Tax laws don’t apply to us. That was the mantra of Ronald and Dorothea Joling of Coquille, Oregon, after self-study. The married couple subsequently “engaged in a shameless scheme to defraud the United States and to evade payment of $1.2 million in federal taxes,” according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Scott E. Bradford.
How did Joling come to believe that tax laws did not apply to him and his wife? Joling, the pastor of Hope Covenant Reformed Church in Coquille, believes that the government is illegal. “We have not had a true government since 1871,” Joling said. “It is a municipal corporation called the USA.” Joling has said that he is sure that his stance is on “biblical safe ground.”
It does not put him on legal safe ground. Last year, a federal jury found the couple guilty of conspiring to defraud the government. Ronald Joling was also found guilty of tax evasion and filing false tax returns; Dorothea was acquitted on a tax evasion charge. At trial, evidence detailed the lengths the Jolings went to in order to hide their income, including sham trusts, bank accounts in the names of other people, a warehouse bank (basically, an account that allows for commingling), bogus money orders, and filing false tax returns. To avoid being held accountable after their activities were discovered, the Jolings resorted to intimidation tactics and threats of arrest, criminal prosecution, and lawsuits.
The pair had been slated for sentencing earlier this April but skipped their sentencing date and headed out of state. The day before they skipped out, the couple sent a notice to the court identifying themselves as “Ronald-Dean and Dorothea-Joan, of the House of Joling” suggesting that the government didn’t have authority over them.
After being on the run for some time, the couple was apprehended last month in rural Arizona by federal marshals. They are currently being detained until they can be sentenced for the tax and conspiracy crimes on December 10.
If that were the end of the story, it would be enough. But there’s more. The couple is facing new charges: one count of conspiracy to file false retaliatory liens and four counts of filing false retaliatory liens against government employees for performing their official duties.
Remember those intimidation tactics? The Jolings allegedly filed false retaliatory liens claiming that multiple federal employees each owed the Jolings $100.003 million. Those federal employees included two federal judges assigned to the criminal tax case, the clerk of the court for the U.S. District Court for the District of Oregon and the Assistant U.S. Attorney who prosecuted the criminal tax case. The liens, which were based on false information, were publicly filed with the Secretary of State for the state of California.
Arraignment in the retaliatory lien case is scheduled for today. If convicted in the retaliatory liens case, the Jolings each face a statutory maximum sentence of 40 years in prison and $1 million in fines. The length of the sentence could effectively be a death sentence: the pair is currently in their 70s. Any jail time for the liens case would be in addition to the sentences each face for the 2014 tax charges: prosecutors have indicated they would seek a 10-year prison sentence for Ronald Joling and a 5-year sentence for Dorothea. It is not yet clear whether the pair will be charged with fleeing their original sentencing.
