Sovereign Citizen Research Paper

Sovereign citizens are anti-government extremists that believe that even though they reside in the United States that they are separate from the country. They do not believe that the government has any control or authority over them. Sovereign citizens believe that the government has no right to tax them, issue licenses, or do many of the other things that the average American citizen has accepted as the roles of government. Sovereign citizens have been known to commit murder or threaten harm of judges, law enforcement and government officials. Some groups or individuals use their sovereign claims in an attempt to avoid legal trouble and circumvent common traffic laws. Other groups believe they are at war with the United States and are willing

Since I would be the senior officer training a rookie officer, I would inform the officer even a minor traffic stop challenges the ideology of the Sovereign citizen and can easily escalate to a violent encounter. While violent encounters with individuals of this philosophy are rare, they can be sudden and deadly. You need to have the right mindset going into the stop and be prepared for the tactics employed by sovereigns. I would inform the officer to maintain focus on situational safety, be aware that the stop may be recorded and/or videotaped by the Sovereign citizen, apply enforcement as appropriate, we will try to make every effort to identify the subject and conduct searches and seizures that fall within legal authority. As a matter of practice every law enforcement officer at every traffic stop will request three items of each operator, license, registration and proof of insurance. When making traffic stops there are general indicators of the possibility that the individual could be a Sovereign citizen. Some indicators may be the license plate as they often have no record, have strange nation or have Republic of a certain state. Another indication could be a bumper sticker that states Sovereign Authority, Don’t Tread on Me, Sovereign Citizen, or Posse Comitatus. The individual may make strange statements when approached by an officer during a traffic stop. During a traffic stop the sovereign citizen will ask if they are being detained or spout off non-existing laws in order to confuse the officer so that the officer might break off the contact. They may state that it is unconstitutional to require individuals to have a license or that they are not driving, they are traveling. If they actually do produce any type of license or registration they are often bogus documents. After the stop I would inform the officer that you may receive a bill for time spent with the