International Journal of Coercion, Abuse, and Manipulation Volume 6 2023 102
3. why these taxpayers believed their suddenly
having no income tax obligations, and obtaining
large and often retroactive income tax refunds,
were legitimate.
In short, here is an opportunity to examine the first-
hand voluntary accounts of pseudolaw adherents,
from their own first-person perspectives, on how they
learned about, and why they adopted, a patently legally
absurd pseudolaw scheme, and obtained, or expected
to obtain, extraordinary benefits on that basis.
A. Pseudolaw
Pseudolaw is an alternative dissident legal system
designed to provide extraordinary advantages to
its users (Koniak, 1997 Netolitzky, 2018b, pp. 3-4
Netolitzky, 2021, pp. 183-186). Pseudolaw’s rules are
framed as law, and use legal language (McRoberts,
2019, pp. 637-644 Netolitzky, 2018a, pp. 420-421
Netolitzky, 2018b Netolitzky, 2021, pp. 164-170), but
some of pseudolaw’s rules diverge from and are rejected
by conventional courts and legal systems (Kalinowski,
2019 McRoberts, 2019 Netolitzky, 2019a Sarteschi,
2020).
Fiscal Arbitrators pseudolaw centered around one
specific component of the stereotypic pseudolaw
memeplex of rules and associated narrative: Strawman
Theory (reviewed in d’Abadie v Her Majesty the Queen,
2018 ABQB 298, paras. 57-70 Kalinowski, 2019, pp.
158-164 Meads v Meads, 2012 ABQB 571, paras. 417-
446 Netolitzky, 2018c, pp. 1069-1078 Pomerleau v
Canada (Revenue Agency), 2017 ABQB 123, paras.
67-96). Strawman Theory claims that humans, what
mainstream law treats as a single unit, instead have two
separable halves: a “flesh and blood” human being, and
an immaterial legal entity, often called “the Strawman,”
or “the person.” According to Strawman Theory, human
beings are not born with a Strawman, but, rather, that
the Strawman is created by birth documentation as a
concealed trickster contract, and then attached to the
human being as a kind of dark legal doppelganger. The
Strawman is identified by a name in all capital letters,
such as “DONALD J. NETOLITZKY,” while the proper
identifier for a human is a mixed case name, or a name
with an atypical structure and/or punctuation, such as
“:Donald-J: Netolitzky:,” or “Donald of the Netolitzky
Family.”
The typical pseudolaw explanation of Strawman Theory
is that governments have no authority over human
beings, but instead chain that authority via contracts
from the government to the Strawman, then through
the Strawman to the flesh and blood individual. To
escape state authority and law, one severs the contract-
based Strawman to human linkage, and/or denounces
and rejects the Strawman’s obligations as not one’s
own. There is no “real world” legal antecedent or
parallel to the Strawman.1 Strawman Theory is purely a
pseudolaw construct.
In a critical sense, Fiscal Arbitrators reversed the usual
Strawman Theory scheme, and instead of the Strawman
operating as a nefarious secret doppelganger, Fiscal
Arbitrators claimed one can exploit the Strawman to
obtain certain benefits. Specifically, Fiscal Arbitrators
used the divided Strawman and human being duality
as a mechanism to generate fictitious income tax
losses. Fiscal Arbitrators claimed that a human being
may claim “business” expenses, allegedly resulting
from operating the Strawman, or “PERSON,” as an
income tax expense (R v Branch, [2020] OJ No 2628
(QL) (Ont Ct J), paras. 7-8). In Fiscal Arbitrators tax
returns, these expenses were claimed by a “Statement
of Agent Activities” (see Peck v The Queen, 2018 TCC
52, para. 30, as an example) where the “Agent” (a.k.a.
Strawman), named in all capital letters, is identified
as a “Business.” Legitimate income for the taxpayer is
identified as “Money Collect as Agent for Principal,”
where the “Principal” is the human being. Then, the
“Statement” identifies “Sub contracts and labour ...
AMT TO PRINCIPAL FOR AGENT,” that is deducted
from the legitimate income. In Fiscal Arbitrators
tax returns, “Sub contracts and labour ...AMT TO
PRINCIPAL FOR AGENT” was stereotypically vastly
more than a person’s legitimate income. For example,
with Peck, his “Statement” identified $116,283.25 in
actual tax year income, but then $458,965.38 in “Sub
contracts and labour,” creating a net “business” loss
of $342,682.13. For Peck, that spurious entry entirely
eliminated his tax year income tax obligation.
The “Sub contracts and labour” loss amount is entirely
fictitious, and has no legitimate basis for either its
existence or quantum. Fiscal Arbitrators promoters
appear to have simply made up these amounts. The
1 Though superficially similar, personal corporations operate on an
ownership-based rather than contract-dependent structure, and have an
opposite path of authority, control, and legal obligation.

ISSN: 2710-4028 DOI: doi.org/10.54208/1000/0006 103
result of this false loss claim was Fiscal Arbitrators
clients reported no net income during a taxation
year, and often would also claim excessive losses that
would be carried back into prior years to create further
unwarranted tax refunds. The most common observed
pattern is that a Fiscal Arbitrators return would falsely
result in no income tax for year X, then retroactively
“carry back” losses to revise years X-1 to X-3 income
tax returns to (attempt to) generate baseless refunds
(e.g., Brisson v The Queen, 2013 TCC 235, paras. 14-
15 Mallette v The Queen, 2016 TCC 27, para. 1).
The exact manner in which the Fiscal Arbitrators
Strawman system was explained by its promoters
seems to have varied somewhat. Often the taxpayer
described a scheme whose language closely matches the
explanation above (e.g., De Gennaro v The Queen, 2016
TCC 108 Mallette v The Queen, 2016 TCC 27, para.
5). Other times Fiscal Arbitrators promoters described
the human as the “animator” for the Strawman entity, a
“corporation” (e.g., Brathwaite v The Queen, 2016 TCC
29, para. 12 Torres v The Queen, 2013 TCC 380, para.
53), or even as a “slave” (Khattar v The Queen, 2015
TCC 338, para. 10).
Besides Strawman Theory, Fiscal Arbitrators materials
and correspondence exhibited a range of what are
best described as pseudolaw ornaments or fingerprint
motifs, minor and meaningless practices that are
unique to pseudolaw, and probably best explained as
ceremonial magic (Netolitzky, 2018c), such as:
• applying postage stamps with a signature across to
documents (e.g., Gray v The Queen, 2016 TCC 54,
para. 13 Torres v The Queen, 2013 TCC 380, paras.
12, 20)
• citations to the US Uniform Commercial Code
(“UCC”) (e.g., Atutornu v The Queen, 2014 TCC
174, para. 24), which are meaningless and irrelevant
in a Canadian context (Meads v Meads, 2012 ABQB
571, paras. 150, 228)
• names signed in upper case letters and blue ink
(e.g., Mallette v The Queen, 2016 TCC 27, para. 8)
and
• a Fiscal Arbitrators-specific motif that taxpayers
signed their name with the prefix “per” before their
signature.
Fiscal Arbitrators promoters also appear to have made
baseless claims against government actors by a category
of foisted unilateral agreements known as fee schedules
(e.g., Lauzon v The Queen, 2016 TCC 71, para. 8).
Foisted unilateral agreements are factually ineffective
pseudolaw documents that purport to take legal effect
when no response occurs by a deadline, so that “silence
means agreement” or “silence means consent.”
The Fiscal Arbitrators tax evasion pseudolaw scheme
may have had an earlier parent or inspiration. Around
the same time that Fiscal Arbitrators was active, other
analogous schemes are known to have operated in
Canadian Detaxer circles. The best characterized of
these is the Kelowna, British Columbia based DeMara
Consulting Inc. program marketed as “The Remedy”
(Canada v Rattai, 2022 FCA 106 R v Stancer, 2016
BCSC 192 Rattai v The Queen, 2020 TCC 55). The
Remedy used the same underlying logic: the Strawman
as a source of tax deductions. However, unlike Fiscal
Arbitrators, Donna Marie Stancer and Deanna Lynn
LaValley, the key promoters who marketed The Remedy,
did attempt to ground Strawman business losses in the
taxpayer’s personal living expenses.
B. Fiscal Arbitrators
The earliest identified example of a Fiscal Arbitrators
tax return was for the 2005 tax year (Engel v Canada,
2017 FCA 122). The Fiscal Arbitrators scheme rapidly
expanded in the following years, but equally soon
imploded. Published reports identify two central
promoters: Lawrence (Larry) Watts and Aurelius
Carlton Branch (R v Branch, [2020] OJ No 2628 (QL)
(Ont Ct J), paras. 3-12 R v Watts, 2016 ONSC 4843,
para. 8). Paid agents sometimes recruited customers (R
v Branch, [2020] OJ No 2628 (QL) (Ont Ct J), paras. 4,
9, 13). Muntaz Rasool is a commonly identified Fiscal
Arbitrators agent. These principal Fiscal Arbitrators
actors were criminally charged in 2012-2013 for their
tax evasion and fraud2
1
promotion activities (Brownell,
2 In this article, false tax returns are described as “fraud,” “evasion,”
and “tax avoidance.” Use of these three terms relates to the type of court and
administrative sanctions and processes involved. Where a Fiscal Arbitrators
actor was subject to criminal prosecution, their illegal misconduct is
described as “evasion,” “fraud,” and “fraudulent,” since those are the offenses
of which the individual was charged and convicted. As far as is known, all
Fiscal Arbitrators criminal proceedings were directed to promoters. They
created “fraudulent” tax returns. However, individual taxpayers were only
subject to Income Tax Act “tax avoidance” penalties, rather than criminal
charges. As a consequence, individual taxpayer misconduct is usually
identified as “tax avoidance,” though, factually, the taxpayer’s activities could
legally meet the criteria for “evasion” and/or “fraud.”