Closing arguments expected for B.C. polygamists accused of taking child brides to the U.S.

Closing arguments are expected to be heard today in a B.C. Supreme Court trial involving three people linked to the polygamous community of Bountiful, B.C.

Brandon Blackmore, Emily Ruth Gail Blackmore and James Oler are each charged with taking a child into the United States for sexual purposes.

The Blackmores a husband and wife couple are accused of taking a 13-year-old across the U.S. border near Creston in February 2004. Oler is accused of taking a child across the U.S. border in June 2004.

Court documents indicate Warren Jeffs, the now-jailed prophet of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, married one of the two girls involved in the case.

During court testimony, former Bountiful, B.C. member Jane Blackmore who is related to two of the accused described being taught polygamy was the key to reaching the "the highest degree of celestial glory" in the afterlife.

Blackmore was married at age 18 to a member chosen for her by the sect's prophet. She told the court she felt she was unable to refuse the marriage.

She later left her husband and Bountiful. By the time her 27-year marriage ended, her husband had 26 other wives.

Bountiful has become synonymous with polygamy after the marriage practices of residents who follow a fundamentalist version of Mormonism, a stream that has been rejected by the mainstream church.