Document apparently sent to hundreds by Aroostook Watchmen host looks like a Sovereign Citizen thing

Oh boy.

Jack McCarthy (or someone claiming to be him) has sent a “courtesy notice” to hundreds of Maine lobbyists and other officials that is supposed to prevent them from ever interacting with him in the future.

If they do choose to interact with him, McCarthy — host of the Aroostook Watchmen, member of the Constitutional Coalition, and all-around interesting guy — says they’ll be subject to fines ranging from 500 ounces of silver for “breaches of privacy” to 10,000 ounces of silver for “engaging any 3rd party service absent a lawfully binding contract between the parties.”

The email comes from “Jack McCarthy” — email address aroostookwatchers@gmail.com — and certainly seems like the type of things we’ve seen from him before, although that’s a different email address than he’s been known to use in the past.

The document comes from a website that gives conspiracy theorists the “tools” they need to declare themselves sovereign from any government or corporation. According to the website, the “One People’s Public Trust” used some fancy legal language back in 2012 to dismantle every government, bank and corporation in the world.

Seriously. Check this out:

On December 25, 2012, three public trustees disclosed groundbreaking legal documents filed on behalf of THE ONE PEOPLE.  From this moment, a grassroots movement was born as the documents swept across the globe like wildfire.

Since these filings, hundreds of thousands of people across the world have been inspired to act on a common goal: Freedom from the old enslavement system and a choice to live their lives according to their own free will and free will choices.

Using a common legal process, current systems such as governments and banking have been lawfully and legally foreclosed upon, bringing an end to their corporate rampage of fraud and deceit.

The One People’s Public Trust documents opened the door so people could free themselves from the failed systems and co-create a new system, according to the desires and free will choice of each, acting in the highest good of all.

The website even lets you download a bunch of bogus legal forms that you can fill out and send to anyone you please. The one McCarthy chose is called a “Courtesy Notice,” which is a really nice letter letting everyone know that there’s no government any more and no banks and no corporations and that they have to leave you alone or send you a bunch of silver (because paper currency has no value anymore, obviously).

For reference, here’s the notice sent to the officials, and here’s the template provided by the OPPT website. I’m no lawyer, but the legal notices seem like junk.

The website that provides all these legal documents (with detailed written and audio instructions of how to file them and who to send them to) is full of all the Sovereign Citizen basics. Here are a couple examples:

  • Here’s the part about how since 1933, when Social Security was started, every person has been assigned a “corporation” at birth, and are slaves to the banking industry without their knowledge, but not anymore because of the aforementioned legal magic that broke all governments and banks.
  • Here’s the “information” on how the OPPT has rendered all debt void, explaining how if you’ve been foreclosed upon, you don’t actually owe anyone anything.

McCarthy sent these documents to people from organizations as disparate as the Maine People’s Alliance, Maine Women’s Lobby, Maine Heritage Policy Center, the American Heart Association, the Maine Wellness Connection, Nestle, Casella, the town of Brunswick and Cumberland County — plus literally hundreds more.

Hate group monitors and others refer to this kind of activity as “paper terrorism.” It seems largely harmless to send documents like this to lobbyists or lawyers, most of whom would likely recognize it as junk and ignore it. But so-called “sovereign citizens” have used similar tactics to harass individuals who may not know any better, filing bogus liens or receipts for damages owed. It’s been described by the Anti-Defamation League as a form of “harassment or intimidation” dressed in the guise of legalese.

It’s interesting because the notices were sent just days after McCarthy and his fellow members of the Constitutional Coalition — which was thrust into the spotlight after liberal blogger Mike Tipping revealed they had met with LePage eight times to discuss their concerns and conspiracies — held a press conference at the State House to let the world know that they were starting a new organization aimed at holding elected officials accountable to their unique interpretation of law and the Constitution.

It makes you wonder whether this is what was meant when they talked about holding people accountable.

Mario Moretto

About Mario Moretto

Mario Moretto has been a Maine journalist, in print and online publications, since 2009. He joined the Bangor Daily News in 2012, first as a general assignment reporter in his native Hancock County and, now, in the State House. Mario left the BDN in 2015.