Where’s Samuel Bateman Now? Here’s if the ‘False Prophet’ Is Still in Jail After All 8 of His Wives Were Also Sentenced
Netflix has become the place for documentaries about true crime, but also documentaries about cults and sects. And director Rachel Dretzin, who is behind 2022’s Keep Sweet: Pray and Obey, is once again taking a look at abuse within the Fundamentalist Church of Latter Day Saints (FLDS) in Short Creek, Utah.
Trust Me: The False Prophet goes beyond what the last documentary chronicled and examines how one of the members of the community, Samuel Bateman, became the next chosen one after the fall of the community’s previous leader, Warren Jeffs. But what happened to Bateman? Does his story end the same way as Jeffs?
Where’s Samuel Bateman Now & Is He Still in Jail?
Samuel Bateman came into play after Jeffs was arrested in 2006 and sentenced to life in prison for the sexual assault of two underage girls, both of whom he said were his wives. Bateman stepped up in his place, ultimately forming an offshoot group.
The documentary follows Christine Marie, a former fundamentalist who became an expert in cults, and her husband, Tolga Katas, embedding themselves among the Samuelite Group with the hopes of garnering evidence to bring to the police. The group consisted of three male followers and dozens of wives and children.
Due to the evidence, Bateman was finally arrested in 2022, and in April 2024, Bateman pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit transportation of a minor for criminal sexual activity and conspiracy to commit kidnapping. In December of 2024, he was sentenced to 50 years in prison, to be followed by a supervised release for the remainder of his life. However, as Bateman was 48 at the time of his sentencing, the sentence is considered basically a life term.
The U.S. Department of Justice says that Bateman abused at least 10 children, some as young as nine years old. He also transported the girls between states for sexual activity. Alongside him, the three male followers of his cult, Moroni Johnson, Torrance Bistline, and LaDell Bistline Jr., were also arrested. They subsidized Bateman’s lifestyle and allowed him to marry their wives and children.
Marie and Katas had one ally inside the group, Julia Johnson, Moroni’s wife and the mother of four of Bateman’s wives. “None of them went easy to get married to Sam,” Moroni and Julia’s son, Warren Levi, says in the documentary, referring to his sisters. “Every one of them referred to him as the devil.”
Eight of Bateman’s wives also received sentences for the same crimes Bateman was convicted. Moroni Johnson pleaded guilty to conspiring to transport a minor for sexual activity and was sentenced to 25 years. Torrance Bistline, meanwhile, was sentenced to 35 years for helping Bateman to transport minors across state lines to engage in criminal sexual activity.
The third man, LaDell Bistline Jr., was convicted of the receipt of child pornography and transporting a minor for criminal sexual activity, among other charges, and was sentenced to life in prison.
At the time of the release of Trust Me: The False Prophet, Bateman and his three male followers are still in jail.
