They hate the US government, and they're multiplying: the terrifying rise of 'sovereign citizens'

["Dave Farber" <farber () gmail com>]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Dewayne Hendricks <dewayne () warpspeed com>
> Date: May 16, 2017 at 11:03:05 AM EDT
> To: Multiple recipients of Dewayne-Net <dewayne-net () warpspeed com>
> Subject: [Dewayne-Net] They hate the US government, and they're multiplying: the terrifying rise of 'sovereign 
> citizens'
> Reply-To: dewayne-net () warpspeed com
>
> They hate the US government, and they're multiplying: the terrifying rise of 'sovereign citizens'
> While US counter-terrorism efforts remain locked on Islamist extremism, the growing threat from homegrown, rightwing 
> extremists is even more pressing
> By J Oliver Conroy
> May 15 2017
> <https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/may/15/sovereign-citizens-rightwing-terrorism-hate-us-government>
>
> On 20 May 2010, a police officer pulled over a white Ohio minivan on Interstate 40, near West Memphis, Arkansas. 
> Unbeknown to officer Bill Evans, the occupants of the car, Jerry Kane Jr, and his teenage son, Joseph Kane, were 
> self-described “sovereign citizens”: members of a growing domestic extremist movement whose adherents reject the 
> authority of federal, state and local law.
>
> Kane, who traveled the country giving instructional seminars on debt evasion, had been posing as a pastor. Religious 
> literature was laid out conspicuously for anyone who might peer into the van, and, when Evans ran the van’s plates, 
> they came back registered to the House of God’s Prayer, an Ohio church. Also in the van, though Evans did not know 
> it, were weapons Kane had bought at a Nevada gun show days earlier.
>
> Kane had been in a series of run-ins with law enforcement. After the most recent incident, a month earlier, he had 
> decided that the next time a law enforcement officer bothered him would be the last.
>
> Another officer patrolling nearby, Sgt Brandon Paudert, began to wonder why Evans was taking so long on a routine 
> traffic stop. When he pulled up at the scene, he saw Evans and Kane speaking on the side of the highway. Evans handed 
> him some puzzling paperwork that Kane had provided when asked for identification – vaguely official-looking documents 
> filled with cryptic language. He examined the papers while Evans prepared to frisk Kane.
>
> Suddenly, Jerry Kane turned and tackled Evans, knocking him down into a ditch. The younger Kane vaulted from the 
> passenger side of the minivan and opened fire with an AK-47. Evans, an experienced officer who also served on the 
> Swat team, was fatally wounded before he even drew his weapon. Paudert was struck down moments later while returning 
> fire.
>
> As the two officers bled out on the side of the highway, the Kanes jumped back in their van and sped off. A FedEx 
> trucker who witnessed the shooting called 911.
>
> The Kanes’ ideological beliefs – which the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) believesare shared by “well into the tens of 
> thousands” of Americans – put them under the broad umbrella of the “Patriot” movement, a spectrum of groups who 
> believe the US government has become a totalitarian and repressive force.
>
> Although the Trump administration is reportedly planning to restructure the Department of Homeland Security’s 
> countering violent extremism (CVE) program to focus exclusively on radical Islam, a 2014 national survey of 175 law 
> enforcement agencies ranked sovereign citizens, not Islamic terrorists, as the most pressing terrorist threat. The 
> survey ranked Islamic terrorists a close second, with the following top three threats all domestic in origin and 
> sometimes overlapping: the militia movement, racist skinheads, and the neo-Nazi movement.
>
> Though the federal CVE program already devotes almost the entirety of its resources to organizations combatting 
> jihadism, the White House feels that the current name is “needlessly ‘politically correct’”, an anonymous government 
> source told CNN.
>
> Paudert’s father – who also happened to be the West Memphis chief of police – was driving home with his wife when he 
> heard chatter on the police scanner about an officer-down situation on the interstate.
>
> He headed to the scene, assuming a state trooper had been attacked. He then saw a figure in uniform sprawled at the 
> bottom of the embankment. It was Bill Evans, his gun still locked in its holster.
>
> Paudert then saw another body lying on the asphalt behind the vehicles. One of his officers tried to block him from 
> going further. “Please,” he pleaded, “don’t go around there.” Paudert shoved him aside. As he came around the corner 
> he saw his son, Brandon. Part of his head had been blown off. His arm was outstretched and his pistol still clutched 
> in his hand.
>
> Images of his son as a child, growing up, flooded through his mind. Then he saw his wife, who had been waiting in the 
> car, coming toward him. He moved to stop her. “Is it Brandon?” she asked. “Yes, it is,” he said. “Is he OK?” she 
> asked. “No,” he said, and she broke down.
>
> [snip]
>
> Dewayne-Net RSS Feed: <http://dewaynenet.wordpress.com/feed/>



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