What happens when you take a tax evader and sprinkle in a good dose of religious nuttery? You get, Robert Beale.
Apparently tax evader (not simple protester), Robert Beale is charged,
In a new complaint unsealed Monday, the former North Oaks executive was charged with conspiracy to prevent U.S. District Judge Ann Montgomery from overseeing his trial.
“Once I take down Ann Montgomery, no judge in the whole court will have anything to do with me,” Beale said in a tape-recorded phone call from jail.
I don’t know about you, but when I think of white collar crime, like tax evasion, I don’t think of more violent actions like attempts to knock off the judge. But it gets more bizarre, because it is based on some faith,
Beale is a “member/leader” of what’s known among certain groups as an extra-judicial “Common Law Court” in Ramsey County. The lengthy title of this specific “court” indicates a religious undercurrent, including a reference to “a superior court for the People, original jurisdiction under Almighty Yahweh exclusive jurisdiction in and for confederation-government United States of America.”
I wonder exactly where in the judicial system that falls? Between District Court and Court of Appeals? Maybe we should get Alberto Gonzalez involved, I hear he is looking for work. But see, it isn’t just this secret court that Beale believes in, God also has some specific plans for the judge,
Snell said that Beale told his common-law wife, Mun Suk Kim, in an April 3 conversation that God wants him to “destroy the judge. That judge is evil. He wants me to get rid of her.”
Wow, that must be some God, if Beale was polytheistic, maybe the God against the tax oppression? Now apparently Beale’s God has conveyed some special powers.
Beale also told Pelton that “God needs us to be like Gideon against the Mennonites– 300 vs. 120,000 men. We rise up and God will take care of us.”
But if his God will take care of him,
His trial was initially scheduled for August 2006. But he fled Minnesota before his trial could be held and was arrested Nov. 1 in Orlando, Fla., after spending 14 months as a fugitive.
why did he need to flee, and why was he caught? Sounds like Beale’s God is not taking care of him.
This is a man accused of evading over $1.6 million in taxes, and uses some bizarre form of religion to justify this. He is not making a strong case to us non-believers.
“I thought everybody should be doing what I was doing,” he said. “I wasn’t hiding anything. I wanted to be a hero. But a lot of people who try to do that end up in jail, just like me.”
Hero or criminal on the tax issue, that could be a point of debate for some people. But when it extends to killing a judge in the name of God, well it sure will be hard make that hero claim.
-Josh
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