Greensboro, NC-- Two Greensboro officers who work in the police Intelligence Squad have become even smarter after stumbling on an extremist group that wasn't on their radar.
The two undercover officers talked to WFMY News 2 and because of the sensitivity of what they do, asked that we not use their names or show their faces.
The veteran investigators said after getting calls from other officers who all shared stories of hostile drivers who went on rants about being exempt from US laws, they started investigating.
Their investigation lead them to a group called the 'Sovereign Citizens.' Once learning that the Sovereigns have a history of overwhelming courts with fake documents, the officers developed a comprehensive program to help arm officials to fight back.
And because of this, one of the officers told WFMY, " Greensboro police is leaps and bounds ahead of most agencies in the country when it come to Sovereign Citizens." The men are using their knowledge to train other officers on how to identify members and deal with them. They said they don't consider the group a hate group or terrorists.
The officers said the group just don't believe the government laws or laws of the land apply to them.
According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, the group has about 100,000 hardcore members. And because of their of their method of bogging down the legal system with fraudulent paper, they are known in some circles as "paper terrorists."
The Detectives said "not every Sovereign Citizen that law enforcement comes into contact with is going to be violent." "Most are not, but if folks are not going o be violent on the side of the road during a law enforcement encounter typically what is going to happen is a overwhelming amount of paperwork, because the goal is to terrorize law enforcement and government via paper."
Related: FBI On Sovereign Citizens
WFMY News 2/GPD