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https://www.theguardian.com/law/2024/dec/15/sovereign-citizen-pseudolaw-family-court-dangerous-ideology-custody-disputes-ntwnfb>
"During the pandemic, Alia’s* former partner started sending “long-winded
rants” via text message. Covid-19 wasn’t real. Stay-at-home rules were
unlawful, he told her, and he took their children to anti-lockdown protests. He
started to share what she later realised were “sovereign citizen” or pseudolaw
ideas.
“He wouldn’t follow anything that the government was saying because ‘it’s not a
genuine law, it’s illegal, it’s treason, and it’s all a scam that’s designed to
try to bring in the new world order’,” she said.
As the virus spread, they were in the midst of proceedings in the family court
over child custody. Alia said she tried to raise his behaviour with the court
and other authorities, but felt like it wasn’t taken seriously.
“It was brushed off as, ‘people have different beliefs and people have
different political leanings’,” she said. “I felt like I couldn’t clearly get
across that this was going so much deeper than a different political leaning.
That this was potentially putting the kids at risk.”
The impact of sovereign citizen pseudolaw movements – where adherents use
“legal argumentation” that has no legal basis, often predicated on a belief in
the illegality of or corruption of government – are having a serious impact on
the family court.
In 2024,
Guardian Australia has tracked almost a dozen family court judgments
where these kinds of arguments had an impact on proceedings.
“It’s really an emerging area in the family law jurisdiction that needs to be
addressed seriously … given what’s at stake with children involved in these
cases,” said Dr Georgina Dimopoulos, an associate professor of law at Southern
Cross University.
The issue is also affecting criminal cases involving children. At least two
women have been convicted this year of offences related to unlawfully removing
children in cases linked to sovereign citizen groups or pseudolaw ideas."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
