Marriages not lawful, polygamist testifies

CRANBROOK, B.C .• Convicted polygamist Winston Blackmore has testified that his religious marriages to 24 women — nine of whom were underage — were all legal under his god’s laws, but conceded those marriages are illegal in Canada.

It was a stunning admission in court, since a mainstay of Blackmore’s application to have his guilty verdict thrown out is that he had no criminal intent and believed plural marriages are legal because of the constitutional guarantees of religious freedom and freedom of association.

His application in court, which contends Blackmore was unfairly charged, says when t he attorney general decided not to charge him with polygamy in 1991, Blackmore was “expressly told no charges would be laid against him and that his religious practices were protected.”

Under cross-examination, Blackmore admitted no one from the attorney general’s ministry specifically told him that.

Blackmore’s concession that he knows polygamy is illegal in Canada came after nearly a full day under crossexamination and at the end of an at-times testy exchange with special prosecutor Peter Wilson.

The former fundamentalist Mormon bishop of Bountiful, B.C ., contends in his court application that his many marriages between 1992 and 2007 were “induced by the public position of the attorneys general over many years.”