It was a nice morning.
I had made coffee and just finished toasting up a zesty jalapeno and cheese bagel for Intransigentia and myself to share before we went to work. The dog was happily crunching on her kibble, the cat was mewing sonorously(?) as he always does and, of course our radio, was on CBC radio One listening to the news. And this is the story that I heard causing me to promptly choke on my the half of my bagel, ruining subtle sweet heat that only a sumptuously slathered creme cheesy-bagel can deliver in the morning.
The source of my bagel negation was this:
“An Alberta pensioner says she feels like a prisoner after her Calgary rental property was claimed as an “embassy” by a man she says identified himself as a Freemen-on-the-Land, a growing movement of so-called sovereign citizens that is raising concerns with authorities both north and south of the border.”
Da fuq?
My ire, and my curiosity have been put on hold until now, as I have the time to do a little research into what the “freeman” on the land movement is all about. But before we get into the back story of these wackaloons, we should finish with the embassy angle.
“A few months after the renter moved in, Caverhill went to inspect the work and she says she found the entire kitchen and bathroom had been gutted. All the doors inside had been removed and the floor of the master bedroom had been painted black, she says.
But Caverhill quickly learned she had much bigger problems.
“He walks me to the door and he’s yelling at me, ‘I’m a Freemen-on-the-Land,”‘ Caverhill says.
“I said: ‘This is my house, not yours.’ He said: ‘No. This is an embassy house now and it’s mine and you have no rights,’ so then he slams the door.”
She says she discovered the locks had been changed and pounded on the door.
“I said: ‘How come the key doesn’t work?’ He said: ‘I changed the locks.’ He said: ‘It’s not your home.”‘
Just as simple as that. This dude just declares the rental property that he recently gutted as embassy and tells the landlady to shove off. This is fucking stupidity with all the upgrades. It gets better –
“She [the landlord] says she later received an invoice from the renter’s personal company for $26,000 in work[?] done to the home.”
This high vicar of stupid who is/was illegally occupying this person’s house then had the audacity to charge her for wrecking and doing weird shit (painting doors black?)to the place.
I would not say that the freeman-on-the-land movement is the zenith of human stupidity, but I believe it is strong contender in the field. More importantly, these besotted tinfoil hat failures at life ruined my bagel experience. For that, they shall feel the pointy tip of my logos-based wraith as I investigate who these people are what their movement all about, in a daring series of lightly researched yet mildly amusing blog posts.
10 comments
October 12, 2013 at 10:38 am
bodycrimes
Find out more! I want to know if the police got involved. What an extraordinary story.
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October 12, 2013 at 11:06 am
The Arbourist
@Bodycrimes
The link to the CBC has the details of this particular Freeman escapade. However, this is just the surface, from what my preliminary digging has uncovered, the rotten onion has many, many, layers of kook. One shameful aspect is that apparently this nonsense (or a major branch of it) originates in Canada.
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October 12, 2013 at 2:59 pm
bleatmop
I’ve been following this story for a while and can add some details. Yes the police did get involved, but only after a while. The landlady was not well verse in rental law when this whole affair started and only went to the police for quite a while. The police, of course, would tell her that this is a civil matter and that there is nothing that they could do at that time. They would direct her to Service Alberta, a resource that she never utilized.
When this story finally hit the city and provincial news, then the lady started getting advice by other landlords on how to get the person out, namely to get an eviction order and post it. The landlady finally did what she should have done over a year ago, got the eviction order and posted it.
Getting this eviction order did two things. One, it actually alerted the authorities in Quebec that the suspect that they had province wide warrants for arrest was now in Alberta. The Quebec authorities then got a Canada wide warrant and had Calgary police service pick the guy up on their behalf. This happened one day before the eviction order. That is where I last saw an article about it, but the eviction order still stood. If the other inhabitants did not vacate by midnight that night, then the police would become involved, as the violation of the eviction order would then turn the situation from a civil matter to a criminal matter. I can only assume the condo is now cleaned out. Now the only thing left to do is for the landlady to go to civil court and have the lean the tenant put on the proper, for not paying for the unasked for renovations, removed. She could also civilly sue him for damages done to her property and lost rent, but something tells me that that would be a waste of time and basically she’ll never see that money.
I’ve actually read quite a bit about the Freeman On The Land Phenomenon. Wikipedia has a great article on it. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freemen_on_the_land
Rationalwiki has a better article http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Freeman_on_the_land
And one of the sources in the article leads to and excellent decision about a different Freeman here in Alberta. The justice took the time to actually explain the whole phenomenon and the legal speak (and the freeman’s legalese, a different language that uses English words but attributes different meaning to each word) behind it. http://canlii.ca/en/ab/abqb/doc/2012/2012abqb571/2012abqb571.html A long read, but well worth it.
I personally adore the level of dissonance that it takes to believe some of the shit these guys spout. For instance, they think when they are read their rights and asked if they understand, if they say yes then they are consenting to “stand under” the law. Thus every time someone asks if they understand they will say no. The best part of this being in this video (the RCMP officer is a saint). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8IPct574o4w
There, as this reply is verging on being longer than the original post I think I should stop.
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October 12, 2013 at 3:04 pm
The Arbourist
@Bleatmop
Well there went the series I was planning to do.. :) Bleat, I believe you just volunteered to write the follow up article regarding the origins and history of this particular movement. *grins*
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October 13, 2013 at 6:37 am
Martin
Have you had a look at how many folks have been gutted by the banks mate?
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October 13, 2013 at 9:44 am
Karl
What the huh ?
The police knew about this for 2 years … Did nothing … Me thinks the police are stupid !
This land lady also seems a few bricks short of a load – she is stupid
The freeman dude is a douche – and certainly stupid
This article is stupid !
The author of this article is stupid !
I am stupider for taking the time to read and comment on this blog! Ha !
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October 13, 2013 at 9:47 am
The Arbourist
@karl
Err..thanks Karl for your important opinions.
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October 13, 2013 at 9:51 am
Karl
@blepmop…
That alberta freeman judgement was nothing novel !
Vexatious litigants can be charged with contempt … However the burden of proving contempt is quite high and shifts to the court to prove !
There is a right to freedom of thought so you can’t prosecute a person for having freeman beliefs, and as I understand … They hold anti government views in earnest so proving them to be vexatious is quite a challenge !
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October 14, 2013 at 3:37 am
bleatmop
@Karl: Thanks for commenting?
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October 14, 2013 at 3:37 am
bleatmop
@the arbourist Doh! I talked myself into that assignment ;)
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