The secret behind a secret set of caves carved out ‘by hand’ by cult members may have finally been revealed, with an explorer revealing what he found inside the strange structures
An explorer claims to have cracked the case of a group of secret caves, which were created by a polyamorous Mormon ‘prophet’. The Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, led by Warren Jeffs, started working on the caves years ago.
The cult were preparing for the end of the world and started digging underneath their compound for future safety measures. Based in Arizona, the area was home to the Mormon man who wed 85 women. Currently, he is serving a life sentence for aggravated sexual assault and a further 20 years for another count of sexual assault.
He featured in the Netflix documentary Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey. In it, he was exposed for having over 80 “spiritual wives”, including minors. Although, these were not formally recognised.
Veteran investigator Mike King told NewsNation about the strange caves around the compound – which have not been explored. He said: “Not only were they preparing for the end of the world from a religious standpoint, but they were temporarily preparing for it.
“And they started digging caves that I heard about all the years I was investigating out there, but I could never prove (their existence), I could never find it when I talked to members of the FLDS”.
The church, which had around 13,000 members, had previously denied the existence of the caves – with their inner cult workings being mostly hidden from the rest of the world.
Members told King “we’ve heard about it, but [the caves] don’t exist”.
King added: “I would talk to leaders in the church who fell away and said, ‘No, it doesn’t exist'”.
The caves remained undiscovered until King was one day handed a key by one of Jeff’s wives while he was living on the compound. Given permission, he finally entered the mysterious structures.
He discovered them stuffed full of survival materials including food, clothes, and church records. Kinng theorised that they were created to protect cult leaders from another potential raid after the church was raided by law enforcement in 1953.
On a YouTube video, King said: “They were not gonna risk their lifestyle to be shackled, and they weren’t gonna risk having their children taken from them again.
“I suspect that the construction of the caves started immediately following that raid on Short Creek in 1953 and it would have taken many years, if not decades, to complete this work project”.
He added that the vast majority of members did not know about the caves. He continued: “This was a well kept secret, and they were not gonna share it. In their terms it was holy ground and it was something nobody else needed to know about.
“The cave also provided a level of preparation against future conflicts that might come against the FLDS community, because the cult had this ‘Us vs. Them’ mindset they harbored resentment and distrust toward the government and frankly any other group or organization that didn’t believe in the same ideologies that they had”.
The caves were found to be full of weapons and explosives, potentially for protection from law enforcement or for the end of the world.
“There is evidence that they actually dug this cave by hand… you’ll even see places where they drilled as they prepared to put explosives into the rock to continue digging”.
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