problem.” Jentzsch concluded that “the victim refused to pursue [the] complaint.” The case was subsequently closed and Van Wagenen was never charged.

The report indicates that the interview between Jentzsch and Van Wagenen was recorded. Truth & Transparency was denied access to this recording by the Unified Police Department (UPD) claiming that because Van Wagenen was never charged, the recording is classified as private under Utah’s Government Records Access and Management Act (GRAMA) Section 302(d). Truth & Transparency has appealed the denial.

David denies that the contact was only over his clothing and reports it as a stroking motion, rather than a pat. He also states that he was not aware that police ever contacted his parents. Additionally, in the recording, he repeatedly said he was ten years old when the abuse happened, but dates on the police reports show that he was actually 13.

Truth & Transparency also submitted records requests to multiple police departments across the country in areas where Van Wagenen has lived. The only other offenses returned were minor traffic violations. A request of his personnel file from the University of Central Florida, where he taught from 1999 to 2005, yielded nothing but employment agreements and no evidence of any complaints from students or colleagues.

Who is Sterling Van Wagenen?

Van Wagenen has been involved in the film industry as a producer and director since the 1970s. In 1985, Geraldine Page was awarded the Academy Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role for her performance in Van Wegenen’s film, The Trip to Bountiful. He worked for BYU from 1993 to 1999 as an Adjunct Professor of Film and then again from 2007 to 2011 as the Director of Content for BYU Broadcasting. According to a profile published by the Deseret News, he was working in 2011 as an Executive Producer for the Mormon Church. He currently works for the University of Utah and, according to his online employee profile, is overseeing an internship class for the current Spring 2019 semester.

But his roots in cinema are much deeper.

Founding Sundance

In 1976 Van Wagenen and a friend decided to organize a film festival in Salt Lake City, Utah to commemorate the bicentennial celebration of the United States. The idea was to put on wide display an overview of American cinema. To his surprise, it was successful and they decided to host the festival  again two years later. Robert Redford caught wind of the plans and contacted Van Wagenen to get involved. The rest, as they say, is history. The two went on to found the Sundance Institute and Van Wagenen served as the first Executive Director.

Mormon Temple Videos

Mormon temples are shrouded in, what many would call, secrecy. The ceremonies that take place are rarely, if ever, talked about outside the temple. The principal ceremony is called the Endowment Ceremony. The Endowment, in part, serves as an instructional session to teach attendees about the foundations of the Earth’s creation and other core doctrines of the Church. This instruction is delivered by a movie played throughout the ceremony. Up until 2013, two videos rotated in these sessions, one was produced in 1988, the other in 1990.

In 2013 those two videos were replaced with three brand new films, all directed by Sterling Van Wagenen. Multiple sources involved in the production of these films told Truth & Transparency that Van Wagenen was brought in by the Mormon Church to direct these movies in an effort to produce a high quality product. These sources tell Truth & Transparency that, of the pool of possible directors, Van Wagenen was likely the best candidate to bring a high production value to the films due to his extensive experience in the film industry. Given the sacredness of these ceremonies, the selection of Van Wagenen implies good standing with the Church.

In January of 2019, due to doctrinal changes in the ceremony, the Mormon Church discontinued the use of the new videos in the Endowment Ceremony in favor of an audiovisual presentation that uses still images from the three movies directed by Van Wagenen.

In addition to directing the temple videos, Van Wagenen has directed or produced a number of films through Excel Entertainment, a for-profit subsidiary of the Mormon Church, including their most recent film, Jane and Emma.

Life After Abuse

David tells Truth & Transparency that he was never contacted by Harold Brown or anyone else from the Mormon Church to check on his well being. No therapy or other assistance was ever offered to him. As he described in the recording, this trauma has greatly affected his life and he has never fully recovered from what happened.

According to an undated press release from the Mormon Church, counselling is offered to victims of abuse and often paid for by the Church. Somehow, that policy was not put into action in David's case, even when his Stake President was an integral part of the Church’s social services.

When asked why he decided to make this recording public, David told Truth & Transparency that there are several motivating factors. He is surprised that Van Wagenen has not faced any real consequences for his actions and went on to enjoy church employment that many would consider prestigious and privileged. He wonders if there are other victims who may feel encouraged to come forward and seek much needed healing. Finally, he feels that sharing his story could provide hope to many who have suffered similar abuse and feel silenced for one reason or another.

David tells Truth & Transparency that he does not blame the Mormon Church for the abuse he suffered, but hopes that his case is an exception to the rule and that the Church normally ensures that perpetrators are held accountable and proper counseling is offered to survivors. If it is not an exception, he hopes that the Church takes proper steps to address the problem, specifically the issue of providing help for the victim.

Comments

Van Wagenen provided Truth & Transparency with the following comment on the morning of February 4th:

“I went through the Church disciplinary process and was disfellowshipped for about two years. I repented and there were no further incidents. I reported the abuse to the police, as I was instructed to by my Stake  President, and the parents elected not to press charges.”

The Mormon Church has not responded to a request for comment.

David revealed his identity in the New York Times on April 28, 2019.

Update February 4, 2019 7:55 am: Truth & Transparency apologizes for any implication that Van Wagenen’s sexual orientation is tied to this abusive act. That was not the intent and the sentence has been clarified.

You can listen to David's conversation with Van Wagenen here and read the transcript here.

You can view the police reports obtained by Truth & Transparency here and here.

If you are a survivor a abuse, below are a list of resources that can be utilized in the United  States. If you are not a resident of the US, we encourage you to search  for resources near you.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline

Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP)

National Sexual Assault Hotline

The Mormon Church, formally the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, has long maintained a neutral position regarding political parties and candidates. They do, however, explicitly reserve the right to call attention to issues that they feel have a significant impact on church members.

A local leader of the Mormon Church in San Clemente, California exercised that right last month, ahead of an information session held by the Capistrano Unified School District (CUSD), to discuss the proposed adoption of a new comprehensive sexuality education (CSE) curriculum for middle school students. The proposed curriculum change is part of ongoing efforts by many California school districts to comply with the state’s California Healthy Youth Act, which took effect in 2016.

According to an email obtained by the Truth & Transparency Foundation (TTF), and published on MormonLeaks, a Mormon leader, known as a Stake President, asked members to attend one of the three information sessions and express their opposition to the proposed curriculum changes. According to the Stake President, the proposed curriculum contains “...highly offensive, controversial, age-inappropriate and inaccurate material that would be inconsistent with the standards of any home, family or parent in our stake.” It is unclear what specific proposal he is referring to and requests for comment from the Mormon Church have gone unanswered.

Recipients of the email are told to visit the home page of United Parents, a local organization that helps parents fight against the CSE curriculum changes. The website provides scripted comments and questions that parents can ask at informational meetings or during other interactions with politicians involved in passing the curriculum. Additionally, the email instructs the recipients to not identify as members of the Mormon Church and to not make any statements that would suggest they officially represent the church.