HOUSTON - Polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs was hospitalized Monday in a medically induced coma in critical condition after fasting in the weeks since receiving a life sentence for sexually assaulting underage followers he took as spiritual brides, officials said.
Doctors were not specific about why Jeffs, the 55-year-old head of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, was put into the coma.
Jeffs' attorney Emily Detoto said her client "hasn't been feeling well" and was taken to East Texas Medical Center in Tyler on Sunday night. She declined to elaborate.
Texas Department of Criminal Justice spokeswoman Michelle Lyons said Jeffs was in critical condition, but Lyons would not give specific details about his status. Lyons said Jeffs told corrections officers he's fasted in the time since his conviction earlier this month, though it was not immediately clear how long he'd gone without food before being hospitalized.
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During Jeffs' trial, prosecutors used DNA evidence to show he fathered a child with a 15-year-old and played an audio recording of what they said was him sexually assaulting a 12-year-old. Both were among 24 underage wives whom prosecutors said Jeffs collected.
Court documents show Jeffs tried to hang himself in January 2007 while awaiting trial on rape charges in Washington County, Utah. He also threw himself against the walls of his cell and banged his head, although he later told a mental health expert he really wasn't trying to kill himself.
During a visit with a brother that same month that was videotaped by jail officials, Jeffs said he'd been fasting for three days and remained awake during the night. Days later, he was taken to a hospital and given medication for depression. The court documents said he'd lost 30 pounds, was dehydrated and suffering from sleep deprivation.
Jeffs also had to be temporarily force-fed in 2009 while in the Kingman jail.
