When I wrote about the “ Cavalcade of the Cretinous” in February 2022, I thought the anti-vaccination early incarnations of “sovereign citizens” were just a hopeless joke (“Summernats without the sophistication”) that would quietly go away.

The Victorian police shooting shows how wrong I was and how bad things have got in 3½ years – and how dreadfully they could yet escalate.

We can only hope, now that lives have been taken, allegedly by a sovereign citizen, that police will remain, as the former long-serving NSW magistrate David Heilpern described them recently on the ABC’s Law Report: “ever patient”.

At least one current ACT magistrate endorses Professor Heilpern’s softly-softly approach to those who believe they can opt out of the legal system, just by changing names, often to “Freeman”, the name adopted by the alleged police killer.

“It is not me, it is a construct of the government” was how one defendant put it before the ACT magistrate – but who was that on the police body-worn camera footage?

The magistrate recalled, “I just said, ‘Look at that video, that’s you. So don’t worry about all this other stuff. Let’s just concentrate on what you are doing in that.’ That pulled the steam out of it …”

The issue had been the defendant, who had no criminal history, refusing an oral-swab test for drug-driving. Guilty. No conviction recorded. Next.

“There’s no point getting in a shouting match with them because the most effective way is to just say, ‘I’m adjourning the Court’, and then come back [on to the Bench] to deal with other matters, ‘and you can come back later’.”

Almost all wanted to make the court a political platform.

“I let this fellow go on for his five minutes and he said, ‘Would you like to respond?’ And I said, ‘You’re confusing the three arms of government. It is not my place to comment on the legislators’ decision so f…. off and pay your fine’.” Of course, that final enjoinder had been delivered in court in entirely judicial language, but the tone and import were as just as clear as the words uttered extra-judicially.

Sovereign citizens (one of whom even admitted the title was an oxymoron) were not yet so frequent as to be clogging up the ACT courts but “it may get worse”.

Before going on the run, the alleged police killer Dezi Freeman had boasted of having had 15 “hearings” in 2½ years.

Both Professor Heilpern and the ACT magistrate were well familiar with the categories of argument, which were thoroughly explored in a Victorian Court of Appeal workshop late last month for judicial officers from around the country.

The defendants are almost exclusively self-represented, because, as Professor Heilpern noted, lawyers have a duty not to put “utter garbage” before the Courts.

A memorandum from the workshop began with the procedural fairness to be afforded the self-represented: the “reasonable opportunity” to present a case, while drawing on “the ability to discriminate between those cases where the interests of justice demand a prolongation or adjournment … and those where the interests of justice call for expeditious disposal”.

Then came the arguments, for which the memorandum provided manifold cases, and multiple sections of the Constitution, allowing judges and magistrates to hit them for six.

Validity of legislation: there is no way to challenge assent and proof of Acts coming into operation, let alone “breaks in sovereignty” due to changes to the style or title of the Queen.

Magna Carta and Bill of Rights: The High Court had ruled a quarter-century ago that they don’t bind legislatures the way the Constitution does.

Strawman duality: “criminal liability attaches to a person where they do the act”. Just ask that gent who refused the drug swab.

Judges’ oaths and affirmations: these operate via tradition, not via statutory requirement.

Options were provided to handle contempt of court and vexatious litigants, with the memorandum recalling one court’s having wondered aloud about why one appellant was bothering to seek the help of the Court that established the laws that he said didn’t apply to him.

Leading Canberra criminal barrister John Purnell, SC, sees sovereign citizens as “basically anarchists”.

“Do you see any nexus between the actual act of violence by killing two policeman and being a sovereign citizen. I don’t …” he said. “They don’t accept any rule of anything …

“The Victorian killing, I think, will see some radicalised. These guys, and they mainly seem to be guys, seem to on the edge of mental illness. They’re illogical. They make representations that are basically against their own interests and they pursue a course in front of the Court, from what I’ve seen, that can only harm them. But they want their publicity and to have their views heard.”

Unlike so many lawyers (including this correspondent) who pass by the gathered aggrieved outside Court, Purnell fronted them during the anti-vaccination campaign.

“I couldn’t get any sense at all,” he recalled. One guy had a sign “Democracy”, and Purnell asked him what democratic principles he particularly advocated when marching with it.

“I always remembered this. He said, ‘If you don’t know what bloody democracy is, mate, then I can’t help you’ and he walked off!”

The silk was more pessimistic than the magistrate about keeping things calm.

“I honestly can’t see how you can de-escalate someone who has … an approach to life where they don’t want to accept any rule of law, they don’t want to be subjected to any court, any police officer, any rules at all,” he said.

He found the Courts had been “incredibly lenient and amenable to putting up with them”, but there were limits, especially when litigants “deliberately want the courts to react”.

He feared the current notoriety would draw followers. Witness the people wanting to get selfies with the leaders of recent anti-immigration rallies.

And as the movement grows, there are some in the shadows peddling websites that have constructed various pseudo-law arguments for them – for a price of course.

Purnell said this would make things tougher for the Bench: “They’ll then have to adjudicate on something that’s not 100% ridiculous, but just 60% ridiculous.”

The views expressed in this article may or may not reflect those of Pearls and Irritations.