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Tag: David Russell Myrland

  • Letter Sent To Federal Judge In Washington State Contained Ricin, FBI Says; Matthew Ryan Buquet Arrested

    americaatrisk4The FBI has arrested Matthew Ryan Buquet, who appeared in federal court yesterday to face a charge he mailed a letter containing ricin toxin to a federal judge in Washington state.

    Buquet is 37. The Associated Press, via Fox News, identified the intended recipient as U.S. District Judge Fred Van Sickle of the Eastern District of Washington. Van Sickle presides over cases in Spokane. He was appointed to the bench by President George H.W. Bush in 1991 and now serves as a senior judge. Prior to his appointment to the federal bench, Van Sickle was a state-court judge in Washington.

    It was not immediately clear whether the FBI suspects a broader crime. Nor was it clear whether Van Sickle ever presided over a case in which Buquet had a role. Washington state is known to be the site of an investigation into the activities of purported “sovereign citizens.” The word “sovereign” does not appear in a statement by the FBI yesterday on the Buquet arrest, but purported “sovereigns” have been linked to cases of domestic terrorism and extremism in the United States.

    “Our coordinated team acted swiftly to resolve a potentially dangerous situation and continues working tirelessly around-the-clock to investigate the origin of the letter and to address any remaining, potential risks,” said Laura M. Laughlin, special agent in charge of the FBI’s Seattle Division.

    “The U.S. Postal Inspection Service quickly deployed resources dedicated to find those responsible for this suspicious mailing to ensure the safety of U.S. Postal Service employees and the American public,” said Bradley J. Kleinknecht, inspector in charge of the Seattle Division of the U.S. Postal Inspection Service.

    The Spokane ricin investigation follows on the heels of an April incident in Mississippi allegedly involving ricin and the mails. President Obama, Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Miss., and a state judge in Mississippi allegedly were targets of the April letters.

    News of Buquet’s arrest came during the same week federal prosecutors in the Western District of Washington alleged that AdSurfDaily Ponzi scheme figure and purported “sovereign citizen” Kenneth Wayne Leaming was channeling deceased cop-killer Christopher Dorner in the courtroom.

    Leaming, 57, was convicted March 1 on charges of filing false liens against public officials involved in the ASD case, harboring two federal fugitives from Arkansas wanted in a separate multimillion-dollar fraud scheme and being a felon in possession of firearms. Based on their bizarre court pleadings, the Arkansas fugitives found with Leaming appear either to be “sovereigns” or people acting under the influence of “sovereigns.”

    “Sovereign citizens,” known to network over the Internet, may have an irrational belief that laws do not apply to them and may draft others into “sovereign” schemes, sometimes for a fee. Though typically linked to financial crimes, some individuals linked to the purported “sovereign citizen” movement also have been involved in sex crimes. In November 2011, a Florida man listed as a registered sex offender was jailed after the allegedly filed a bogus lien against a judge.

    In a separate case involving a purported “sovereign,” Bruce Chalmers Hicks was jailed in Florida last week. The Tampa Bay Times reported that Hicks served seven years in prison after his 2004 conviction for molesting a child under the age of 12.

    MailOnline reported yesterday that Buquet “was listed as a sex offender following an ‘indecent liberties’ charge in 1998.”

    The office of U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan of the Western District of Washington prosecuted Leaming, the ASD figure and purported “sovereign.” Leaming now claims a federal judge owes him 208,000 ounces of fine silver. Durkan’s office recently has prosecuted other purported “sovereigns,” including David Russell Myrland.

    In 2011, Myrland was sentenced to 40 months in federal prison for threatening the mayor of the Seattle suburb of Kirkland and other public officials. He later bizarrely claimed (apparently) that the government was engaging in a grammar conspiracy against him.

     

  • BULLETIN: AdSurfDaily Figure Kenneth Wayne Leaming Was Founder Of ‘Sovereign Group’s Armed Enforcement Wing’ And Had ‘Assault Rifle’ With Bayonet At Time Of Arrest, Prosecutors Say; Probe Was Part Of Deeper Investigation Into ‘Sovereign Citizens’ Operating Nationally Through Washington State

    Kenneth Wayne Leaming

    BULLETIN: The November 2011 arrest by the FBI of Kenneth Wayne Leaming was part of a deeper probe into the activities of a “national” group of “sovereign citizens”  operating in the Pacific Northwest, new court filings by federal prosecutors in the Western District of Washington reveal.

    “Local jurisdictions alerted federal law enforcement that they had received a significant number of threats from members of this group,” prosecutors said.

    Leaming, prosecutors said, was “a long-time constitutionalist/sovereign citizen, who had a
    documented history of holding himself out as a law enforcement officer and/or a lawyer . . . He also was instrumental in founding the ‘County Rangers,’ the sovereign group’s armed enforcement wing. Members of the County Rangers were issued realistic-looking badges and credentials were required to possess firearms as part of their duties, and held themselves out as law enforcement agents.”

    Leaming, 56, of Spanaway, Wash., is a figure in the AdSurfDaily Ponzi scheme story. Some ASD members have claimed Leaming was performing legal work for them, and his name appears on the ASD court docket as the filer of a purported “Notice of Final Determination and Judgment.”

    Such filings have been associated with the “sovereign citizens” movement.

    As first reported on the PP Blog last year, Leaming, 56 and a convicted felon for piloting an aircraft without a license, was found with two federal fugitives from Arkansas at the time of his arrest.

    Both of those fugitives — Timothy Shawn Donavan and Sharon Jeannette Henningsen — now have been convicted of multiple counts of mail fraud in a home-based business caper in Arkansas, according to court files.

    The new filings by prosecutors came in response to a bid by Leaming to challenge the search warrant in the case and to suppress evidence against him.

    Leaming was indicted on charges of filing false liens, harboring fugitives, possessing firearms as a convicted felon and uttering a bogus “Bonded Promissory Note” with a face value of $1 million and depositing it in U.S. Bank.

    The bank “briefly credited Leaming’s account in the amount of $31,350, before realizing the amount was wholly fictitious and reversing the credit,” prosecutors said.

    At least four of Leaming’s “sovereign” associates — David Russell Myrland, Timothy Garrison, Raymond Leo Jarlik-Bell and David Carroll Stephenson  — already have been charged or convicted in various schemes, prosecutors said.

    Bogus liens linked to Leaming were found during a search of Jarlik-Bell’s residence, prosecutors said, making a veiled reference to the ASD case as a “a large wire fraud case” in the District of Columbia.

    Whether Jarlik-Bell has any ASD ties is unclear.

    The liens had been filed with the Pierce County Auditor [in Washington state] against a “federal District Judge, an AUSA, and other federal agents and employees, ” prosecutors said.

    Other records show that each of the alleged lien targets had ties to the ASD case, including U.S. District Judge Rosemary Collyer of the District of Columbia. Collyer presided over the ASD case.

    Prosecutors now assert that agents conducted a search of Leaming’s Spanaway residence and found an “AK-47 style assault rifle with a bayonet; several handguns (one of which was in a drawer of the desk Leaming was sitting at as entry was made); two other rifles; and a shotgun.”

    From the prosecution filing (italics added):

    “Immediately after execution of the search warrant, but before Leaming was transported from the scene, agents asked Leaming questions about the presence of firearms for officer safety purposes. Leaming admitted that a number of firearms were present in the home.”

    Meanwhile, agents found a “box of ‘County Ranger’ badges and other false law enforcement credentials,” prosecutors said.

    At the same time, agents found “numerous boxes of correspondence and legal paperwork documenting other apparent fraud schemes,” prosecutors said.

    Leaming is contending that the alleged liens aren’t really liens and, even if they were, “he had some constitutional right to file them,” prosecutors said.

    He also contends that he has a Constitutional right to possess firearms as a convicted felon and that the government is not permitted to regulate firearms ownership, prosecutors said.

    As the investigation continued more bogus liens were discovered against other government officials, prosecutors said.

    Those liens have been linked to Leaming and Stephenson, a jailed former business colleague of Leaming’s. They were filed in Pierce County “against the Warden” of the Federal Correctional Institution in Phoenix and the “direct[or] of the Bureau of Prisons,” prosecutors said.

    From the prosecution’s filing (italics added):

    ” . . . during the investigation agents also discovered that Leaming was preparing and using false and fictitious financial instruments. These instruments were typically called “Bonded Promissory Notes,” and purported to be issued by the Federal Reserve or the United States Treasury.”

    As to the firearms allegations, Leaming “advanced some type of nonsensical, quasi-legalistic explanation as to why they were not, in fact, firearms,” prosecutors said.

    Leaming has been jailed since his November 2011 arrest. Since that time, he has sued President Obama, Attorney General Eric Holder and a county sheriff in Arkansas, according to court filings.

    ASD operator Andy Bowdoin was sentenced in August to 78 months in federal prison. He admitted in May that ASD was a Ponzi scheme. Prosecutors said the scheme gathered at least $119 million.

  • Jailed AdSurfDaily Figure Kenneth Wayne Leaming Sues Obama, Holder; Purported ‘Sovereign Citizen’ Claims President Not A U.S. Citizen And Demands Compensation In ‘Silver’ And ‘Gold’ For Alleged Unlawful Imprisonment

    EDITOR’S NOTE: Just when you thought AdSurfDaily-related events could not get any stranger . . .

    ** _____________________________ **

    Kenneth Wayne Leaming

    Jailed near Seattle and awaiting trial in September on charges he filed false liens against at least five public officials involved in the AdSurfDaily Ponzi case, purported “sovereign citizen” Kenneth Wayne Leaming has sued “Barrack Hussein Obama” and U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder in federal court in the Western District of Washington.

    The complaint was written in longhand and names Leaming business associate and fellow federal prisoner David Carroll Stephenson a co-plaintiff. In addition to Obama and Holder, the complaint names as defendants “J. Doe #1 (U.S. Atty)” and “John Does 2-10.”

    It is believed that “J. Doe” refers to U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan of the Western District of Washington. Durkan’s office has been involved in the prosecution of a number of purported “sovereign citizens,” including David Russell Myrland. Myrland was convicted last year on charges of threatening the mayor and officials of the Seattle suburb of Kirkland.

    After his conviction, Myrland sued federal prosecutors in Washington state, apparently alleging a grammar conspiracy.

    Obama, according to the Leaming/Stephenson complaint, is not a U.S. citizen and therefore is ineligible to be President. And because an ineligible President appointed Holder, it follows that Holder is “Personating [sic] the Attorney General of the United States” and therefore “cannot lawfully appoint or delegate authority to “Any United States Attorney.”

    It further follows, according to the complaint, that the charges against Leaming and Stephenson brought by the U.S. Attorney for the Western District of Washington should be declared “VOID For FRAUD” because the U.S. Attorney also is “personating” [sic] a federal officer.

    In court filings after Leaming’s arrest, the FBI cited a passage from an alleged Leaming email that referenced the children of U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts and their “school.”

    “In this email,” the FBI agent who sought Leaming’s arrest wrote, “I believe that LEAMING is offering to file documents on Stephenson’s behalf, including sending them to the Chief Justice, via his minor children.”

    Investigators discovered a paperwork trail that linked Leaming and Stephenson to a purported $10 million lien against Harley Lappin, the former director of the Federal Bureau of Prisons, and a purported lien for $20 million against Dennis R. Smith, the warden of the Federal Correctional Institution in Phoenix.

    As the probe that led to Leaming’s arrest proceeded, agents found bogus liens filed in Pierce County, Wash., against other public officials, including at least five officials involved in the ASD Ponzi case. Liens against Mary Peters, the former U.S. Secretary of Transportation, and Cutler Dawson, president and CEO of Navy Federal Credit Union, also were discovered.

    Leaming and Stephenson are demanding 100 “ounces of .999 fine silver” from each defendant as “compensatory damages ” for each day the government allegedly holds them unlawfully. In addition, they are demanding 1,000 “ounces of .9999 fine gold” from “each defendant” for “Punitive and Exemplary damages.”

    Screen shot: From the Stephenson/Leaming complaint.

    With two defendants formally named and 10 “Does,” it appears as if Leaming and Stephenson are demanding 12,000 ounces of gold. Gold is trading at roughly $1,600 an ounce, meaning the duo is asking for about $19.2 million at today’s approximate rate.

    Leaming was arrested in November 2011, after an investigation by an FBI Terrorism Task Force. Stephenson — already a federal prisoner at the time of Leaming’s arrest — later was indicted with Leaming on a charge of retaliating against a federal judge or federal law enforcement officer.

    In addition to the charges of filing false liens, Leaming also faces charges of harboring two federal fugitives, being a felon in possession of firearms and uttering a bogus “Bonded Promissory Note” with a purported face value of $1 million.

    The U.S. Secret Service has described AdSurfDaily as a $110 million Ponzi scheme and a “criminal enterprise.” ASD President Andy Bowdoin is jailed in the District of Columbia, pending formal sentencing Aug. 29 in the ASD Ponzi case.

    One of the individuals against whom Leaming allegedly filed false liens is the Secret Service agent who led the ASD investigation. False liens also allegedly were filed against three federal prosecutors who worked on the ASD case and the federal judge who presided over it.

    Leaming has a prior federal felony conviction for piloting an aircraft without a license.

  • UNBELIEVABLE: ‘Sovereign Citizen’ Imprisoned For Harassing Mayor Of Kirkland, Wash., Files Lawsuit Against Federal Prosecutors; Complaint By David Russell Myrland Apparently Alleges ‘Grammar’ Conspiracy By Public Officials

    UPDATED 3:38 P.M. ET (U.S.A.)

    David Russell Myrland, the Washington state “sovereign citizen” ordered in December 2011 to spend 40 months in federal prison for threatening the mayor of Kirkland and other public officials, has filed a lawsuit against federal prosecutors in Seattle that alleges (apparently) that law enforcement engaged in a grammar conspiracy against him.

    The story first was reported today by Seattle Weekly.

    Myrland’s 28-page complaint (including purported exhibits) formally was filed Jan. 23. Information within the complaint suggests Myrland began working on the document only days after his prison sentence was handed down Dec. 2. He is listed as an inmate at the Metropolitan Correctional Center (MCC) in Chicago.

    MCC houses prisoners of all security levels, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons website.

    While apparently alleging a grammar conspiracy by government officials contributed to his legal problems in a threats case, David Russell Myrland may be demonstrating his own lack of command over language skills.

    “Sovereign citizens” are known to file all sorts of wild documents, but  Myrland’s grammar lawsuit may set a new standard for the absurd. The document appears to parse virtually every word of a criminal complaint filed against him in the threats case by a special agent of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

    It does the same thing with Myrland’s plea agreement in the case.

    Both documents purport to break down individual words into their individual parts of speech, but the complaint suggests Myrland himself may suffer from grammar confusion. The word “mayor,” for instance, is declared an adjective under the interpretation “key” Myrland included in the complaint.

    “Mayor” is actually a noun.

    Myrland also declares the word “the” an adverb under his numbering system. “The” is actually a definite article. Mistakes involving other words pepper the complaint.

    Seattle Weekly reported that the office of U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan declined comment on Myrland’s complaint, “except to say he could face civil sanctions for filing a frivolous lawsuit. “

  • ‘Sovereign Citizen’ David Myrland Sentenced To Federal Prison For Threats; U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan Lauds Mayor, City Officials Of Kirkland, Wash., For Courage During Sustained Intimidation Campaign

    EDITOR’S NOTE: If Kirkland’s name sounds familiar to you — but you can’t quite place it — think about two of America’s great national pastimes: baseball and building things. Indeed, the city produced the 1982 Little League World Series champs, carding a thrilling win over a team from Taiwan, a youth-baseball powerhouse. Kirkland’s team became a source of tremendous U.S. pride, motivating the nation’s middle-schoolers to pursue excellence.

    The Kirkland team further was immortalized by legendary sportscaster Jim McKay in the “thrill of victory” clip on ABC’s “Wide World of Sports.” (The joyous “thrill of victory” clip featuring the Kirkland team was juxtaposed against the program’s signature “agony of defeat” clip showing ski-jumper Vinko Bogataj’s jarring ramp crash at a competition in West Germany in 1970.)

    Kirkland also is the home of Kenworth Truck Co., a renown nameplate whose parent firm, PACCAR, is a Fortune 500 company with 17,700 employees.  (Source: 2010 annual report.) PACCAR and its subsidiaries, including  Kenworth, create tens of thousands of ancillary jobs in the United States. In short, Kirkland is about excellence — and employment across America.

    That Kirkland, a city that motivated young people to pursue excellence and has contributed so much to U.S. commerce and the building/rebuilding of the vital infrastructure of the United States, was subjected to a series of ugly, life-altering incidents by the “sovereign citizen movement” should be a subject of great introspection for all Americans . . .

    “For too long Kirkland Mayor Joan McBride and other city officials have had to live with the specter of Mr. Myrland’s armed associates invading their homes. I applaud the courage of the mayor and her officers who appeared at the sentencing hearing today and described how this defendant’s selfish campaign of threats and quasi legal filings has altered their lives.” — U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan, Western District of Washington, Dec. 2, 2011

    Mayor Joan McBride

    UPDATED 2:03 P.M. ET (U.S.A.) David Russell Myrland, a Washington state “sovereign citizen” whose name is referenced in the criminal complaint filed Nov. 21 against AdSurfDaily figure Kenneth Wayne Leaming, has been sentenced to 40 months in federal prison for threatening the mayor of the Seattle suburb of Kirkland.

    But Mayor Joan McBride, according to federal prosecutors, was not the only target of Myrland’s sustained intimidation campaign, which began in April 2010 with a garden-variety traffic stop by police and evolved into a stupefying drama that will live in infamy.

    Myrland, 53, was pulled over for driving without a license plate. A police officer at the scene discovered he also had no driver’s license — though Myrland insisted it didn’t matter because “he was not subject to Washington State laws regarding driving,” federal prosecutors said.

    If Myrland were arrested, prosecutors said he insisted, Myrland would become “constitutionally authorized to come to the officer’s residence and ‘arrest’ the officer” — and would be permitted to use  “deadly force.”

    McBride received a letter from Myrland telling her that 50 “armed men and women” would appear at her home to arrest her, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reported. The mayor, according to the Post-Intelligencer, was advised to facilitate her arrest by not locking her doors.

    “DO NOT RESIST as these Citizens will be heavily armed,” the letter read in part, according to the Post-Intelligencer.

    U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan applauded Kirkland Mayor Joan McBride and city officials for their courage in the face of threats from purported "sovereign citizens."

    “Our cherished right to free speech does not extend to the freedom to make threats against our public officials and law enforcement officers,” said U.S. Attorney Jenny A. Durkan of the Western District of Washington.

    Other Kirkland officials also were threatened by Myrland, Durkan’s office said yesterday in a statement.

    In September 2010, Myrland “sent emails and placed calls” to Kirkland officials urging them to “keep their doors unlocked,” because they were going to be arrested and “should not resist,” prosecutors said.

    Myrland initially was arrested on state charges, but not even his arrest stopped the intimidation campaign. Federal prosecutors filed charges “after his associates continued to send letters to local officials referencing the use of ‘deadly force’ to apprehend a ‘fleeing felon’ such as Kirkland city leaders,” Durkan’s office said.

    During the probe, investigators linked Myrland to an “Assembly” of sovereign citizens with an “armed wing” known as the “County Rangers,” prosecutors said yesterday.

    Leaming has been linked to the same groups, the FBI said last month. Leaming, 55, of the Pierce County, Wash., community of Spanaway, is accused of filing bogus liens in Washington state against at least five public officials involved in the ASD Ponzi case in the District of Columbia — nearly 3,000 miles away.

    Among the allegations against Leaming is that he discussed a plan by which he’d serve U.S. Chief Justice John Roberts with a writ through the school his preteen children attend.

    U.S. District Judge Ricardo S. Martinez told Myrland at his sentencing yesterday that the law “applies to everyone,” as do “the consequences of breaking the law,” prosecutors said.

    Whether Myrland, who also was ordered to pay Kirkland $1,961 for “police overtime costs” because of his threats and will be placed on supervised probation for three years after his prison release, got the message is an open question.

    “He continues to this day to apparently believe that he was in the right, and everyone else is in the wrong,” prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memo. “Despite his guilty plea, he continues to argue that he had a legal right to make the threats he made; that they were not legally threats; and that he was in the right in virtually every respect.”

    Leaming repeatedly violated his probation after an earlier arrest for piloting an airplane without a license, the FBI said last month.