Cut Leader In Dark About Guns Elizabeth Clare Prophet Says She Learned About Husband’s Arms Spending Through Newspapers

The spiritual leader of the Church Universal and Triumphant says it was through news accounts that she first learned her husband was spending thousands of dollars in personal money on assault rifles and armor-piercing bullets.

In a 1993 deposition, Elizabeth Clare Prophet said she and her husband, Ed Francis, maintain separate checking accounts and try to avoid discussing business at home. She said she routinely referred all memos and questions about security of church facilities to Francis, so she could focus on spiritual issues.

So when Francis, the church’s vice president, was arrested on federal weapons charges in buying rifles and ammunition to defend the church’s fallout shelter, it was a surprise, Prophet maintained.

“Sooner than he even discussed it with me it was all out in the papers,” Prophet said of her husband’s arrest. “I’m not sure to this day that I know the whole story.”

The comments are contained in depositions taken in connection with a federal lawsuit over the church’s tax-exempt status. The suit has been settled, and thousands of pages of sworn statements released under Freedom of Information Act requests filed by the Livingston Enterprise and the Bozeman Daily Chronicle.

Both Francis and Prophet said they attempted to keep church issues in the office, so they could maintain a normal home life.

“I work really long days, and she (Prophet) does the same thing,” Francis said in his deposition. “And for the most part we don’t like to bring the office home. … Otherwise we have no private or social time together.

“So a lot of times we just don’t discuss what is going on in the organization at night, because it’s stressful,” Francis added.

They also said there were some things they did not even talk about at work, and they painted a picture of disengagement with some of the issues that got them in trouble in the first place.

For example, although Prophet said she received 1989 memos from church staffer Vernon Hamilton about weapons and the inadequate shelter arsenal, they were forwarded to Francis.

“I receive piles of mail every day. So I see a memo from (Hamilton) to Mother and the board, and I see the subject of it. I know I have absolutely no expertise … so I read the first, you know, paragraph … and I route it to Edward,” she said of her reaction to a Hamilton memo about forming a shelter security team.

She said that in her role as president and spiritual leader, she oversees the religious, publishing and teaching departments. She said she stays out of the security issues, even though countless memos about security were addressed to her.

“I did not handle security ever. I could care less to attend a security meeting,” she said.

That job, as well as the ranching, business, construction, legal and public relations departments, is her husband’s field, Prophet told Justice Department attorney Stuart Gibson.

Francis and Prophet have long maintained the weapons were purchased with Francis’ private funds in a misguided attempt to ensure the shelter’s inhabitants would have a defense in the aftermath of some catastrophe such as nuclear war.

They say no church money was involved, and the purchases were not officially connected with the church.