Modern-Day Outlaws, “Sovereign Citizens” Threaten the Rule of Law
Killings
Sovereign citizens have killed police officers and civilians. Darrell Brooks, who represented himself in court as a sovereign citizen, was found guilty in October 2022 of killing six people when he drove an SUV through a Christmas parade.
Dejaune Anderson, a self-declared sovereign citizen, is accused of neglecting her 5-year-old son so badly that he died of dehydration. Her trial is pending.
Traffic stops can be especially dangerous for police because sovereign citizens often will not comply with officers’ basic commands. At times, this tendency can lead to violence.
In April 2024, two police officers in Florida investigated a report of a man in a vehicle in a public park after the park’s closing time. The person identified himself as a “Moorish sovereign citizen,” a type of sovereign citizen who claims that people of African American descent are not subject to U.S. law because of a 1787 treaty between the U.S. and Morocco, which says nothing of the sort.
During the confrontation that ensued, the man allegedly shot and wounded the officers before being killed by police.
A New Subgroup
Over the past several years, a new variation of sovereign citizens has emerged, known as American State Nationals. In my research, I learned that they have been congregating on social media and gathering at seminars. Their leaders teach traditional sovereign citizen ideology along with new methods that supposedly let them live outside the law.
For instance, leaders teach their followers that driver’s licenses, marriage licenses, Social Security cards, car registrations and voter registrations are “contracts with the government,” which to them form the basis for requirements that they obey laws.
American State Nationals are urged to cancel or rescind these documents by filling out a set of forms, which are sold by the seminar leaders for about $250, in addition to the $150 seminar fee. Then they are told to submit the documents to county recorders and even the U.S. State Department. They are told that doing so will remove them from the reach of the U.S. government.
Paul Grice, the fifth member of God’s Misfits to be arrested in that Oklahoma kidnapping and murder case, reportedly sent his packet of paperwork by certified mail to Antony Blinken, the U.S. secretary of state.
Perhaps paradoxically, American State Nationals are also told to acquire a federal document that group members call a “noncitizen national passport.” They believe this document gives them many special privileges, including no longer being a U.S. citizen and having immunity from U.S. laws. They believe this even though U.S. law applies to everyone within the borders of the U.S.
In reality, this document does none of what they think it does. The document, officially called a “Certificate of Non Citizen Nationality,” is really for use by people born in one of several U.S. possessions, such as American Samoa. Directly contrary to what sovereign citizens think, the document certifies that its bearer does “owe permanent allegiance to the United States.”
Sovereign citizens’ beliefs have yet to hold up in any court of law in the U.S. or overseas. As an Australian law school lecturer said of a case involving a sovereign citizen in Australia, “No court in Australia, no court in the U.S., Canada, anywhere that I’ve seen, has ever accepted the legal arguments raised by sovereign citizens.”
Christine Sarteschi is Professor of Social Work and Criminology, Chatham University. This article is published courtesy of The Conversation.
