David Wynn Miller
David Wynn Miller, also styled :David-Wynn: Miller or David-Wynn: Miller, was an American tool and die welder, proponent of conspiracy theories, and leader of a far-right tax protester group within the sovereign citizen movement. He was a proponent of the use of certain syntax he created to be used by people involved in legal proceedings. He referred to his syntax as QUANTUM-LANGUAGE-PARSE-SYNTAX-GRAMMAR which he asserts constitutes "correct sentence structure communication syntax." This is a variation of the tax protester "capital letters" argument, a form of strawman theory. People seeking remedy with Miller's syntax in court have not met with success.
Miller's description of his work and views
Miller lived in Ohio before moving to Milwaukee, Wisconsin. In his Messianic origin story, he said that he died for half an hour at the age of 25 when an inept surgeon removed both his kidneys and adrenal glands. His heart restarted spontaneously while outside his body during autopsy. Following this, he said his IQ became 200, his endorphin levels were six times normal, and he stopped aging. According to his website, he appeared pro se 67 times in child custody hearings, losing every time, and was inspired to develop his own theory of language. Among the bizarre rules of his language, sentences start with prepositional phrases, only nouns have legal meaning, and a word that starts with a vowel followed by two consonants voids a contract. He began styling his name as "David-Wynn: Miller", claiming that the punctuation marks are hieroglyphics that make him "life" and that without them his name is two adjectives and a pronoun. He "turned Hawaii into a verb" to become "King of Hawaii".Miller has used and may have originated a scheme found in Organised Pseudolegal Commercial Arguments that cites the Universal Postal Union as authority. The argument is that affixing a stamp to a piece of paper changes the authority under which it is governed. He assumed the title "postmaster" and called his followers the adherents of the "Universal Postal System". On December 21, 2012, he claimed to restart the "US :FEDERAL-POSTALCOURT" and made himself judge. He also described himself as a "Plenipotentiary-Judge" of the "Unity States of the World".
Miller said that in 1988 he created what he has called "QUANTUM-MATH-COMMUNICATIONS", "PARSE-SYNTAX-GRAMMAR", or "CORRECT-LANGUAGE". According to Miller, the language he pioneered could end war. Miller's design involves some sentences that begin with prepositional phrases, using the word For. His sentences have many more nouns than verbs. According to Miller, only nouns have legal authority. The language also has an abundance of punctuation. For example:
According to Miller, the addition of hyphens and colons identifies a person as a matter of fact, existing in the "now-time-dimension". The names as written in this way are distinguished from the names listed at birth and in "all-caps", which identify the legal estate and not the living being in fact. Signing up to get a "birth certificate" allegedly creates a taxable Person . No judge has ever accepted this argument, and in fact many of those who have tried to make the argument have ended up in jail.
David J. Peterson, a language creator, observed that his ideas on language, both English and in general, make no sense.
Other ideas
Wynn Miller was a proponent of the 2012 phenomenon. He said that Mastercard gained control of the US economy on September 17, 1999. This was a prelude to his 9/11 conspiracy theory in which the steel beams and all the plastic items in the World Trade Center buildings were plastic explosives which created an electromagnetic pulse as a coverup for a $12 trillion electronic heist.Notoriety
The Los Angeles Times characterized Miller's political views as "far-right". The Anti-Defamation League described Miller in an article on the Redemption movement: "This Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based sovereign citizen is one of the most unusual of the 'common law gurus' who travel the country holding seminars and offering legal advice. Miller has created his own unique version of English grammar, one that even many sovereign citizens find hard to understand or accept." Miller claimed that Bill Clinton and the entire Supreme Court of the United States were his students. The Southern Poverty Law Center listed a wide variety of conspiracy theories associated with Miller.In 2001 he was banned from entry into Canada for 2 years after a number of judges had jailed people for contempt of court after they had attempted to use his truth language to defend tax evasion charges. An Australian barrister has described Miller's teachings as "the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard in my life."
He has also been described as leading a linguistic cult''.
A "federal postal court", operated by Miller and unrelated to the civil court operated by the United States Postal Service issued a $11.5 million dollar judgement against a mortgage service company because "a sophisticated mathematical understanding of language that proves that certain mortgage documents are fraudulent". The federal judge who struck down the filing, one of dozens from Miller's court, as "a sham and no more than a product of fertile imagination".
Selected cases
Defendants have attempted to use Miller's language or ideas in courts of the United States and Canada. These attempts have been uniformly unsuccessful.In 1998 Miller assisted Ingleside, Illinois resident George Johnson in his legal defense against child molestation charges. Johnson was convicted and returned to prison in 1999.
In June 1998 Prescott, Arizona resident James McCreary filed a federal lawsuit after being arrested in February for aggravated assault and possession of drug paraphernalia. In his filing, "McCreary mentions the name of his apparent mentor. David Wynn Miller of Ohio is an advocate of the restoration of Constitutional rights through 'correct' language and procedure." McCreary's actions in court got his conviction reduced by the judge to three misdemeanors, and he was sentenced to three concurrent 60-day sentences in jail.
In August 2001, Paul and Myrna Schuck unsuccessfully used Miller's language during a tax-evasion trial in Calgary, Alberta. They wrote their names on postage stamps affixed to laminated identification badges, which they claimed gave them authority equal to the Queen of England's. Online posts during the procedings show they were using Miller's methods. They served 19 days of a 30-day sentence.
In October 2001, Andrew William Sereda, a naturopath, went to jail in Calgary, Alberta for contempt of court when he addressed a judge in Miller's language during his tax evasion trial.
In September 2002, Miller was profiled when Milwaukee-based accountant Steven Allen Magritz was jailed after engaging in what authorities called "paper terrorism", or filing large numbers of legal claims against perceived enemies, as part of the sovereign citizen anti-government movement. The article calls Miller "the movement's linguist" and outlines his belief that people don't need to pay taxes if they can "prove that money is a verb". Magritz was convicted in 2003 on seven counts of criminal slander of title and sentenced to five years in prison.
In December 2002, Wisconsin juries convicted Oconomowoc, Wisconsin residents Janice K. Logan and Jason Zellmer of "simulating legal process" by filing documents that purported to be legal documents from the jurisdiction of the "Unity States of the World," a concept originated by Miller. Zellmer had been previously convicted of resisting an officer. Miller testified at the trial. The defendants were found guilty. Miller remarked that the genesis of Truth-language was when he "turned Hawaii into a verb" and showed "how a preposition is needed to certify a noun."
In 2005, Montclair, New Jersey resident Brenda Rickard was arrested and charged with orchestrating a $30 million mortgage scam: "Rickard, who claimed her name is :Brenda :Rickard, is a follower of :Judge: David-Wynn: Miller, who gives seminars around the country and advocates speaking in the 'true language,' which features odd punctuation and syntax. 'I have no problem with the complaint against me as long as it’s in the truthful language,' Rickard told the judge." Her lawyer requested a psychological evaluation following Rickard's behavior in court. Rickard and co-defendant Jamila Davis were convicted of conspiracy and six counts of bank fraud in 2008.
In 2006, Hemet, California physician Jerome Mueller was jailed for tax evasion: "Part of a loose-knit group calling themselves 'freemen' and 'patriots,' Mueller is an adherent of 'truth language.' Developed by self-professed genius David Wynn Miller, of Milwaukee, truth language is based on mathematics and purports to be the only correct way of interpreting English. A major tenet, according to interviews with Miller published on the Internet, is that maritime law is the only worldwide governing authority because the Earth is a vessel in a sea of space. The U.S. government, however, contends in everyday English that Mueller owes income taxes back to 1993."
In 2008, Wai'anae, Hawaii resident Rita Makekau was convicted of eight counts of assault and one count of domestic abuse for injuring five children in her care with hammers and knives. In 2009, Makekau challenged her child abuse conviction by claiming her sovereignty group, Hawaiian Kingdom Government, declared her innocent. Miller said he is the group's spokesperson and is a "plenipotentiary judge, ambassador and postmaster". Makekau was ordered to prison in 2009.