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Thursday, November 7, 1996

Florez shatters independente challenger

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Incumbent Precinct 2 County Commissioner Julian Florez shattered an
independent challenger in the only locally contested election on Tuesday.

Florez, a Barstow businessman who had been appointed to the commission
and was running for the office for the first time, came out the early
voting opponent Jesse G. Garcia 320 to 45 votes, an 80-plus percent
margin.

In the final count of vote in Precinct 2, according to unofficial
tallies released by Ward County Clerk Pat Finley, the percentage results
were about the same.

Florez wins 703 to 148 with 82.6 percent of the vote.

"I want to thank all of those who supported me, "Florez said. "I want to
encourage all those who voted for my opponent to join with us to better
represent Barstow and our part of Ward County."

Florez said he had expected to win but, he would not declare victory
until all of the votes were counted.

"Now," he said, "I can get about the business of representing my
precinct on the commission and doing all that we can for the people of
our county."

Ward County voters, generally considered some of the most conservative
in a conservative state, usually vote Democrat in local races and are
likely to vote Republican in state and national electoral battles.

In the crowded race for state senator from the sprawling Senate District
28, Ward County gave Gary L. Watckins, a Democrat, 1200 votes, 36.73
percent of those cast. Republican Robert Duncan had 533 votes to finish
second in the county.

District wide, former Lubbock Mayor David Langston, a Democrat, and
Republican Duncan, a former state legislator from Ector County, were
assured of a face-off in the run-off election on Dec. 10.

That runoff between Langston and Duncan will decide who will replace
former State Sen. John Montford, who resigned earlier this year to
become chancellor of Texas Tech.

In other elections, Ward County favored the winning Clinton/Gore ticket
by less than a percentage point in the race for President. Clinton/Gore
took 1,644 votes (43.9 percent) in Ward County; Republicans Dole/Kemp
1,620 votes (43.3 percent.)

Dole carried Texas but the Democrats rolled to victory.

Fraudulent legal documents

distributed in Ward County

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By Jerome P. Curry

of the News Staff


The document looked official. It came from something called the
"superior court" of Tarrant County and it purported to change a child
support order of the 143rd District Court in Monahans. The issue in the
case was $27,852 owed to a woman for her children.

District Clerk Jo Ann Roark identified the so-called court pleading as
fraudulent almost immediately although it does appear to be proper and
legally styled.

A reference in the so-called pleading to District Judge Bob Parks, the
woman to whom the money is owed and the attorneys representing her as
"Alien Enemy Agents" was a definite hint that all was not right with
this court order.

Jo Ann Roark did not file the documents. She sent hem back with this
terse note to the deadbeat spouse: "This is the 143rd Judicial District
Court of Ward County, the Hon. Bob Parks, Judge Presiding... A motion
for enforcement for child support was filed by the Attorney General of
the State of Texas against you alleging you owe a past due amount as of
12/31/95 of $27,852 for the support of your children. This is a pending
case and will go forth in this Court. It will be necessary for you to
file all future pleadings according to law."

The document Roark rejected was a product of the self-styled provisional
government of the Republic of Texas, a group of men and women, who say
they have established an independent nation and who do not answer they
say to either the laws and statutes of the State of Texas or the United
STates.

To them, says Richard L. McClaren of Fort Davis, the ambassador at large
for the Republic of Texas, Tuesday's general election, at least in
Texas, was a farce because he and his fellow "declared citizens" of the
so-called Republic of Texas are the only valid government in the state.

And McClaren warns the time will come when the provisional government
will be recognized by most of the citizens of Texas. Although that time
is not yet, even in Monahans, says McClaren: "We've got a few heavily
declared citizens in Ward County."
Within the past two weeks both First National Bank and First State Bank
in Monahans have received documents from the "Republic of Texas"
Treasurer Darrell Dean Franks of Shiner, which previously had been known
only for a Texas-produced beer. The Monahans banks were not alone.
McClaren said comparable cash transfer orders were sent to every bank in
Texas.

These false papers announce the "dissolution of accounts of the State of
Texas and its political subdivisions" and order the banks to transfer
those monies they may have on deposit to Franks Shiner.

Said Johnny Jordan of First State Bank commented: "These guys may be a
laughing stock but they're a danger and they don't have much respect for
law and order."

Both bank officers noted that although the transfer papers are
immediately identified as being without value, they still cost the banks
who received them time and money.

Because of the pervasive nature of the Republic of Texas activities in
the state, the incidents must be reported to both the state Department
of Banking and to the Attorney General's office where Attorney General
Dan Morales has an on-going team investigating the Republic of Texas
adherents and their activities.

A major problem, noted by Gatzki, Jordan, Roark and Ron Dusek of the
Attorney General's office in Austin is the possibility that some of the
documents generated by the so-called judicial system of the Republic of
Texas might well be filed inadvertently in official court records.

The Republic of Texas and other groups, the various incarnations of the
Texas Militia, operate what they term "common law" courts. The first
actions from these "common law" courts was the filing of liens in
regular courts against properties.

Attorney General Morales told the court and county clerks in a special
letter in May: "The so-called Republic of Texas" movement has harassed
various local public officials by, among other things, conducting
"trials" in self-styled "common law" courts of the movement's invention
and attempting to file the "judgments" resulting from those trials, and
other such documents, including pleadings, in the lawful district and
county courts of this state... Some clerks of courts have been misled by
the attempted filings of these bogus papers, apparently because, at
first glance, they appear to be similar in form to documents routinely
filed in the courts of Texas. Invariably, however, they indicate on
their face the purported existence of the "common law courts of the
Republic of Texas" or similar bodies which have no legal existence
exception the minds of the partisans of the movement."

In reference to the spurt of liens from the "common law courts" intended
for filing in the official courts, Morales notes the law provides for
the filing of lawful liens only.

Writes Morales: "A purported lien from a 'common law' court is not a
lawful instrument and therefore cannot create a lien."

McClaren though and his fellow officers of the Republic of Texas
movement seem convinced of their cause. McClaren spent May 4 through May
9 of this year in the Ward County Jail in Monahans because of a federal
court contempt citation issued against him and others for attempting to
file documents from "common law courts" in the official courts.

Today he and his fellow Republic officers face a $10,000 a day fine for
a contempt citation issued on Tuesday by a state district court in
Austin because he and others refused to disavow all of the documents
that had been filed. The deadline for that disavowal was 5 p.m. on
Monday.

Meanwhile, the Republic of Texas movement is building its Texas Defense
Forces in West Texas as, McClaren said, "Any sovereign nation has the
right to do to protect life, liberty and property."
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Copyright 1996 by Ward Newspapers, Inc.
107 W. Second St., Monahans TX 79756
Phone 915-943-4313, FAX 915-943-4314
e-mail news@bitstreet.com
http://www.pecos.net/news

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