Prison plays hide-and-seek with ex-polygamist sect leader

HUNTSVILLE, Texas (AP) — Earlier this year, a wife of former polygamist sect leader Warren Jeffs tried to visit him at a Texas state prison with a tiny microphone implanted in her hollowed-out watch.

Another time recently, a woman planning to visit the convicted sex offender was denied entry after a metal detector found something buried in her hair and she refused to show it to a corrections officer.

[...] is the hide-and-seek game authorities play with the self-styled prophet of the breakaway Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, who is serving a life sentence for sexually assaulting his 12- and 15-year-old child brides at a church compound in West Texas.

Among other breaches of prison rules, Jeffs' phone privileges were temporarily suspended in 2012 when it was determined the caller at the other end was broadcasting the conversation on a speakerphone.

Jeffs gets few visitors, makes only a smattering of phone calls, sends out a handful of letters and doesn't socialize much with others, prison officials said.

Texas authorities declined to provide the visitor and phone lists to The Associated Press, saying such records were confidential.

Outgoing mail marked as legal correspondence avoids scrutiny of the mailroom clerks, although the name on the letter is checked to ensure that person really is a lawyer.

Michael Piccarreta, an Arizona lawyer who's represented Jeffs in criminal cases from 2007 to 2010 — before Jeffs arrived at the prison — said he had not heard of lawyers serving as couriers.