'Sovereign citizen' given 7 years in prison

Chicago Tribune/October 14, 2014

By Jason Meisner

Cherron Phillips seemed to waver moments after a federal judge sentenced her to seven years in prison Tuesday for filing a series of bogus multibillion-dollar liens on top court officials.

Phillips, a devotee of the sovereign citizen movement that doesn't accept court rules, told U.S. District Judge Michael Reagan she was confused. She wanted the advice of her court-appointed attorney, a lawyer she'd previously refused to cooperate with and flat-out ignored during her trial.

"I'd like to speak to Miss ..." Phillips said in a quiet voice that trailed off.

"Solomon," Reagan reminded her.

The scene was the culmination of a downward spiral for Phillips, whose once-promising life was derailed by an irrational ideology that has ruined her tightknit family, according to her lawyer, Lauren Solomon. At one point earlier this year, Phillips as well as her younger brother and both of their parents — all of whom espoused the same anti-government philosophies — were each in federal custody.

Phillips, 44, who now calls herself River Tali Bey, was convicted by a jury in June of 10 counts of retaliation against a federal official for filing the bogus "maritime" liens in 2011 on then-U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, several judges and other top federal court officials.

The liens were filed with the Cook County recorder of deeds after Phillips had been barred from the Dirksen U.S. Courthouse for disrupting proceedings in her brother's drug conspiracy case, prosecutors said.

Phillips' case cast a spotlight on the tactics of those who claim to be "sovereign citizens," subscribing to an anti-government movement whose adherents often file nonsensical, complex legal documents and refuse to follow court rules. Phillips represented herself for more than a year while awaiting trial, filing a series of odd and unsuccessful motions in an attempt to get her case thrown out until Solomon was finally ordered to take over.

Reagan and the prosecutors on the case both usually work at federal courthouses downstate but were brought in to handle the case because Phillips' actions created conflicts of interest for judges and prosecutors in Chicago whose colleagues were targeted.

Before the judge announced the sentencing Tuesday, Phillips once again denounced the authority of the court in quasi-legal terminology, calling her incarceration "an unauthorized punishment that is not recognized by Congress or the Constitution."

The judge was not swayed, however. His sentence was beyond the recommended federal guidelines and six months more than what even prosecutors had requested.

In his ruling, Reagan called Phillips' attempts to harass and intimidate public officials "death by a thousand paper cuts." He also noted that she continued her campaign even as her trial approached, sending letters to him and to prosecutors naming them as defendants in a lawsuit purportedly filed in Washington.

In asking Reagan to consider probation, Solomon said the sovereign citizen ideology is driven by a deep-rooted mistrust of the justice system and only inflamed in prison by those who feel that the weight of the government is stacked against them.

"Can we really solve this problem with incarceration?" Solomon said. "How powerless do they feel, in the face of the overwhelming power of the federal government … to have to go to this ideology that is nonsensical at best?"

Born and raised in Chicago's Chatham neighborhood, Phillips was the high school sweetheart of Simeon Career Academy basketball star Nick Anderson. In 1988 the two had a son together, and although they never married, they remained close as Anderson's star rose, first as he led the Illini to a Final Four appearance and then as his NBA career blossomed with the Orlando Magic.

In a 1990 interview with the Orlando Sentinel, Anderson described Phillips as his rock, a down-to-earth person who loved him for who he was and not his newfound fame and riches.

"I can remember when I would show up at school without any lunch money, and she would give me half her lunch," Anderson told the newspaper. "That's what I'm talking about. She was with me when I didn't have a dime."

As a single mother, Phillips taught math at the school her mother founded and later became a successful real estate agent and insurance broker, her lawyer said in a court filing last week. Solomon wrote that the unraveling of Phillips' close-knit family began with the death of her older brother, Wayne Jr., of natural causes in 2003.

Three years later, the federal drug charges were brought against Phillips' younger brother, Devon. While that case was pending, Phillips' parents, Wayne and Betty Phillips, were indicted on federal tax evasion charges in a case that also featured a number of strange pro se filings challenging the jurisdiction of the court, records show. All three were convicted and sentenced to prison.

Phillips' father, who was recently released from prison, attended Tuesday's hearing but declined to comment outside the courtroom. Betty Phillips is scheduled to be released next spring, records show.

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