This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2010, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
Wanda Eileen Barzee said she now knows her husband was a manipulator, a liar and "a great deceiver."
During her second day of testimony, Barzee said Friday that Brian David Mitchell used religious blessings and revelations to get what he wanted — including Barzee's cooperation in the alleged 2002 kidnapping and rape of then 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart.
Barzee dabbed at tears while agreeing with federal prosecutor Felice Viti that she would never have participated except for her belief that Mitchell was inspired by God.
The 65-year-old woman acknowledged feeling "great sorrow" for what happened to Smart.
She said Mitchell had a revelation about forcibly taking young girls as plural wives after failing to convince any other adult women to marry him.
She said she was "heartbroken" and "devastated" at her husband's plan to "snatch" a girl, and she tried to dissuade him.
"I didn't want a young woman taken away from her family and her friends," Barzee testified. But she said Mitchell insisted it was the Lord's will for her to be "submissive and obedient ... I was told I needed to listen to the plan of my husband."
Barzee was called by the defense, which hopes to convince a jury to find Mitchell, 57, not guilty by reason of insanity.
While Barzee detailed plenty of bizarre behavior leading up to Smart's abduction, prosecutors appeared to score the majority of points from her testimony.
Her final assessment of her husband was that of a cool and calculating criminal, rather than a crazy, religious fanatic.
Barzee, who pleaded guilty last year, is serving 15 years in a federal prison for her part in Smart's abduction. She said she is taking anti-psychotic medication and undergoing therapy, which has improved her mental state since her arrest in March 2003. She said she believes Mitchell also has mental problems.
On Friday, Barzee testified Mitchell began receiving revelations in 1994. But his revelation about plural marriage came in November 2000.
"Brian said he had a dream that celestial marriage was going to be restored and he had a dream about a black woman," Barzee testified. "I started thinking about it and I got really devastated. I collapsed and cried in his arms."
Asked defense attorney Robert Steele, "You were upset because you had to share him?"
"Yes," Barzee said.
—
Revelations • Two days later, Mitchell had another revelation and said, "I needed to live the law or suffer eternal consequences," Barzee recalled.
Mitchell later took her to meet a woman named Kelly, a panhandler about 40 years old who was eight months pregnant by another man. Barzee said she thought she was supposed to give her consent, but Mitchell later said he had "already married Kelly … and consummated the marriage."
Barzee said they lived with Kelly for a week at her Salt Lake City apartment, where "Kelly wanted Brian all to herself and I would stay in the back room … and Brian didn't want to have anything to do with me."
The relationship ended when Barzee returned Kelly's key and declared she had no claims on Mitchell. But Mitchell, as a result, was "very hateful toward me," she said.
Mitchell also proposed to a woman named Julie, who was about 30 years old and worked at a shoe store. After a brief discussion during the woman's lunch hour, she rejected Mitchell's offer, Barzee said.
Barzee said Mitchell then had a new revelation about plural marriage: "We were commanded to take 14-year-old young women. We were to snatch them out of the world and train them in the ministries of God."
She said Mitchell began to go downtown to "stalk young girls [and] try to find out where they lived."
In the fall of 2001, Mitchell met Lois Smart, who was downtown with her children, including Elizabeth, and he was invited to do odd jobs at their Federal Heights home.
Barzee said that on April, 30, 2002, Mitchell had a revelation that on the night of June 4, 2002, "the Lord would open up the way for us to obtain our first wife."
—
The preparations • Barzee said they moved their camp to a higher, more isolated location and spent a week preparing for their captive. That included stringing a cable between two trees as a human tethering system.
During their preparations, they got into a heated argument. "We were so stressed out," Barzee testified. "I just knew how drastically my life would change, having a 14-year-old girl."
She said she gave Mitchell a way out by telling him that if the Lord did not "open the way," he would not go through with it.
In the early hours of June 5, 2002, Mitchell broke into the Smart home and abducted Elizabeth Smart at knife point, taking her back to his camp, where he performed a marriage ceremony and raped her, according to Smart's testimony.
During cross-examination, Viti asked Barzee about later confronting Mitchell because of his lust for the girl.
"You were angry both in Utah and after you took Miss Smart to California?" Viti asked.
"Yes," Barzee replied.
"And when you made your feelings known, he'd come back with a priesthood blessing … [that] involved scheduling time for you and scheduling time for Miss Smart?" asked Viti. "But he just wouldn't even follow the schedule, would he? He just kept lusting after Miss Smart and neglecting you?"
Barzee again agreed.
Viti also brought up episodes showing a mean and selfish side to Mitchell, including when he killed his 11-year-old daughter's pet rabbit and fed it to her, saying it was chicken.
Barzee cried as she recalled, "I vaguely remember him coming into the kitchen and telling me how to cook it."
She said Mitchell sold the wedding ring he had made for her when it got in the way of his panhandling in Palo Alto, Calif.
A student had told them that if Barzee "could wear a ring like that" they didn't need any money, she said. Mitchell used the cash from the sale to see a dentist about a toothache.
When Barzee tripped and was run over by a tire of their heavy half-ton hand cart, she said Mitchell's first concern was getting her out of the street before someone called an ambulance, because he feared they might lose custody of the cart.
She said she was in excruciating pain from a crushed chest cavity, and separated knee and shoulder joints. But they didn't believe in going to doctors and Mitchell tried to heal her using a form of massage called "lymphology." Barzee said that after three days she was able to sit up, but was still in pain. Barzee did not discuss her recovery from the injuries any further on Friday.
Barzee said she and Mitchell first began dressing in Biblical-style robes when they traveled to Miami in 1998.
Once there, Mitchell "started dressing like Gandhi with just the loincloth and the piece of yardage around his shoulder and he'd go barefoot into South Miami Beach and minister," she said, adding that "ministering" was Mitchell's term for "panhandling."
Barzee noted there were "naked topless women and in string bikinis" at the beach.
That prompted Viti to say, with a touch of sarcasm: "So he goes to South Beach in a Gandhi get-up and where there are topless women. He spent a lot of time ministering there?"
"Yes," Barzee replied.