Las Vegas Anti-Government ‘Sovereign Citizens’ Couple Plotted to Kidnap and Kill Police Officers

A Las Vegas couple who plotted to kidnap and kill police officers are part of a growing movement whose adherents believe they aren’t subject to laws and follow a complex theory about the secret enslavement of American citizens, authorities say.
The couple spent hundreds of hours developing a plot to attract attention to the movement, a cause known as “sovereign citizens,” which holds that police do not have legitimate power, authorities said.
The two shopped for guns, found a vacant house and rigged it to bind captives to cross beams during interrogation, and they planned to subject officers to their form of a trial for civil rights violations, authorities said.
Authorities have linked the “sovereign citizens” movement to the killing of police officers in the past. After two deputies in Louisiana were killed in a shootout last year, police said some of the seven people arrested had ties to the movement.
And three years ago in Arkansas, a father-son team of adherents to the movement killed two police officers before they themselves were killed in a separate gun battle with authorities.
In Las Vegas, an undercover officer was with the couple and documented their plans, police told reporters Thursday. Las Vegas police Lt. James Seebock characterized it as a domestic terrorism plot.