Footage has emerged showing two young girls hidden inside a barrel at a remote doomsday cult compound.
The girls were among six children rescued from a grim polygamist site, which consisted of shipping containers in the Utah desert.
They were victims of child marriages and they were kept there by their fathers.
John Coltharp had kidnapped his four children and handed his daughters, Dinah (8) and Hattie (4), to his friend Samuel Shaffer
His friend reportedly married the girls and hid them at the makeshift compound.
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| John Coltharp and his daughters |
Doomsday Cult
John Coltharp and his friend Samuel Shaffer were part of a doomsday cult called the Knights of the Crystal Blade.
The religious cult, called a 'fundamentalist group for millennials' by its leaders, believed that a Muslim invasion of the US and an apocalypse were about to happen.
That's why they operated in extremely isolated areas like the desert where the children were discovered.
Shaffer and Coltharp were considered prophets in the church, but Coltharp was regarded as the 'higher prophet' within their cult.
When asked about her ex-husband's accomplice, Micha Coltharp had this to say:
"He goes by the name Samuel the Seer. He thinks he possesses the keys to this era and has been reborn multiple times in history."
Coltharp’s sister, Cindi Ray, described her brother as a ‘doomsday prepper’ and feared he was grooming his daughters for child marriage.
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| John Coltharp |
Court documents revealed that both men had married each other’s daughters, who were aged between four and eight because of their beliefs.
The older girls were said to have been sexually abused by the two men, whose beliefs were rooted in outdated doctrines that the mainstream church no longer follows.
On their cult's website, Shaffer frequently wrote about women submitting to men within their group, promoting a troubling and manipulative ideology.
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| Samuel Shaffer |
The Rescue Operation
The site where the children were kept was raided after Coltharp's ex-wife wife, Micha Coltharp, reported them missing, leading to a massive search.
When authorities arrived, they found Dinah and Hattie, along with Coltharp’s other daughters, Lily (7) and Samantha (5), who had not been reported missing.
The two youngest girls, Hattie and Samantha, were found inside large blue water barrels.
They had been hidden there for over 24 hours in extremely cold weather to avoid being found by the police.
Chilling images captured the girls barefoot, dressed in thin leggings and pajama bottoms, as they were rescued from the barrels.
The older girls were found in an abandoned trailer.
Coltharp’s sons, William (7) and Seth (6), who were also missing, were found earlier the same day.
All the children were dehydrated, according to reports.
Both leaders of the cult were later arrested and During questioning, Shaffer admitted they were hiding the girls from the police.
Michael Lee, Coltharp’s brother-in-law, believed they went off the grid to gain cult followers or join another group.
The authorities also stated that the men took the children to the isolated compound to prepare for an apocalypse
In May 2018, Shaffer, aged 34, pleaded guilty to child rape and abuse images and was sentenced to at least 26 years in prison.
Three months later, Coltharp, then 35, admitted to sodomy and child bigamy charges and received a minimum sentence of 25 years.
Polygamy and bigamy are illegal in the US, but in Utah, which has a large Mormon community, polygamists who are law-abiding citizens are usually not prosecuted.
This has led to situations like the 'Sister Wives' in some parts of the state.
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