From the December 2001 Idaho Observer:

New Mexico resolves Leas custody case

ROSWELL, New Mexico -- A judge here finally put an end to the nightmare that Fred Leas has lived since February, 1993. That was when Idaho courts, cops and child protective services personnel began insisting that his two little girls remain in the violent, sexually and emotionally perverse, drug and alcohol abusive home of their mother and step father. Leas, 51, was awarded custody of his daughters Audrey, 13 and Heather, 12 earlier this month.

“I am glad that New Mexico finally recognized that forcing my girls to live with their mother is not right,” said Leas.

Leas has been in court over 140 times and 14 judges have been recused from the case.

The Idaho Observer began covering the Leas child custody case in November, 1998. The evidence suggested then that the whole problem began when Leas' ex-wife Ruth and her new husband Paul Mohr wanted Leas out of the way and began a campaign to have him sent to prison. Mohr, a convicted sex criminal and a known drug dealer, went so far as to sodomize a woman named Christine Elder and convinced her to file a police report alleging that Leas forcibly raped her at gunpoint.

This case against Leas was dismissed after it was discovered to be based upon a false police report.

The Mohrs filed other false police reports as well. Though they were obviously false, Latah County Prosecutor Bill Thompson refused to prosecute the Mohrs for filing them. We have discovered that Thompson is most likely protecting an underworld relationship he had with Mohr.

Leas had evidence that his girls were being sexually and emotionally abused by their stepfather. The state would not listen so Leas rescued his girls in 1996 and hid them in South Dakota until he was arrested and prosecuted by Thompson for custodial interference.

In violation of a court order, the Mohrs moved the girls with them to Roswell. Thompson refused to prosecute them for custodial interference.

The Idaho Legal Aid Clinic from the U of I Law School has been representing the Mohrs at public expense even when they lived in New Mexico.

Last spring, the girls were forced by Idaho courts to return to their mother after hiding out with their father for several months. A child protective services caseworker in Roswell then determined that Paul Mohr was indeed subjecting the girls to sexual abuse.

Against the will of Idaho, a state that has forced the Leas girls to grow up in this bureaucratic nightmare, New Mexico saw fit to award custody of the two girls to Leas.

Leas now hopes to prosecute civil remedies that will expose the corrupt cast of players who participated in this travesty.