Update: 401 children from polygamist sect in custody

Texas officials said Monday that they had taken more than 400 children into temporary state custody while they continued investigating allegations that girls at a remote polygamist compound were being sexually abused by men.

"This is the biggest single removal in the history of this agency," Child Protective Services spokesman Darrell Azar said Monday evening. "No one can remember anything quite like it. We had enough information to show a judge that many of these children had in fact been abused and others were in jeopardy."

Texas' decision to take temporary custody of the 401 children represented a significant ratcheting up of state intervention -- child welfare officials had initially placed 18 children under state control and merely moved others to a more neutral location to interview them.