Naomi “Nomz” Bistline was one of Samuel Bateman’s 23 “spiritual wives” — but after a stint in prison, she’s coping with her past, one song at a time

When Naomi “Nomz” Bistline initially auditioned to be in her prison’s band, she tried out to be the guitarist. “Then I started singing a little and they said, ‘Put the guitar down. Let’s just hear you sing,’” she says. “I sang Miley Cyrus’s song, ‘Flowers,’ a cappella. And they said ‘We got our lead vocalist.’”

Though excited, Bistline, now 27, was apprehensive about performing in front of the other incarcerated women. “I remember that night going back to my cell and thinking, ‘This is so scary — I’ve never done this,’ and then coming to the conclusion that I’m the lowest that I’ve ever been,” she says. “I’m the lowest that anyone will be. Nobody has phones to video me and mock me or anything. Like, why not?” 

At that point, Bistline was in a Texas prison serving a 21-month sentence for unlawfully removing minors from state custody — a crime she committed under the direction of Sam Bateman. Bateman is the leader of a small offshoot sect of the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints (FLDS) who claims to be a prophet and the heir apparent to Warren Jeffs, the FLDS president who is currently serving life in prison for child sexual assault. 

Bistline was the 13th of Bateman’s 23 “spiritual wives” — nine of which were girls as young as nine, and all of whom he sexually abused. After living a sheltered life in a secluded town, followed by a stint in prison, Bistline now finds herself in the public eye, thanks to Netflix’s new docuseries Trust Me: The False Prophet. It tells the story of Christine Marie, PhD — an expert in cult psychology who infiltrated Bateman’s group posing as a documentary filmmaker, ultimately taking him down using footage as evidence against him — and the women like Bistline whom she helped to set free.

In September 2022, Bateman was arrested following an FBI raid of his Colorado City, Arizona compound, and the minors in his group were placed in state custody. That November, he instructed Bistline and two of his other followers to kidnap the girls and take them out of state. The women were caught in Washington State, arrested, and returned to Arizona.

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It took a few months of being in prison — and away from Bateman — for Bistline to realize that  he wasn’t a prophet, and that he had actually been abusing her and the other women and girls. “I started talking to the other inmates, and they’d tell me about their lives,” she says. “When I hinted about things that happened in my life, they’d be like, ‘Your life was not normal.’”

From there, she started challenging her beliefs. “I was also really scared,” she explains. “I literally thought that if I questioned Sam or Warren Jeffs, then lightning would come in and strike me and kill me. That was how brainwashed I was.”

Now, 18 months out of prison, Bistline has turned to making music and studying psychology to gain control over her own life.

“To see her come into her own is a profound experience,” Marie, who is featured in False Prophet, tells Rolling Stone. “She’s finding her independence and walking her own walk and making her own decisions. It makes me ecstatic.”

While Bistline’s eyes were opened in prison, many of the women in Bateman’s group still believe that he is a prophet and remain devoted to him. 

“I think Sam’s group was actually a cult within a cult,” Bistline tells Rolling Stone. “After Warren Jeffs took power, the FLDS did turn into a cult. But a lot of the people in it are not bad. They’re very, very good people, but they don’t know any different. So when Sam came, it was kind of like a break off of the FLDS. He was still controlling us through Warren Jeffs’ trainings.”

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SECULAR MUSIC IS STILL NEW to Bistline. “Growing up [under Jeffs], it was all religious,” she says. “[Our songs] were either written by the people in the cult, or they were the FLDS hymns.”

Today, Bistline has Olivia Rodrigo, Faouzia, Benson Boone, Bruno Mars, and Lady Gaga on repeat, but she’s constantly exposing herself to new genres and musicians. She recently listened to Hole for the first time after Courtney Love commented on one of her Instagram posts. “I do love that old music a lot because of the rawness of it,” she says of artists from the 1990s. “There’s no AI stuff and it’s not autotuned or anything. It’s so refreshing.”

Music has always been a presence in Bistline’s life. “[In Bateman’s group] we sang every day, but it was all choir singing — very classic, calm, like, cult singing,” she says. “It was still beautiful, though, with amazing harmonies.” It was around then she started to write her own songs. “Going back and reading those lyrics, it’s quite painful to realize how much conflict was going on inside when my heart was hurting all the time, and then my brain was just trying to do everything he said,” she says. “I didn’t understand the pain and suffering and punishments when I was trying my hardest to appease him, do everything he said, become the perfect wife.”

Though she started on guitar at 13, she was able to practice in prison after one of the unit managers learned that she played the instrument. “It was crazy cool and unexpected, but one day he just brought one in to me,” she says. “I started writing more and playing in my cell and just singing.” That’s when other incarcerated women approached her about being in the prison band.

Now, Bistline is working with a vocal coach and making her own music, which she describes as “mostly pop, some country.” This is a departure from the first songs she wrote while in prison. “They were before I’d ever even heard of Billie Eilish, but they had a very Billie Eilish-vibe — sad, melancholy,” she says. “I wrote songs about my past and forgiving that younger girl. But then I got into these rage anthems when the anger hit.”

Today, music is a critical part of Bistline’s trauma recovery. “It’s been a release,” she says. “Whenever I’m getting overstimulated or overwhelmed I usually just put on music or start singing. It’s a go-to and so easy to do — I can do it when I’m doing anything. It’s really nice.”

Bistline is currently working on her first album. “The only songs that I have finished are the prison experiences and processing that, and the rage anthems against Sam,” she says.

She hopes to release her first single and the accompanying music video in the next few weeks.

“I actually can’t wait, because it’s been this little secret obsession,” she says. “But when it’s actually out there, and I have something to prove, I think it will be so much better.”

Though she’s still living in Short Creek — an enclave of FLDS families on the Arizona-Utah border — she plans to move out of the area soon. At this point, she hasn’t decided where to call home next. “I have so many options,” she says. 

Once she earns her degree in psychology from Mohave Community College, Bistline plans to become an advocate for people in cults and coercive relationships — work she has already started by sharing her story in the docuseries.

“She did a great service to all of the other victims of Sam Bateman,” Marie says. “She validated their pain without them having to come forward. And because the response has been so positive, now other victims are realizing they have nothing to be ashamed of.” 

Though watching herself in the series was initially difficult, she’s now processing viewers’ positive response to the show. “I’m still in this space where it’s overwhelming, but a relief, because I didn’t expect this much support,” she says. “I was bracing for more pushback, more hate. I felt like everybody has that right to hate me because I existed in that space, even though I was born and raised in it.”

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In the meantime, amid the music, classes, and self-reflection, Bistline is building herself back one step at a time. 

“I started this diary called ‘My First Time Diary,’ and I save receipts and tickets and all the different things and then take pictures and write about those experiences and what I felt about them.” Her diary includes a napkin from the first time she ate in a restaurant (she had a tomato sandwich, fries, and orange juice) and the ticket stub from her first trip to a theater (she saw Moana 2). “I’m still in that era where I say I’m just a baby,” she says. “I’m only 18 months old.”