Expert Report Shows Sovereign Citizen Extremists Will Use Bank Debt Collection Units To Target Victims
Expert Report Shows Sovereign Citizen Extremists Will Use Bank Debt Collection Units To Target Victims
Expert Report Shows Sovereign Citizen Extremists Will Use Bank Debt Collection Units To Target Victims
1. Explain what Sovereign Citizens are, what they do, how they are dangerous
and in this case whether Monica Jones, Sheri Moody, and Cindy Brown
have exhibited that same type of conduct.
2. Whether it appears the conduct toward Ms. Albert is the type of conduct
used by Sovereign Citizens.
3. Is there a Privacy Issue at Play Here?
4. Did Ford Motor Credit Company, LLC put Ms. Albert at substantial risk of
harm by communicating with an informant and/or Monica Jones?
At the time of the repossession of Ms. Albert’s vehicle, George Olivo, Cindy
Brown, Sheri Moody were outside in the courthouse parking lot filming the
repossession and were there when Ms. Albert exited to go to her vehicle.
According to the testimony of Moody, Jones and Brown, Ford Credit knew that
someone there sent a photo of the car to either Ford Credit or the Repossesser. So,
Ford Credit knew they were there. It is in Ford Credit’s own notes that Ms. Albert
expressed her fear that she did not feel safe due to the perceived psychological and
physical threats she had received. That notation was made on March 19, 2015 just
two weeks before the date of repossession and her encounter with these
individuals.
Paper Terrorism:
Sovereign Citizens use bankruptcy filings and erroneous real estate related
documents to delay foreclosure.
Anthony Troy Williams admitted he is a Sovereign Citizen and was arrested for
unlawful practice of law, mortgage broker fraud, and grand theft in Broward
County, Florida after drafting and recording real estate related documents and
other papers to avoid foreclosure for another homeowner.
The result of the series of Cindy Brown’s lawsuits is that she has avoided paying
her mortgage for almost a decade. Like Cindy Brown, Sovereign Citizens are
allowed to live without paying their mortgage by filing a series of bankruptcies,
liens at the Recorder’s office and/or civil lawsuits with no nexus to any underlying
legal justification. Sheri Moody has used the same venues in a similar pattern,
while neither Ms. Brown nor Ms. Moody had formidable employment.
Sovereign Citizens commonly record false liens to try to retain property or in order
to punish someone they determine has wronged them.
The real estate documents recorded by Sheri Moody and Cindy Brown on
November 26, 2014 have the hallmarks of these false liens filed commonly by
Sovereign Citizens. Both real estate documents use the name Common Law
Offices of America (“CLOA”). Common Law Offices of America web page was
run by Anthony Troy Williams.
The Two Orange County videos of Cindy Brown and others attempting to record
the documents on November 26, 2014, the first labeled the “denial” is
characteristic of a Sovereign Citizen where they will continue to tweak their
documents until they do it. They are fearless.
There are classic words and phrases commonly associated with Sovereign Citizen
ideology. For example, they use name variations and all capitals in the liens. They
speak of a strawman, identity theft, the vessel, court’s jurisdiction, and common
law grand juries. They use common law and cite statutes but rarely use them in the
modern modified and amended sense.
The Sovereign Citizen will talk a lot about the lack of jurisdiction. Blurring
jurisdiction is another characteristic of being a Sovereign Citizen. Rene Powers
does this during her interview with William Wagener and Cindy Brown. The
CLOA webpage has a PO Box located in Newport Beach but then where the zip
code is supposed to be it say “[Zip Exempt]”
There are references where they cite statutes, make statute of limitations
arguments, jurisdiction arguments without the amendments demonstrating their
actual contempt for the real law.
Other paper terrorism tactics include filing lawsuits and never pursuing them. Sheri
Moody did not pursue her federal litigation in California in 2014. Soledad Corona
filed a TRO against Ms. Albert and then never appeared at the hearing although
Soledad Corona personally served Ms. Albert at her TRO hearing against George
Olivo.
Additionally, Sovereign Citizens will use the legal process or Recorders office to
tie up a property, tie up a person or disarm them.
For example, Karen Rozier, Mr. Rhodes, Mr. Sandoval, and Soledad Corona filed
Temporary Restraining Orders (TROs) against Ms. Albert in 2014 after she filed
for protection against George Olivo. She had never met Mr. Sandoval in her life.
They were a tactic used which tied her up or disarm her.
On March 18, 2015 David Seal filed a few hundred-page TRO against Ms. Albert
and then never pursued a hearing date. The TRO was filed in retaliation with the
intent to tie Ms. Albert up or disarm her.
On the other hand, when Ms. Albert was served with the TRO by David Seal, she
dutifully turned in her firearm and waited out the legal process.
Sovereign Citizens are dangerous because they seek to undermine civil law and
authority that exists as necessary to protect personal safety and property. They also
seek to undermine community safety and property.
Exaggerating Experience and Education:
Sovereign Citizens try to appropriate bits and pieces of education, experience, and
professional affiliations, unlike those individuals that actually start education and
go through to get their license, experience and training to apply to a profession.
Sovereign Citizen will start things and not finish.
Karen Rozier was arrested for impersonating a licensed professional (architect) and
bilking over $70,000.00 from an elderly person in Los Angeles by taking the
money under the pretense they were going to provide home renovation services.
According to her statements, she continued to represent she was a rocket scientist
which the court would not allow the jury to hear.
Anthony Troy Williams was arrested for exaggerating his profession as a mortgage
broker and/or attorney.
George Olivo was arrested for misrepresenting his identity to police.
Exaggerations can be subtler. For example, Cindy Brown and Anthony Troy
Williams are labeled private attorney generals on the CLOA web page, but they
have never been employed as an attorney general. Additionally, Cindy Brown,
Valerie Lopez, and Monica Jones all have photos of badges on their social media
pages although none of them are law enforcement officers. Paul Murray is
displayed on the CLOA website and represented to be someone who was armed
and believed he had the authority to arrest people. Ms. Albert’s face was on that
page with a threat posted by Anthony Troy Williams saying she crossed him.
When the State Bar told Cindy Brown to pick up her files at Ms. Albert’s office on
November 10, 2014, Cindy Brown unnecessarily had the police enter Ms. Albert’s
office in November 2014 representing that Ms. Albert was under investigation and
she was acting as a party to that investigation which the State Bar was directing her
to initiate contact with them. After the video showed Ms. Brown retrieving her
files, Ms. Brown filed a 77 page document with the court of Appeal in January
2015 asserting she did not have her files while disparaging Ms. Albert and citing
common law.
Monica Jones deposition is a perfect example of exaggerating education and
experience. For instance, she testified that she had some college, then it was a
couple of semesters and then it was one semester and then she said she had trade
school, which was really just a real estate course to get your realtor’s license and it
does not really teach you how to sell your house.
Cindy Brown represented herself to be an investigator.
Sheri Moody represented herself to be an advocate for animals, but she was really
trying to get herself out of felony charges in a dog bite case.
Both Sheri Moody and Cindy Brown represented that they were employees of Ms.
Albert but the evidence shows that David Lovell employed Cindy Brown and Sheri
Moody has no evidence of ever being an employee.
Neither Sheri Moody, nor Monica Jones nor Cindy Brown hold a juris doctorate in
law like Ms. Albert. None of them passed the California State Bar and was
licensed to practice law like Ms. Albert and none of them were a small business
owner like Ms. Albert had been for the past 16 years.
Bullying:
Sovereign Citizens employ bullying techniques. Those techniques can include
filming their targets, retaliation, using the internet to harass, threaten or annoy their
target, and such.
Karen Rozier was arrested under Section 5150 and held for approximately five
days because she was not able to control herself in court after she threatened an
investigator for the Los Angeles District Attorney’s office in online social media
and by email.
George Olivo has been arrested multiple times for Driving While Under the
Influence and for drug transportation. His associates that support him, excuse his
bullying due to his intoxication issues.
Vern Nelson has also been arrested multiple times for DUI. Vern Nelson helped
George Olivo and Greg Diamond to get Ms. Albert’s State Bar issues in the local
press as shown in Maegan Nikolic’s social media page.
Maegan Donovan aka Maegan Donovan Nikolic was arrested for probation
violation on her drug charges.
Greg Diamond, Vern Nelson, Maegan Nikolic, Karen Rozier and David Seal were
other associates supportive of George Olivo. Here, there were multiple emails sent
to Ms. Albert by Karen Rozier telling her to kill herself after she threatened Ms.
Albert that men with guns were ready if she was seen driving down the street.
David Seal sent a very dark poem to Ms. Albert which can be psychologically
perceived as a bird being stuck in a tree and bleeding to death. Greg Diamond,
another associate supportive of George Olivo upset over a candidate race Ms.
Albert was a participant in ended his blog with “I will cut you” without naming
names as he said he was heading to their executive board meeting where she was
co-chairing Credentials. This was after a prior incident where Greg Diamond had
two near physical altercations over Ms. Albert’s candidacy at two different times
with two different gentlemen.
The act of working to get Ms. Albert’s vehicle repossessed was a form of bullying.
Another characteristic of being a Sovereign Citizen is showing up or bullying in
numbers. Six people showed up outside the courthouse filming on repossession
day while Maegan Nikolic, David Seal and others were inside the courtroom. The
Social Media posts shows that there have been multiple people involved and
requested to be involved to retaliate against Ms. Albert. The groups of people
showed up not only on the day of repossession but also in other Justice Protection
Project hearings where Ms. Albert said they would surround her where she was
sitting to make her feel uncomfortable. They showed up at her client’s hearing, her
endorsement votes, political activities and they even had a fake State Bar page
created on Facebook which then they tagged things about Ms. Albert in a false
light.
Cindy Brown videotaped Ms. Albert’s clients too such as Nathan Koshak and then
would post a photo of the vehicle with license plate number and description of the
person to social media that Ms. Albert was stalking her. Yet, she objected to giving
her height at the deposition based on her right to privacy. When Ms. Brown was
served with a legal subpoena for documents on behalf of Ms. Albert, Ms. Brown
taped the process server and told the server that she was a process server, too. Ms.
Brown refused to object to the subpoena or to comply with it based on her rights.
Monica Jones said she went to Friendly Ford to see if Ford was looking for the
vehicle because she was upset that Ms. Albert called her a Sovereign Citizen in a
legal paper and found it appropriate to tell Ford Credit things that she did not even
know was true in order to track Ms. Albert around town. Yet, Monica Jones
refused to answer questions at her deposition based on her right to privacy.
The reactions by Monica Jones, Cindy Brown and Sheri Moody are examples of
working outside the law and using their different set of rules for themselves.
As federal employees especially in the law enforcement discipline, we are
continually trained on privacy issues. I am confident that the employees of Ford
Credit were similarly trained on the right to privacy. Lack of vigilance assisted in
the efforts to undermine Ms. Albert’s privacy rights or anybody who seeks to
maintain some level of community safety with respect to their personal safety and
property. They have disrespected the law in this sense.
Another tactic used by Sovereign Citizens is the use of common law grand juries.
The question is posed on a video interview by William Wagener of George Olivo
whether they should call up a common law grand jury against Ms. Albert due to
her representation of Cindy Brown. An email exists where Rene Powers requests a
common law grand jury for Cindy Brown after an adverse ruling by a judge in
Orange County. Sheri Moody and George Olivo also state that they used a
common law grand jury or brought them with them to Florida with Anthony Troy
Williams regarding Sheri Moody’s condominium that was being foreclosed on.
Monica Jones posted bonds and oath amounts on her social media page as well a
radio show dedicated to Common Law Grand Juries. There was also a homeowner
seminar in Ventura being held by Cindy Brown, Anthony Troy Williams, Rene
Powers, George Olivo and Cliven Bundy sponsored by the Common Law Offices
of America.
Cindy Brown, Sheri Moody and Monica Jones each took pleasure in the
repossession and in recalling it at their depositions. They laughed throughout the
deposition. At the end, Sheri Moody told Ms. Albert that she was “going down.”
This behavior is consistent with a Sovereign Citizen.
Ford Credit put Ms. Albert at risk of danger because Ford Credit did not know who
Monica Jones was or what her interest was in following Ms. Albert around.
Ms. Albert’s fear was reasonable because Sovereign Citizens and those that use
their tactics and adopt their methods are unpredictable.
This group was working one step ahead. David Seal filed the TRO against Ms.
Albert on 3-18-15 the same day she contacted Ford Credit to pay her bill. Ms.
Albert was required by law to turn in her firearm while that TRO was pending and
she turned it in on 3-21-15. She was still fighting to regain her TRO against
George Olivo in the court of appeal at that time. Ford Credit then took her vehicle
at court on 4-6-15 knowing that others were there. In fact, George Olivo, Cindy
Brown, Sheri Moody and David Seal were all there.
They not only filmed the vehicle leaving the parking lot, they waited to capture the
look of Ms. Albert and her assistant upon the realization the vehicle was gone. This
ambush style of tactics could have been worse for her and it was a dangerous risk
for Ford Credit to take by communicating with this group through Monica Jones.
When Sovereign Citizens target, they target individuals. So, it is not uncommon to
see a target like Ms. Albert all of the sudden get pummeled with large TROS and
all of the sudden find businesses becoming uncooperative like Ford Credit treated
her. However, financial institutions are well aware of Sovereign Citizens and they
should have guarded against it in this instance. They did not and put Ms. Albert at
risk for over a year as she tried to get the security codes changed, VIN changed,
trade in her vehicle or get it registered.
Based on these factors, I conclude that the conduct of Sheri Moody, Cindy Brown,
Monica Jones and tactics they employed were consistent with that of a Sovereign
Citizen.
Conclusion:
Cindy Brown, Sheri Moody, and Monica Jones denied being Sovereign Citizens at
their deposition. Their testimony does not change my opinion. One does not have
to say they are a Sovereign Citizen to be one or to even believe in their ideology. It
is whether or not the person or group of people are using the tactics employed by
Sovereign Citizen extremists that is at issue. For example, one does not have to say
they are racist to be one, in fact they can deny it. Also, a person can be a racist
without being a card-carrying member of a Neo-Nazi group. It is their conduct that
determines whether they are a racist or not and the same is true for being a
Sovereign Citizen.
I reserve the right to augment or correct my opinions based on information that I
have not been provided or other documents that may be presented to me.
My hourly rate is $250.00 per hour.
Dated: October 27, 2017 _______________
Gregory Meinhardt, retired Special Agent
for Homeland Security