In Royal Bank of Canada v Anderson, 2022 ABQB 525 Rooke ACJ states
[1] This Decision responds to an unusual, but not unique, litigation scenario. Sandra Ann Anderson [Ms. Anderson] owns a condominium in Calgary [the Condo] that she financed with a 2019 mortgage, with a principle of $160,000, loaned from the Royal Bank of Canada [RBC]. Ms. Anderson calls herself many things and by many names, as indicated in the style of cause, above. Ms. Anderson has ceased making payments on the mortgage. RBC, on June 16, 2021, filed a Statement of Claim to foreclose on the Condo, and recover its debt, which had by then had increased to $160,954.94. Ms. Anderson also had secured a personal Visa credit card against this property, and accumulated $3,930.58 in further debts.
[2] None of this is particularly unusual. Foreclosures such as this occur all the time at this Court. However, Ms. Anderson is an unusual litigant because she believes she is not subject to Canadian law - but rather only to a different and special law, that she seems to claim means that she can get a condo for free, and that she does not need to pay her credit card debt. Ms. Anderson says she is not subject to Canadian “law, statutes, ordinances, codes”. Ms. Anderson says there are no debts, at least any that she owes. Instead, she says it is RBC who owes her money. Ms. Anderson has many explanations for these claims. She points to secret (and imaginary) bank accounts operated by the US government that are linked to her birth certificate. She says that a bank in the UK, the “WeRe Bank” and its proprietor, “Peter of England”, have provided a “Voucher” signed by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, that discharges all her obligations. These are clearly irrational and unaccepted OPCA claims: see Meads v Meads, cited at para 12 infra.
[3] Other times Ms. Anderson says that “i woman sandra-ann” does not owe anything. Rather, it is SANDRA ANN ANDERSON who is in a contract with RBC. That all capital names entity is someone, or something, else, but certainly not her, she claims. Ms. Anderson, at various points, says she is the “Executrix” of SANDRA ANN ANDERSON. And many, many more unusual claims, some of which I will later survey.
[4] The net effect is that Ms. Anderson is doing all she can to frustrate RBC’s foreclosure. She has bombarded the Court and RBC with obviously legally worthless, abusive documents. When Ms. Anderson appears in court physically, or via teleconference, Ms. Anderson is disruptive, contemptuous, ignores court directions and orders, and acts, literally, as a law unto herself. That has led to Ms. Anderson being kicked out of courtrooms, and muted and expelled from teleconference appearances.
[5] None of Ms. Anderson’s claims, arguments, or magical documents have any merit, whatsoever. Ms. Anderson has been wasting, and continues to waste, the Plaintiff’s and the Court’s time.
[6] Ms. Anderson is a self-represented litigant, and, so, has the benefit of special privileges and status, as set by the Supreme Court of Canada in Pintea v Johns, 2017 SCC 23. However, Ms. Anderson has been involved in a range of litigation before this and in other courts that makes very clear that her activities are not those of some misinformed and confused person, stumbling through a complex, inscrutable, apparatus. Instead, Ms. Anderson is an intentional bad, vexatious, actor. She has been informed of the what, why, and how she is getting things wrong. Ms. Anderson has been cautioned that very negative consequences will follow from her misconduct - and that is, indeed, what has transpired. All that has made no difference to her continuing vexatious conduct. Instead, as I will subsequently discuss, Ms. Anderson’s bad conduct in the foreclosure action has now escalated to a new level: she is directly threatening the Court staff and judiciary, who will pay Ms. Anderson the fines that she purports to levy, in silver coin, a.k.a. “lawful money”.
[7] This Decision has several functions. One is to address Ms. Anderson’s abuse of the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench, its employees and decision makers, and wastage of the Court’s resources. A second objective of this Decision is to end the RBC foreclosure proceeding in a manner that is fair and efficient to those involved parties who have engaged this Court in good faith. That means that Ms. Anderson may not find the result of this Decision is what she prefers, but Ms. Anderson has forfeited her interests being front and center in this matter. Ms. Anderson is a litigation terrorist (Lee v Canada (Attorney General), 2018 ABQB 464 at para 155; Unrau v National Dental Examining Board, 2019 ABQB 283 at paras 227, 238 [Unrau #2]), a person who uses courts and law to harm others, because she likes it, and for her personal advantage. The time for that to end is now – and this Decision will do that.
[8] I also note, as an initial point in this matter, that Ms. Anderson recently was involved in a testamentary manner where I was one of the Case Management Justices. Suffice to say that Ms. Anderson received a multimillion-dollar inheritance from her father. That fact is relevant in several ways. First, Ms. Anderson is well able to pay her mortgage payments, and the outstanding Condo debt as a whole. Second, Ms. Anderson can easily afford to hire a lawyer. She formerly did so, but that cramped her litigation style. Ms. Anderson is thus not a destitute, desperate person, but, instead, a greedy scofflaw, who seeks a condo for free, with no legitimate legal basis. [9] Third, those significant resources mean that Ms. Anderson is well positioned to misuse legal processes, and harass and abuse others, and she has done exactly that. That capacity, intent, and activity also warrants certain steps.
[10] As will become apparent, Ms. Anderson’s bad conduct in the Condo foreclosure is simply one facet of Ms. Anderson’s overall, and consistent, approach to her social and legal obligations. Simply put, Ms. Anderson seeks to do only what Ms. Anderson wants to do.
II. Sandra Ann Anderson
[11] Prior to reviewing the status of the Condo foreclosure, and taking steps to achieve the two goals identified above, some further background on Ms. Anderson and her activities is helpful to put this Court’s admittedly unusual and stringent responses into context. What follows is an overview with illustrative examples, rather than a comprehensive record of how Ms. Anderson has flouted Canadian law, and abused Canadian courts. Compiling a complete record would be excessive, repetitive, and a waste of judicial resources.
[12] Ms. Anderson is a pseudolaw adherent and guru, an individual who claims that the laws created by Parliament and the legislatures, and inherited via the common law, are all a fraud, that are unjustly imposed without valid authority. In Canada, pseudolaw is usually grouped as “Organized Pseudolegal Commercial Arguments” [OPCA], a term coined in the first court decision to comprehensively review that subject: Meads v Meads, 2012 ABQB 571. OPCA schemes are pseudolaw, rules that sound like law, and use legal language, but are false, “not- law”.
[13] Functionally, OPCA strategies are a kind of cheat code, a sort of “get out of jail free card”, that pseudolaw adherents engage to purportedly get free money (and condos), not pay taxes, drive without insurance or a driver’s licences, engage in criminal offences without state sanction, and so on. In Meads v Meads, I observed, at para 4, that beyond using a highly stereotypic and conserved set of not-law concepts: Page: 4 ... This category of litigant shares one other critical characteristic: they will only honour state, regulatory, contract, family, fiduciary, equitable, and criminal obligations if they feel like it. And typically, they don’t. That exactly describes Ms. Anderson, and, in many ways, is all one needs to know about her.
[14] No court in any jurisdiction has accepted the stereotypic conspiratorial not-law concepts that make up pseudolaw. Employing pseudolaw is always an abuse of court processes, and warrants immediate court response: Unrau #2 at paras 180, 670-671.
[15] Ms. Anderson has a dismal legal record. What follows are a sampling of illustrative examples.
A. Sandra Anderson, Horse Smuggler, and Vigilante Judge of Her Own Do-It- Yourself Court
[16] Ms. Anderson is an international horse smuggler: Anderson v Ossowski, 2021 ABQB 382, action struck out 2021 ABQB 428, costs ordered 2021 ABQB 456. Ms. Anderson has repeatedly purchased horses in the US, and then, when transporting those horses into Canada, she has claimed the horses were her property that she had taken first into and then back out of the US, thus evading customs duties. Ms. Anderson was caught, and that led to horse seizures and fines. I note that one of Anderson’s smuggled horses, “Gaesbekers Gabbertje”, was purchased by Ms. Anderson for about $120,000 Canadian - in the range of her outstanding condo debt.
[17] Ms. Anderson then took the unconventional step of filing pseudolaw paperwork in the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench that purported to seize control of the Court’s physical infrastructure. Ms. Anderson’ pseudolaw documents stated she would then conduct a vigilante legal proceeding against Canadian Border Service officers and administrators, federal government officials, and a Public Prosecution Service of Canada Crown Prosecutor. Ms. Anderson, “i.woman.Sandra of the Anderson family”, would be the prosecutor and judge, who would determine the guilt and penalties of these “trespassers”. All this follows a well-established and never successful US Sovereign Citizen pseudolaw scheme promoted by Carl (Karl) Lentz: Anderson v Ossowski, 2021 ABQB 382 at paras 19-32. [
18] Needless to say, this attempt to conduct at a vigilante “do it yourself court” was rejected by this Court, Ms. Anderson’s materials were struck out, and Ms. Anderson was ordered to pay costs. Ms. Anderson sent the Court printed copies of the Decisions that rejected her horse smuggling vigilante judge process, with each page marked, in red sharpie, at 45 degrees to the lower right: this seventh day of June two thousand and twenty one. No Trespass Contract declined All rights reserved Sandra-ann [ink fingerprint] [See Anderson v Ossowski, 2021 ABQB 456, Appendix “A”.]
[19] Naturally, that was meaningless and had no legal effect.
B. Sandra Anderson, Criminal Proceedings
[20] Ms. Anderson is the accused in numerous Provincial Court of Alberta criminal proceedings: Docket 190768739P1 - charges include driving while impaired, failure to produce a driver’s licence, and operating a motor vehicle while having a prohibited blood alcohol concentration. Docket 210776647P1 - uttering a forged document (forged COVID-19 test results), and transporting fireworks on an aircraft. Dockets 210335584P1, 201295763P1, 210335584P1 - customs and fraud offenses resulting from Ms. Anderson’s international horse smuggling. Docket 211079462P101 - failure to attend court. Docket 211071105P1 - failure to comply with release conditions.
[21] Ms. Anderson has illegally attempted to disrupt and sabotage those criminal proceedings by submitting forged subpoenas (Anderson (Re), 2022 ABQB 35 at paras 8-11), repeatedly submitting pseudolaw documents that purport to unilaterally terminate the prosecutions against her, in some instances by “payments” from an imaginary bank account (Canada (Attorney General) v Anderson, 2022 ABQB 310 at paras 8-11, 14). When Ms. Anderson appeared in Court, she was disruptive and was ejected by the Sheriffs.
[22] Ms. Anderson also took the unconventional step of retaining a Calgary-based pseudolaw lawyer, Daniel Terry Lozinik, “private sovran attorney general”. Lozinik operates the “Angelic Law” OPCA website: http://www.angeliclaw.com. Lozinik’s in-court misconduct has led to him being ejected from Alberta courtrooms: Anderson (Re) at para 17. Lozinik has been prohibited from engaging in unlicenced legal services: Law Society of British Columbia v Daniel Lozinik (26 January 2021), Vancouver S-211132 (BCSC). Lozinik is also facing multiple criminal charges, including firearms offenses: Canada (Attorney General) v Anderson at para 17.
[23] Ms. Anderson currently has outstanding arrest warrants in five criminal matters, dating from June 2019, onward. Ms. Anderson has informed my office that she is no longer in Canada, and, instead, has relocated to California. I find on a balance of probabilities that Ms. Anderson has absconded from Canada to evade arrest and detention in her criminal proceedings.
C. Straw(wo)man Theory Strategies
[24] Ms. Anderson’s wealth of pseudolaw activity includes her persistent use of “Strawman Theory”, the idea that individuals have two aspects, a “flesh and blood” human being, and an immaterial legal doppelganger, the “Strawman”: see Meads v Meads at paras 417-446; Pomerleau v Canada (Revenue Agency), 2017 ABQB 123 at paras 67-88; Potvin (Re), 2018 ABQB 652 at paras 83-92; Donald J Netolitzky, “Organized Pseudolegal Commercial Arguments and Magic and Ceremony” (2018) 55:4 Alta L Rev 1045 at 1069-1078. The two halves use names with different letter case and, often, punctuation, e.g. “Sandra-Ann: Anderson” vs “SANDRA ANN ANDERSON”. The core reason for Ms. Anderson’s use of Strawman Theory is it that SANDRA ANN ANDERSON is purportedly responsible for everything bad, and thus is the only half that is subject to debts, legislation, criminal liability, and court authority.
So Sandra-Ann: Anderson says she owns the Condo, and if someone has to pay, that’s SANDRA ANN ANDERSON. [25] Ms. Anderson has over and over used Strawman Theory, and, Ms. Anderson has been told, over and over, that Strawman Theory is false and does not work. Her Straw(wo)man is a fanciful imaginary thing: Anderson (Re) at para 12. Strawman Theory is so notoriously false that anyone who employs Strawman Theory is presumed to do so in bad faith, and for abusive, ulterior purposes: Fiander v Mills, 2015 NLCA 31 at paras 37-40; Rothweiler v Payette, 2018 ABQB 288 at paras 6-21; Unrau #2 at para 180. That presumption applies to Ms. Anderson, who consistently and persistently uses Strawman Theory schemes, periodically switching to new variations, but always maintaining her SANDRA ANN ANDERSON sock-puppet to take all the debts and blame.
D. OPCA Guru
[26] Ms. Anderson has now gone past simply acting as user of pseudolaw, to actively propagating misinformation of that kind, she is an “OPCA guru”: Meads v Meads at paras 85- 158. Ms. Anderson is now teaching others via the Internet that they (incorrectly) do not have to pay income tax. Ms. Anderson claims to have the secrets for that. As I noted in Meads v Meads at paras 669-674, pseudolaw promoters are predatory conmen/women who profit from exploiting the naïve and vulnerable. In Canada (Attorney General) v Anderson at para 18, I observed: ... The fact Ms. Anderson has escalated and deepened her pseudolaw activities from “student” to “teacher” is not a prerequisite for her to be subject to prospective court access restrictions. What this development demonstrates is the degree to which Ms. Anderson is dedicated to, and has oriented her life around, these toxic non-law concepts. She is a committed pseudolaw adherent and proselytizer.
[27] Tilleman J in Fearn v Canada Customs, 2014 ABQB 114 at paras 215-256 concluded that OPCA guru activities are prima facie criminal contempt, given their rejection and public denial of Canadian legislation and court authority. That is Ms. Anderson’s legal character, rather than a “good faith, fair dealing” litigant.
E. Vexatious Litigant Status and Court Access Restrictions
[28] These factors, and other litigation misconduct by Ms. Anderson, led this Court to on April 26, 2022 to impose Judicature Act, RSA 2000, c J-2, ss 23-23.1 court access restrictions to mitigate Ms. Anderson’s abusive litigation conduct: Canada (Attorney General) v Anderson. The chief effect of these court access restrictions is that Ms. Anderson cannot initiate litigation or litigation steps at the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench, except with the permission – “leave” – of the Court.
[29] Court access restrictions are a useful tool to minimize the harm cause by abusive litigants, but they are far from a universal panacea. One problem is that court access restrictions do not meaningfully affect “defensive” steps taken by abusive litigants to frustrate litigation where the abusive litigant is a responding party. This limitation on court access restrictions will become very apparent when I subsequently review the progression of Ms. Anderson’s foreclosure proceeding.
[30] Court processes are based on the underlying assumption that litigants at least will try to cooperate with the Court and its procedures. Pseudolaw litigants rarely engage in anything that could be described as “cooperation”. Ms. Anderson is an illustrative, even dramatic, example. F.
Conclusion
[31] Ms. Anderson is an unrepentant, disruptive, greedy, uncooperative, abusive scofflaw. That has now been her uniform approach to legal rights and obligations, and the Courts, for years. Her misconduct is expanding into multiple subjects and disputes. Ms. Anderson cannot be trusted. When she is pointed to the actual law, she reliably rejects that, and claims to unilaterally impose something else.
[32] Unlike many pseudolaw litigants, Ms. Anderson has significant and substantial resources. She has already demonstrated that she will use unorthodox vigilante processes against those who simply are engaged in their legal duties. All these factors, and Ms. Anderson’s dismal record of pseudolaw misconduct, mean that Ms. Anderson is an appropriate target for unusual and intrusive litigation and litigant management steps by this Court. Doing otherwise simply guarantees more trouble ahead.
