Traveling is a right, but driving is a privilege. Why should I register this van for commerce, when….” Just then, the trooper turned on the cruiser’s light bar.
Matt declared, “Oh mercy’s sake. Another ticket. Swell. There goes a good chunk of today’s profit. Time to render unto Caesar.” He waited until there was a wide spot in the road, and pulled off onto the shoulder. The cruiser stopped five yards behind the van.
The trooper didn’t approach immediately, which made Matt even more nervous. In the rearview mirror, he could see the trooper using his radio handset. He asked Chase, “Is North Carolina on that NRVC you researched?”
He was referring to the Non-Resident Violator Compact, an agreement signed by more than thirty states. The NRVC shared records of motor vehicle registrations and driving privilege suspensions in a computer database that was available to law enforcement agencies in each of the signatory states. Under the NRVC, any violation in any compact state was treated as a violation in any other NRVC state. Cars and trucks were often impounded until fines and late penalties were paid and records were cleared in distant states. This process often took more than a week, leaving motorists stranded.
“I don’t recall,” Chase answered tersely.
As they were waiting, Matt flipped down his visor and pulled out the expired registration form and the notarized bill of sale signed by the man in Spokane from whom he had bought the van.
With his citation book in his left hand and his right on the butt of his holstered Glock Model 17, the trooper walked up to the van. He paused to examine the plate’s registration sticker, and then to peer in the back and side windows at the pile of cardboard boxes and plastic storage bins in the back. Then he walked up passenger side window, which Chase had already rolled down.
A Randolph county sheriff’s deputy approached from the south. As soon as the deputy saw the sharp angle at which the trooper had turned his car’s front wheels, he applied his brakes and pulled his car in behind the state patrol car.
He had recognized a secret signal used by law enforcement officers in the area.
Sharply turned wheels meant: “I need back up on this traffic stop—from an officer of any jurisdiction.” The deputy dutifully but regretfully stepped out to assist. He disliked the typically arrogant attitude of the state police, and their weekly ticket quotas. He mumbled to himself, “Gotta keep up that revenue….”
The trooper, who was six-feet-two and weighed two hundred and ten pounds, leaned over and gazed down at Matt. Matt was just five-feet-seven and weighed one hundred and thirty five. “Your registration sticker expired three months ago. That’s going to cost you.”With practice and precision he intoned,
“Driver’s license and registration, please.”
The sheriff’s deputy stepped out of his car and walked to the front bumper of his patrol car, so he could assist, if necessary. He edged forward so that he could hear what the trooper was saying. He didn’t want to intrude on the state police’s business, but to provide an effective backup, he had to hear what was going on.
Fumbling with the papers in his hands, Matt said, “Here’s the registration, but as for the driver’s license, I haven’t got it on me now, sir.”
“Just where is your driver’s license then, in your luggage?”
“No, it’s at home in Washington. I only carry it for when I’m driving.”
“Then you weren’t driving? So the other young man there was? I didn’t see you switch places.”
“No. He wasn’t driving either.”
“Don’t play friggin’ games with me, son. One of you was driving! Now which one of you was it?”
“Neither of us was. We’re traveling. Driving is a privilege, and requires a license. Traveling as a free de jure Sovereign Citizen doesn’t. If you refer to Shapiro v. Thompson and U.S. v. Meulner, the case law is well established on the unconditional right to travel.”
The trooper put on a stern expression. “You know, about ten years ago some uppity militia-Sovereignty-Citizen type like you with custom plates that said ‘Militia Chaplain’ tried to smart mouth the Ohio state patrol. He was saying the same sorta things you are, and he was packing a pistol. And they settled his hash, but good. The Federal Task Force boys showed us a training video on that incident. Did you hear about that one?”
“Yeah.”
The trooper tightened his grip on the Glock and thumbed off the retention strap with a loud pop. “Do you want the same thing to happen to you?”
Now Matt wasn’t just nervous. He was scared.
The trooper intoned with a practiced voice, “Your passenger can stay where he is. Will you please step out of the vehicle?”
“It’s not a ‘vehicle,’ and he’s not a ‘passenger.’ He’s my guest. I’m not getting out. You don’t have probable cause or even reasonable suspicion. You just want an excuse….”
“Get out, now!”
Matt obeyed the order. He was shaking. They walked in unison on either side of the van and met at the double rear doors. Matt asked, “Don’t you want to see these papers?”
“No. I want you to step back to my car. I’m going to search you for weapons first!”
Hearing the urgency in the trooper’s voice, the deputy jogged forward.
Matt replied, “I don’t want to be violated like this!” and took a step backward.
“You friggin’ sovereign-militia types are like peas in a pod. You quote two-hundred-year-old laws, and refuse to be ruled by those in authority over you. You’ve got no respect for legal statutory jurisdiction. The guys on the task force told me how to deal with you and your uppity attitudes. So you ‘don’t want to be violated.’ All right, son. Then I’ll just arrest you for not having a driver’s license, and then I’ll search you, and I’ll put you in jail, and I’ll impound your vehicle and its contents. How do you want to play it?You tell me.”
Matt stood his ground. The trooper snorted, and said in a demanding voice,
“We have three options…. Option one is I’m going to search your person to make sure you have no dangerous or deadly weapons. Odds are I’ll find something on you or in your van that could be construed as deadly. Then I’ll put you in jail. Option two is I can arrest you for not having a driver’s license. Then I can search you, and I’ll put you in jail…. Option three is if you continue to resist being searched, claiming your mythical ‘rights’ I’m going to ventilate you.
Those are the options you have, son. Which would you like to exercise?” The trooper tucked his citation book under his left arm and pulled the Glock from its holster.
The sheriff’s deputy now stood immediately to the trooper’s right. Seeing the trooper draw his pistol, he instinctively drew his, too. He asked quizzically,
“What’s going on here? Are there warrants on these guys?”
Matt asked, “How long will it take for you to call the state of Washington and have them confirm that I have a valid driver’s license?” He looked down at the muzzles of the two guns pointing toward him at “low ready.”
The trooper’s mouth contorted into a crooked grin. “Timezup! You just picked ‘option three,’ scumbag.”
Matt turned and ran back toward the front of the van, yelling to Chase, “Go!”
The trooper jerked the trigger of the Glock and it roared, even before the sights came in line with Matt’s body. The bullet barely grazed Matt’s leg, tearing a neat hole through his black denim jeans, just below the knee. The bullet bounced harmlessly off the pavement.