Illegal Federal Courts
This is to raise the question for any of my crime, mystery, thriller, conspiracy writer friends. Are there illegal federal courts?
A fellow was in a Federal court hearing once. The judge read the charges. The fellow answered by telling the judge a certain federal law U.S. CODE number and section. The judge immediately released the man and stated that he had no jurisdiction in the matter and then left the court immediately.
As a writer, I am surprised that there isn't more fiction, screenplays, or articles written on this subject. In another case, there was a fellow in Montana who was involved in a shootout with authorities at his home. I don’t remember the charges, but when he was arraigned in the court hearing, he refused to cooperate and pointed to the American flag with the gold fringe and stated, “the gold fringe on the flag means it is a military court and an illegal court.”
Back in the 80s and 90s I read about this sort of thing, and there was the talk about the “gold fringe flag courts.” See: http://message.snopes.com/showthread.php?t=1067 For more questions see: http://www.expertlaw.com/forums/showthread.php?t=103384 and perhaps:
http://msgre2.people.wm.edu/civproqsIII1a.html
Supposedly, ever since President Lincoln declared martial law during the Civil War, that declaration had never been rescinded after his death nor after the end of the war later. Apparently, that is the reason for the jurisdiction issues and “legality issue over civilians.” Article III courts and Foreign Intelligence Security Act [FISA] courts aside, it was clear that most of the so-called “illegal court” references had to do with tax issues. Google: “IRS Hoax.”
Related to the tax issues is the supposed viewpoint that the state of Kentucky never ratified the nearly eighty or ninety year old original IRS Act, according to anti-tax proponents. And that may be a reason that some authors have avoided the issue like the plague.
The gold fringe flag thing has a certain kooky history, which according to some is completely false. See: http://mysite.verizon.net/vzeo1z2a/YellowFlag.html. Amongst other sites there is argument as states at: http://www.tonyrogers.com/news/gold_fringed_flag.htm. But the federal jurisdiction cases are real, and may be so because of the increased federalization of a number of crimes. These crimes in the past were the sole jurisdiction of states.
Still, the question persists for me. Even if there is a legal gray area, what is the truth about illegal federal courts? Any of you writers heard of this stuff? Are any of you crime writers out there, up on the laws with this?
Timothy J. Desmond
http://timdesmondblog.wordpress.com
THE DOC, ebook conspiracy thriller novel at
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http://timsfiction-art.com
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Thanks for the note and "like." As I mentioned, it was or has a "kook" status ... in some circles. And yet, there are these stories that are out there.... or were out there. Some of this goes back to the 80s or 90s, but those linjs I posted are up now, one dated in their home page index is in it's 2004 archives. There are several overlapping issues. One is the "tax protestor movement." Another is the 90s "militia movement." A lot of that was quelled by the [I believe] the Oklahoma City bombing case - terribly sad story all around... and the Feds took it over from state of Oklahoma...... and hence adding to the "federalization of laws" issues. Those issues also cover "drug crime" - "money laundering." I think some of these have been written into some screenplays .. some "Lethal Weapon" movies subplots, etc. But, the reality at the local level, at least until the financial crisis of past three or four years, was that local and state police agencies were getting lots of money in federal grants, and getting added "crime task force" support. As Mark Levin mentioned on the radio last week, "Do you know how many federal agencies have their own SWAT teams?" I think he answered himself by saying "maybe all of them." Lately, what is being said is that none of this federal domestic surveillance has to do with "anti-terrorist" actions/controls. Since 9-11, a lot has changed with law inforcement. And yet, most folks are going to work, trying to solve their every day problems, and raise their kids in a decent environment. I haven't had other comments yet. It's Sunday too.
Wow! This is a very intriguing topic. I've never heard of it, but it sounds like good story material. It falls into the "strange, but true" category. Like today, I was telling my husband about the euthanasia of a Canadian bear a few days ago for eating a man. Sounds grizzly (pun intended), but not unbelievable, right? That is until you find out that the eaten man was a convicted killer--and apparently died of natural causes before being found by the bear.
I'd be interested in hearing what you find out.