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Roy Jeffs,the 26-year-old son of self-proclaimed prophet and convicted pedophile Warren Jeffs, never fully recovered from the molestation and solitude he was forced to endure during his childhood, according to his half-sister Rachel Jeffs.
Roy defected from his father’s cult —the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints— in 2014 before going public with his claims of paternal sexual abuse, inspiring others to come forward.
“He was so alone all his life,” Rachel Jeffs tells PEOPLE, noting police believe Roy died Wednesday night. “That pain, that hurt, he carried it with him his whole life.”
Rachel says she last saw Roy on Monday — two days beforehis death— after spending much of the weekend with him at a family member’s wedding.
“I hadn’t seen him for a few months, and he told me, ‘I’ve kind of withdrawn from the family a lot, but I want to get more involed with the family again,'” she recalls. “I was so glad.”
However, because Roy had spent much of his life before leaving the cult in houses of hiding, Rachel claims he was stunted socially, and had a hard time relating to many of his relatives.
“A bunch of the brothers were playing football, and he was sitting there … you could see the pain in his eyes that he couldn’t really relate to them. He didn’t know how to interact with them.”
At the wedding, Rachel says Roy — an avid swimmer who loved to laugh — told her and several of his other relatives “he was happier than he’s been in a long time.” Now, she wonders if she missed something or if she could have done more to help him.
“He was trying to be encouraged, trying to be a part of the family, but that pain he experienced as a child, it was still there,” Rachel explains.
According to Rachel, Roy was working for a brother who owns a company that installs solar panels. When he arrived to work on Wednesday, another employee he was supposed to do a job with never showed.
“Roy takes things like that personally,” Rachel says. “He feels like no one wants to work with him.”
She says Roy went to his brother’s house to speak with him, learning from the brother’s girlfriend that he was not there. “She said Roy was depressed that his brother wasn’t there,” says Rachel. “It really hurt him.”
Local authorities told Rachel that Roy took his own life that same evening.
“It was pretty courageous of him to leave the cult, and he had been living alone for a long time,” Rachel reflects. “He had been trying within the last few months to reconnect with his mom. But because of what had happened to him, his life was so hard.”
In 2011, a Texas jury convicted Warren Jeffs on two counts of child sexual abuse. A judge later sentenced Jeffs, now 63, to life in prison.
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Warren Jeffs fathered dozens of children, some of whom have leveled similar allegations against him. At least two of his nephews also alleged he abused them sexually.
Roy’s family has launched a GoFundMe campaign to help cover the costs of his impending funeral.
If you or someone you know is considering suicide, please contact the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 1-800-273-TALK (8255), text “home” to the Crisis Text Line at 741-741 or go tosuicidepreventionlifeline.org.
source: people.com
