Former Child Bride Elissa Wall Says Her Marriage to Warren Jeffs Was “About Submission”

The time has come for Elissa Wall to speak out about Warren Jeffs. The former child bride recently revealed that she was forced to marry her then 19-year-old cousin when she was only a 14-year-old girl. As part of the A&E's new documentary — Warren Jeffs: Prophet of Evil — Elissa is telling the world what it was like being married to the president of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. The former cult leader is currently serving a life plus 20 years sentence after being convicted of two counts of sexual assault.

"I really think at the time it was about submission," she explained to Fox News about being a child bride. "I could have become a really big problem for the community and for Warren. I was a little more outspoken than the average girl. But I really think it was about pounding me into submission… I was just the next player he wanted to eliminate and to quickly get control over."

The 62-year-old convicted felon is believed to have had 78 wives, more than 50 children and controlled millions of dollars of the church before he was sentenced to life in prison for sexually assaulting his 12-year-old and 15-year-old child brides in 2011. Elissa admitted that she knew her childhood wasn't the healthiest even as a teenager.

"We led a very secret lifestyle," she continued. "We didn’t interact with the outside world. We didn’t go to public school. We were educated, cultivated and bred to be products of the church and the religion… I have this one vivid memory being at a beach in northern Utah. I was watching this family play about 500 yards away from us. They looked loving, kind and caring. The mother was hugging and holding her children. They were laughing and they didn’t look like these evil disciples of the devil like I have been told they were. So I think my questions really started early on."

Even though she endured such a tragedy, she has still been able to speak out against her attacker. She later became a lead witness in the trial that put him in prison. Elissa currently lives in Utah with her two children, where she runs a clothing company.