The Nanaimo Three - Political Prisoners in Canada

[Hilfskreuzer Möwe]

Anybody know what happened to Mr. Brady Kirk? He seemed to be a pseudo-guru for Mr. Ream for a bit.

I haven't seen any mention of him in quite some time. I note Kirk acquired a girlfriend a few months ago - that may have cut into his 'talk about the law while drunk on the subway' time. Perhaps LightinDarkness has some data? I recall he mentioned Kirk was a part of the OPPT community.

Mr. Ream seems to be pretty much doing his own thing now - I don't detect any 'guiding hand'. That's not to say that Alex's material and strategy is anything unique, but it certainly appears to be a homemade variation on some old Freeman recipes. So when Alex says (as he often does) that he is "just being himself", I believe it.

Alex is still on the run, and apparently his family is concerned. An understandable response.

SMS Möwe

[Clovenhoof]

Ream is the only one of this gang I feel any sympathy for, he has always seemed to be in over his head, confused and lost. While he is the most active poster and an obsessive articulator of his position (if what he spouts can be considered coherent enough to be called a "position") I think he may actually have mental issues that might, legally, give him a way out. I don't feel that about the rest of them.

Mowe, in a previous posting, talked about Alex's One-Way Hell-Train to Incarceration but I'd suggest that phrase is more appropriately applied to Lange who seems to have doubled down and is in a full-throttle suicide run. Simpson seems the only defendant actively working on damage control. Jody Vaillant's disappeared from the scene, I think he plea bargained and I believe Smith is locked up but not sure about that. We're culling the sane and leaving the hard core for trial!

After all this despair and losses I wanted to revisit those wildly optimistic, happier days when things seemed to be going their way so I checked out the video links Mowe gave us from the time when the gang was driving to Kelowna B.C. to support Dean Clifford. All the links are dead! Has somebody been talking to lawyers?

I haven't been following the thread for a while, but I can maybe provide a little bit of general insight.

The charges against Jody Vaillant were dropped. He didn't plead to anything.

I'm assuming that Alex's arrest on January 9th was because of his outstanding bench warrant when he failed to appear for court back in September or October. Obviously, the moment he opened his mouth, the police would have had concerns about his mental health. The procedure that is followed is that once he's taken into custody, police either bring him directly to hospital for a psych assessment, or he's first brought to court to deal with his warrant. In the latter case, if anyone involved -- police, Crown, judge, duty counsel -- thinks there's a mental health issue, then the arrestee's bail hearing is adjourned for an overnight psych assessment. A doctor interviews the person, and gives a preliminary opinion on fitness to stand trial, and will also consider whether the person is certifiable. (This is also what happens if the police bring him directly to hospital on arrest.)

If the first doctor thinks he's certifiable, then he's seen by a second doctor the next day, and if that doctor agrees then the person is officially "certified", and kept in the psychiatric wing of the hospital. In practise, there are I think only three hospitals that are equipped to deal with violent/criminal people who are certified, Surrey, VGH, and Royal Columbian. So if he was certified at Burnaby, for example, he'd usually be transferred to Surrey.

The certification process in the Lower Mainland is problematic because they don't have enough beds. Often they have to cut people loose who are clearly mentally ill, and do represent a danger to themselves or others, but the risk is considerably less than the most recent guy brought in, so they find a way to decertify him. Those people often end up back in hospital within a short period of time, because (of course) nothing's happened to stabilize them. The other thing they do is, if the person is showing that he can be managed, he can be released from hospital on a pass. That may be what happened with Alex -- still certified, but released.

If at any point after his arrest on January 9th Alex was out of the hospital and on the street, then that means that somehow, someway, his outstanding warrant was dealt with, and he's back out on bail, so he won't be in-custody (meaning in jail) for his trial. He still may be certified, and they might be bringing him in from the hospital.

I'd be very surprised if they actually proceed with the charges against Alex. I thought the charges against Vaillant were a little bit stronger than the charges against Alex, though I didn't think either of them actually did enough that day to bring them within the scope of the Criminal Code.

I'm pretty sure David Lange has been around quite a while... I might be confusing him with someone else, but I think I remember him giving some "legal" advice to some members of a group called Fathers 4 Justice that seemed very similar to the whole Magna Cartians of the Freeland thing. (The grateful recipient of his wisdom spent 60 days in jail waiting for his trial on a minor assault charge, where the Crown was agreeing to his release on bail, was seeking only probation upon conviction, and where he was, indeed, convicted and received said probation.) Before that, I remember him having a beef in the Burnaby courts (back when they were still operating) about pesticide spraying, with similar kinds of arguments being made.

I really wish I could be there to watch the show at the end of February.

[Dai Kiwi]

Thanks for the update and for the interesting little bit about the difference between the theory and practice in the mental health system there - something that sounds all too familiar.

[Burnaby49]

I'm pretty sure David Lange has been around quite a while... I might be confusing him with someone else, but I think I remember him giving some "legal" advice to some members of a group called Fathers 4 Justice that seemed very similar to the whole Magna Cartians of the Freeland thing. (The grateful recipient of his wisdom spent 60 days in jail waiting for his trial on a minor assault charge, where the Crown was agreeing to his release on bail, was seeking only probation upon conviction, and where he was, indeed, convicted and received said probation.) Before that, I remember him having a beef in the Burnaby courts (back when they were still operating) about pesticide spraying, with similar kinds of arguments being made.

I really wish I could be there to watch the show at the end of February.

I'll be there and I'll give the blow by blow account. As far as Lange is concerned I've met him once, at Chief Sino Rock's seminar, and watched his antics in court once. He is a true believer who is going to demand that the court find him guilty. Since a judge just confirmed the February court date at the pre-trial hearing I don't see charges being dropped for him and Simpson. As I've related elsewhere Simpson is alsp up on charges of disobeying a court order in respect to filing tax returns so he is fighting on multiple fronts.

[LordEd]

Mr. Ream reports a return to hospital. Continues to report he is not 'diagnosed' with anything. Wonder what the definition of diagnosed is in freemanese.

He says he went to 'talk about whats real'. Not a smart move for a freeman.

[Jeffrey]

Mr. Ream reports a return to hospital. Continues to report he is not 'diagnosed' with anything. Wonder what the definition of diagnosed is in freemanese.

He says he went to 'talk about whats real'. Not a smart move for a freeman.

They have diagnosed his person, not the living flesh and blood man.

[LordEd]

http://thelawdictionary.org/letter/d/pa ... z2sHVMKdiR
DIAGNOSIS

A medical term, meaning the discovery of the source of a patient’s illnessor the determination of the nature of his disease from a study of its symptoms.Said to be little more than a guess enlightened by experience. . Swan v. Railroad Co.,79 Hun, 012, 29 N. Y. Supp. 337.

Is this sufficiently old for freeman-ese?

[notorial dissent]

Way too many big words, although that may be the problem to begin with, but I'm betting that until they stick a tag in his ear he won't be convinced he's been diagnosed.

[Arthur Rubin]

Way too many big words, although that may be the problem to begin with, but I'm betting that until they stick a tag in his ear he won't be convinced he's been diagnosed.

I thought the tag was on the toe. Is it different in Canada?

[Pottapaug1938]

http://thelawdictionary.org/letter/d/pa ... z2sHVMKdiR
DIAGNOSIS

A medical term, meaning the discovery of the source of a patient’s illnessor the determination of the nature of his disease from a study of its symptoms.Said to be little more than a guess enlightened by experience. . Swan v. Railroad Co.,79 Hun, 012, 29 N. Y. Supp. 337.

Is this sufficiently old for freeman-ese?

Perhaps it is, in common-law medicine.

[arayder]

The usual freeman discussion ploy at this stage of events is to whine that the courts are, in effect, saying that anyone who seeks freedom using freeman theory is insane.

Clearly this is not the case.

The freeman "they're calling us nuts" false argument ignores the reality that the courts are not saying all freemen are nuts. If they were every freeman who comes before the courts would get a psychiatric evaluation.

The reality is that by, when appropriate, examining the sanity of those before them Canadian courts are protecting the rights of folks like Ream, who may not be capable of defending himself in court.

Without judging Ream's sanity I have to wonder how dysfunctional the freeman cult must be such that its members, including Bobby Menard, didn't notice or care that poor Alexander was so far out of his league in dealing with real cops, real courts and the real world and had no business getting fixed up in the C3PO fantasy in the first place.

[Jeffrey]

I think Cloven is right to sober up the thread by reminding everyone that this stupidity hogs precious mental health resources.

I think even in Meads the odd relationship between mental illness and Freemanism is discussed. On some level it clearly appeals to target people who are already unwell but at the same time the gurus clearly craft their messaging to it appeals to people like Alex. I was discussing Kate of Gaia off site with someone who deals with LGBT issues in real life. I think that's probably among the clearest cases where mental illness is interwoven into the persons freeman beliefs that you can't deal with them separately.

It would be great to get an actual mental health professional to chime in with their opinion to see how far off base my/our speculation on these issues is. Is reeducation viable or even recommended from a health care standpoint? What is the priority for them when someone like Alex gets to the hospital, to treat the underlying situation but not address the freeman beliefs? Are we helping or doing more harm by challenging their beliefs?

I mean if the resources only exist to stabilize them then throw them into the streets, then chances are they will just keep running into problems with law enforcement, remain burdens to society, reach old age having done nothing with their lives. Among tax protesters there are
a lot that snap out of it since they clearly have money and things to lose, but it isn't the case here.

[notorial dissent]

arayder,

The people involved in these groups are for the most part no more or less sane, I would expect, than those of any other group, although they do all seem to share a greater level of societal ignorance than most and an incredible gullibility. What sets them apart, and very quickly gets the appellation of "insane" is their stranglehold on their belief and their unwillingess to look beyond their ignorance intentional or otherwise and look to the possibility, reality, that what they believe is just simply and completely wrong. That is what gets them looked at and the labels added, and usually, eventually locked up when the stupid meets the pavement.

I'm not sure that dysfunctional is exactly the word you are looking for, although I wholeheartedly agree, that it is one of the major components of the crowd in question. I really, truly, don't think they know or care, or really are capable for that matter of determining just how far round the bend or bounds of sane behavior someone like that is, and groups like this tend to eat their young, and their failures, as a group function, so it wouldn't really matter to them, and I quite truly believe that it doesn't matter to them. In their world view, they are "right" and we are "wrong" so the likelihood of them accepting anything from that source is like slim and none. The biggest issue is that the majority of them would seem to be so far over the edge themselves, or were never very close to begin with there to begin with that there is no reason they should recognize that there is a problem or an issue with their fellow, other than that he is just being his sovrun/free soul/fill in the blanks person.

In saying this, I am not saying that all Freemen/sovruns, etc are mentally incompetent, just that a great majority, of at least the very visible ones at any rate, all seem to exhibit a very wide variety of poor to no socialization, alienation, and varying degrees of paranoia, some with very good reason, and a general and near universal ignorance of the things most of us take for given in many cases.

[Hilfskreuzer Möwe]

I think Cloven is right to sober up the thread by reminding everyone that this stupidity hogs precious mental health resources.

I think even in Meads the odd relationship between mental illness and Freemanism is discussed. On some level it clearly appeals to target people who are already unwell but at the same time the gurus clearly craft their messaging to it appeals to people like Alex. I was discussing Kate of Gaia off site with someone who deals with LGBT issues in real life. I think that's probably among the clearest cases where mental illness is interwoven into the persons freeman beliefs that you can't deal with them separately.

It would be great to get an actual mental health professional to chime in with their opinion to see how far off base my/our speculation on these issues is. Is reeducation viable or even recommended from a health care standpoint? What is the priority for them when someone like Alex gets to the hospital, to treat the underlying situation but not address the freeman beliefs? Are we helping or doing more harm by challenging their beliefs?

I mean if the resources only exist to stabilize them then throw them into the streets, then chances are they will just keep running into problems with law enforcement, remain burdens to society, reach old age having done nothing with their lives. Among tax protesters there are
a lot that snap out of it since they clearly have money and things to lose, but it isn't the case here.

The answer is here:

• Jennifer Pytyck and Gary A. Chaimowitz, “The Sovereign Citizen Movement and Fitness to Stand Trial” (2013) International Journal of Forensic Mental Health, 12:2, p 149-153

Unfortunately the full text is not available online (as far as I am aware) but in brief the forensic psychiatrists who reviewed a couple Canadian Sovereign Citizens (I'd classify them as Freemen) conclude the concepts and beliefs that drove their unusual behaviour were a consequence of extreme political belief reenforced by membership in deviant subgroups. They only mimicked psychotic behaviour. Psychiatrists refuse to treat persons with unusual political or religious beliefs, so these Freemen were not appropriate subjects for mental health intervention.

What the authors do not continue to say is that leaves the solution to law enforcement, courts, or political resolution, but there you go - that's what's left.

SMS Möwe

[arayder]

Well said, folks.

I have more than once commented that Canadian freemen just can't seem to make a go of it in one of the world's most resource laden and just democracies.

If, as Jefferson and Locke told us, the pursuit of happiness is the freedom to participate in society, then Canada's open and free nature offers no excuses to "what victim I am", whining freemen.

I don't know if I should call this dysfunctionality. Maybe we should ask the families, siblings, spouses (and ex-spouses) and friends of freemen who so often prop them up if it is dysfunction? Or maybe we should ask the public welfare agencies which, we now know, often provide food, housing and medical care to freemen who cast themselves and "flesh and blood men" free of involvement with the government?

[notorial dissent]

I realize that a number of these people arrived at their current slew of despond by way of some type of very traumatic personal event, child services seems to be the larger common theme here from what I've seen, but if you go back further, a great majority, most????, of these people do not seem to have gotten what I would call even rudimentary basic socialization or education at the family level, and then it was acerbated as they got older and attempted to interact, and apparently failed miserably, with the society around them. The why of this would I think be the important factor, and dealing with why this is happening, as I agree with the mental Health professionals, that it is not their place to be dealing with these individual's political thought, but I do think many of them suffer from next to no functioning socialization or interpersonal skills which is why they have ended up where they are to begin with.

[arayder]

The fact that yo ole daddy didn't teach you right or that yo momma didn't love you enough is no excuse for telling similarly unsocialized individuals they can thumb their noses at the law and the courts.

We in the states went through all that with Jesses James and John Dillenger.

[Lambkin]

Jennifer Pytyck and Gary A. Chaimowitz, “The Sovereign Citizen Movement and Fitness to Stand Trial” (2013) International Journal of Forensic Mental Health, 12:2, p 149-153

Very interesting citation! I will see if my librarian friend can obtain it.

I suspect that many sovereigns are competent greedy scumbags, but (as with any radical social movement) people who are truly mentally ill will also be attracted to the flame. The courts need to be able to separate the two.

[Clovenhoof]

I've never spoken one-on-one with a Freeman, but I did have a chat with a trio of whatever you call the "9/11 truth" crowd. They were in a pretty chipper mood given that I'd just dropped the charges against their leader, some minor stuff that arose during the 2010 Olympics. Other than their general disposition at the time, they struck me as very similar to Alex and his ilk. The main guy seemed to have a semi-legitimate theoretical point to make (though factually absurd), and something resembling a sense of proportionality in how it should be delivered. His two followers were less well-adjusted, more disorganized in their thinking, more obsessed on the issue than the main guy.

I think there's a real commonality in the mental states/conditions of a bunch of these kinds of groups, and for the most part I don't think it rises to the level of a mental illness. A personality disorder, perhaps, but not much more than that. But given the strength of their convictions, and how very antagonistic they are in their approach to anyone who isn't "with" them, it certainly would look initially like a mental illness. It also makes anything resembling a rational conversation with them completely impossible.

I don't know how you'd ever get to the root issue -- childhood trauma, narcissism, excessive entitlement, or just pure greed. No way would they ever open up to any mental health professional.

I should probably be Googling this before asking it, but are there any ex-FOTL'ers out there who've gone public? You know, like ex-cult members, ex-FLDS members, that sort of thing?

[Hilfskreuzer Möwe]

... I should probably be Googling this before asking it, but are there any ex-FOTL'ers out there who've gone public? You know, like ex-cult members, ex-FLDS members, that sort of thing?

I've been watching for that kind of person. To date, no real hits. The closest I can suggest is Gordon Watson, who is documented here (viewtopic.php?f=46&t=9477). Watson was a Detaxer rather than a Freeman, and I have surveyed materials from his period of high activity, in the early 2000's, while he was active in that movement. Watson was one of the most intelligent, competent, and organized Detaxers I have ever encountered, and a leading personality in a large B.C. area Detaxer cell.

As for the Freemen, when they quit they just seem to disappear. I keep waiting for an 'insider' to talk. It puzzles me, to be honest. I have had a number of opportunities where I could have attempted to directly interact with what appeared to be local ex-Freemen but I have always refrained from that as a part of a risk minimization policy.

I would be quite delighted if someone who had been neck deep (or further) were to appear here and discuss their experiences. This seems to be a gap in our understanding of the phenomenon.

SMS Möwe