The family sued Buhman, Gov. Gary Herbert and Attorney General Mark Shurtleff in July, claiming Utah's bigamy statute violates its constitutional rights to due process, equal protection, free exercise of religion, free speech, freedom of association and having four wives.
(And bigamists tend to be anti-gay marriage . . . )
Waddoups, in his 21-page ruling, wrote that he dismissed Herbert and Shurtleff from the case because Shurtleff assured the Browns that they wouldn't be prosecuted. Shurtleff has a policy of not prosecuting consenting-adult polygamists as long as they're not committing other crimes.
But the judge wrote that Buhman conducted interviews with the media that made it clear he did intend to investigate and prosecute. That no charges have been filed does not matter, he added.
"The entirety of actions by the Utah County prosecutors tend to show either an ill-conceived public-relations campaign to showboat their own authority and/or harass the Browns and the polygamist community at large, or to assure the public that they intended to carry out their public obligations and prosecute violations of the law," Waddoups wrote.
TATTBITS
* E! News reports that
Demi Moore has entered treatment at the Cirque Lodge in Utah.
"She's on total lockdown and only talking to a small group of people," a source told E!
* A lawyer says the mother of the actress Phil Spector was convicted of killing has settled her wrongful-death suit against the legendary music producer.
Attorney John Taylor told the Los Angeles Times that terms were confidential, but says his client, Donna Clarkson, is pleased and relieved the suit is over.
Lana Clarkson was shot and killed in the foyer of Spector's Alhambra mansion nine years ago.
* Scarlett Johansson and Denzel Washington have received Germany's most prestigious film award as best international actors.
