LA PLATA, Md. — At 8 a.m. Friday, 9 sheriff’s deputies had been bunched behind the safety desk on the entrance to the Charles County Circuit Court docket.
Maryland
‘Treason!’ Moorish Americans facing gun charges create disarray in Md. courtroom
Lamont Butler and George Neal-Bey had been arrested after a confrontation with Charles County sheriff’s deputies throughout a site visitors cease final month. Each males had been armed on the time. Butler was additionally charged with resisting arrest.
The boys — a part of a bunch of Moorish Individuals who’ve tried to take over a southern Maryland gun vary — had no attorneys and had been representing themselves. They consider they’re immune from U.S. authorized and monetary methods, together with the Charles County officers who’re presently holding them with out bail on the county’s detention middle.
“Calling all Moorish American Nationals to be bodily current on 12/30/2022,” a discover on the group’s web site learn within the weeks main as much as the Dec. 30 listening to. “We want each one in every of you (close to or far) to indicate up!!!”
However as court docket was gaveled into session at 8:30 a.m., the three rows of benches remained largely empty.
Decide Brown booted up Zoom.
Butler, 38, appeared, seated in a sparsely furnished room with a mural of a setting solar.
This wasn’t Butler’s first brush with the regulation. In 2013, he tried to occupy a 12-bedroom Bethesda mansion value $6 million and was charged with breaking and getting into, fraud and tried theft.
However Butler — who claims to be the consul normal of the “Morocco Consular Court docket on the Maryland State Republic” — argued that the mansion fell underneath an 1836 treaty between Morocco and the US and truly belonged to him. It didn’t work.
On Friday morning, the choose had barely spoken when Butler made his first objection. He glided by a special identify — Lamont Maurice El — and didn’t consent to standing in for this different individual, regardless that that “different individual” was legally him.
As Butler spoke, 4 Moorish-Individuals wearing purple filed into the courtroom.
A second later, two extra males adopted, waving a big purple flag with threadbare edges. A deputy ordered them to fold it up.
On Zoom, Butler refused to offer his identify or affirm his date of delivery.
“Do you will have a house deal with?” Decide Brown requested.
“I object,” Butler stated.
When he repeatedly spoke over her, the choose muted him.
“I can’t have you ever talking once I’m talking, sir,” she stated. “Solely one in every of us can communicate at a time. … I communicate, and then you definately communicate, and we are going to commute till we’re accomplished.”
Butler stated he had a consultant within the courtroom. However the lady wasn’t a lawyer, so Decide Brown requested her to take a seat.
“Until you’re licensed within the state of Maryland, you can not communicate on anybody’s behalf,” Decide Brown stated.
When the lady refused to take a seat down, sheriff’s deputies tried to usher the complete group out. However they balked on the thought of leaving and refused to budge.
“Should you’re prepared to take a seat quietly, I’m comfortable to have you ever right here,” the choose stated.
Brown tried to maneuver ahead with the listening to, going over Butler’s prices — which embody possession of a firearm with a felony conviction — and advising him that he had a proper to authorized counsel.
“I’m not making an look, to start with,” Butler replied. “So long as the grass grows inexperienced, so long as the water runs downhill, so long as the solar rises within the east and units within the west, we are going to by no means come collectively. We’re separate folks.”
The choose requested if he’d like a referral to the Workplace of the Public Defender.
“Objection,” he stated.
“I’ve to mute you, since you’re speaking whereas I’m speaking,” she stated.
His subsequent court docket date, she stated, was scheduled for Feb. 3. Although he’d objected, she was going to ship him a referral for a public defender.
At the back of the room, the group of Moorish Individuals stood, making an attempt to talk on Butler’s behalf. They refused to settle down.
“Please take away them from the courthouse,” the choose stated. “… When you’re eliminated, I’ll come again.”
She stood up and walked by way of the chamber doorways, disappearing. The deputies tried to escort the Moorish-Individuals out.
“That is treason!” one man shouted.
“You don’t need to put your fingers on me,” an older man with grey hair stated to a sheriff’s deputy, pulling his masks down to speak. He gripped the purple flag.
“You can not contact me and harass me by grabbing me,” shouted one other lady in an extended inexperienced coat.
After they had been escorted out, the choose reappeared and moved on to 37-year-old Neal-Bey.
“I’m invoking my treaty proper,” he instantly stated, referencing Morocco, a rustic 4,000 miles away.
“Solely one in every of us can speak at a time,” the choose chided.
“I’m not consenting to an look,” Neal-Bey stated.
Like his co-defendant, Decide Brown instructed him, his subsequent listening to could be Feb. 3.
“Objection,” Neal-Bey stated.
The court docket was performing with out authority, he defined. This was an act of treason. However his listening to, too, was already over.
Close by, a printer whirred, spitting out a duplicate of his legal indictment.
On Zoom, Neal-Bey’s display screen went darkish.
“Can we name our subsequent case?” the choose requested.