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The Dr. Phil Podcast

Manipulated in the Name of God: A Self-Proclaimed Prophet Exposed

The Dr. Phil Podcast

Dr. Phil McGraw

Education, Society & Culture

4.313.5K Ratings

🗓️ 18 May 2026

⏱️ 52 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Dr. Christine Marie, who along with her husband Tolga helped expose a man named, Samuel Bateman, who claimed to be the self-proclaimed prophet of a religious polygamous sect, known as the FLDS. Samuel Bateman claimed the group’s leader, Warren Jeffs, had died while in prison, and he was the now the prophet. It is reported that Bateman formed his own group within the FLDS, where his male followers not only gave their adult wives to the him, but also their underage daughters, as young as 9 years old, to become Bateman’s “wives,” and who he would sexually abuse. Dr.Phil will speak with Dr. Christine, who along with her husband Tolga, would earn the trust of Samuel Bateman and his followers, and be invited to spend one and a half years filming hundreds of hours of footage with them. Dr. Christine and Tolga would eventually begin secretly working with the FBI, while continuing to be embedded within the sect. Samuel Bateman would eventually be arrested and sentenced to 50 years in prison for the crimes he committed against his underage wives. Many of his adult male and female followers were also held to justice. Christine, Tolga, and their footage are featured in the Netflix 4 part documentary series, “Trust Me: The False Prophet,” which chronicles the rise and fall of Samuel Bateman, and is streaming now on Netflix.

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Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Tonight's episode is a conversation about a religious sect that I first began covering 21 years ago

0:14.0

when I first spoke with two teenage girls, Fawn Broadbent and Fawn Hol Home, who claimed to escape the powerful rule of a prophet

0:25.2

who was leading a religious polygamous sect.

0:29.7

You guys are torn.

0:30.9

I mean, it's like part of you misses your family, but part of you says, I don't ever want to go back there.

0:40.3

I need to know if this is right. I need to know if this is worth out of the pain.

0:42.3

I just know if I'm really going to go to Hill.

0:45.3

Now, many have reported it as a cult, but you can decide that for yourself as you listen

0:52.3

and learn more about what was going on.

0:55.0

It's a group with a reported core belief that the more wives a man has, the closer he gets

1:01.0

to salvation.

1:02.0

The sect called the FLDS, short for fundamental Latter-day Saints, broke away from the mainstream

1:09.0

Mormon Church when polygamy was outlawed in the late

1:13.0

1800s. Now the group would eventually settle in the neighboring two-state bordering communities of

1:21.9

Colorado City, Arizona, and Hilldale, Utah, the place I've visited personally in my 20-plus years of coverage.

1:29.4

Now, in the FLDS community, the prophet Warren Jeff's is who you are devoted to and obedient

1:37.2

to, doing everything he commands. Why? Because it is believed that God communicates directly

1:44.0

through him.

1:45.7

Now, I met the Fawns.

1:47.3

They had run away from their homes in fear that they would be forced to become teenage wives to warn Jeff's,

1:54.6

who was reported to have more than 80 wives with as many as 24 believed to be underage and that he was sexually

2:03.6

abusing.

...

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