Oops, it didn’t work. Last Wednesday, District Judge Tanya Walton Pratt tossed out Fogle’s claim, writing in her decision:Fogle filed a motion on his own earlier this month in U.S. District Court in the Southern District of Indiana, saying he wanted to correct an “error” regarding subject matter jurisdiction in the case.
His defense?
That he is a sovereign citizen — a group the FBI calls “a domestic terrorist movement,” believing “federal, state, and local governments operate illegally.” In his motion, Fogle pointed to a “friend of the court” brief that was previously filed by a fellow inmate in the same federal prison, stating, “whether a judicial judgment is lawful depends on whether the sovereign has authority to render it.”
Judge Pratt apparently has dealt with these weirdos before, and not even the magic of Sovereign Citizen anti-logic could persuade her that federal courts lack authority over people who declare themselves not subject to their jurisdiction. Which is pretty much what you’d expect from someone so deeply embedded in The System. Pratt also noted that Fogle had pleaded guilty to one count of “distributing and receiving child pornography” and also to a count of “traveling and attempting to travel to engage in illicit sexual conduct with a minor” — not that claiming he was a sovereign citizen, a free man on the land, or the King of the Sandwich Islands would have done him any good two years ago, either.If Fogle is now claiming to be ‘sovereign’, the Seventh Circuit has rejected theories of individual sovereignty, immunity from prosecution, and their ilk. […] Regardless of his theory, Fogle’s challenge of this Court’s jurisdiction is rejected.
Fogle was sentenced to 15 years, and we’re sure that at some point in the future he’ll find some other stupid goddamned way of preventing us from forgetting his name. In 2030 he’s probably got a decent shot at a Senate seat, as long as he runs as a Republican in Alabama.
Source: Wonkette