Kevin Massengale brought a civil rights action against San Bernardino County Sheriff Shannon Dicus, San Bernardino High Desert Detention Facility, and San Bernardino County. He was arrested for having fraudulent license plates on his vehicle.
He alleges that he had “private plates” on his “[p]rivately owned [v]ehicle” that was held in a “Common Law Pure Trust.”
“[W]hile being detained[, he] exercised his rights to freedom of speech and expression, and stated that these deputies have nothing better to do but harass me and then started to record their actions,” which prompted Deputy Ragland to “immediately put him in cuffs as an instinct retaliation of exercising his First Amendment rights to free speech, expressing and to record public officers’ activity.”
Plaintiff demanded the presence of a supervisor, which prompted a second deputy to “force[]” Plaintiff “into [a] caged patrol vehicle,” resulting in an injury to his head and neck. When a supervisor spoke with him, the supervisor “engaged in an unprofessional manner making derogatory comments, mislead with negligence and defamation of character by stating you are a sovereign citizen.”
He informed the supervisor that he is not a sovereign citizen, but rather, is “a Sovereign[,] a non-citizen National.”
This was a “false” charge and that he was “intentionally [arrested for] a false charge to state a reason why he has already arrested . . . for exercising his rights to freedom of speech and, expression and recording the deputies detaining him[.]”
He further alleges that Deputy Ragland “did not arrest plaintiff for the private plates,” but rather, “seized him… to stop [him] from expression and recording.”
He equates his detention and arrest to being “kidnapped” and “held in slavery,” and alleges that his arrest was made without probable cause because there was no complaint of illegal activity prompting Deputy Ragland to investigate his vehicle.
He alleges only that the “San Bernardino County Sheriff made the poor judgment as an employee of the State to assume my automobile was stolen with fraudulent[] plates, which they took on the liability of their actions, judgments and enforcements, when they harassed and infringed upon plaintiff inalienable rights by abusing their power and authority off of assumptions,” and “[t]hese State actors must train their employees properly and in accordance with the Constitution to uphold the supreme law as well . . . .”
He seeks one million dollars for each of the four days he “was unlawfully held in slavery”; damages “for [p]hysical harm, psychological distress, [and] [d]amage to [r]eputation”; and “deletion of [his] information and return of [his] fingerprints.”
Source: Massengale v. Dicus, 2025 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 3147