International Journal of Coercion, Abuse, and Manipulation Volume 6 2023 134
government of Texas has ...” (Forwarded from Bonnie
Straight, 2022).
Another now-deleted audio clip posted by Bonnie
Straight is of her calling the police to again involve
herself in an Amber alert. In the clip, she stated that she
was calling to ask further questions about the situation.
Bonnie Straight repeats her claims that CPS is a child
trafficking organization that harvests the organs of
children. She instructs the dispatch worker to give her
message to the chief of police and to tell CPS that she
called. This audio clip was coupled with a “call-to-
action” message from Bonnie Straight that instructed
others to “Call your local sheriff department,” and then,
“tell Sheriff ‘so-and-so’ that CPS is a child trafficking
agency that uses children in satanic ritual abuse, organ
harvesting, child trafficking, adopting children out
for profit to other families which is an act of genocide
under 18 USC 1091” (Take action now, 2022).
In a third October 7, 2022 video posted on the
Straights’ Telegram page, Bonnie Straight recorded
herself calling the Sheriff’s Department of Livingston,
Texas, after the Department issued an Amber alert for
a child abduction case. The abducted child was a two-
week-old Caucasian female. The suspect was the non-
custodial mother who absconded with the child. The
alert instructed the public to call 911 with information.
Bonnie Straight decided to call 911 to put the Sheriff’s
department “on notice.” She told the 911 dispatcher
that if a parent:
In addition, she stated that if the Sheriff’s department
did not stop what it was doing, then it would be
prosecuted. Bonnie Straight encouraged her followers
to also call the Sheriff’s department to do the same.
She ended the video with a notation that read: “the
end of CPS is coming” (Bonnie Straight calls sheriff’s
department, 2022).
has not been adjudicated as an unfit parent
with a trial by jury of her peers, with a real and
meaningful hearing, that it is an attempt to
kidnap the child from the mother and that they
can be held accountable ...for a war crime of
genocide underneath the Nuremberg code 18
USC 1091.
3. December 2022 Video
In a six-minute video directed to the Straights’
Telegram followers, Bonnie Straight advises that the
“civil servants” who work at CPS are getting more
aggressive. She accuses them of unlawfully entering
people’s homes and taking children. Her advice, if
one is dealing with CPS, is to go on vacation, do not
use your cell phone or get a new one, to avoid being
found. The government, she explains, has gone rogue,
is a “corporation,” and has a financial incentive to
take children from their parents. She explains that the
problem of CPS taking children is so serious, that you
have to be ready to defend your children “with force
if you have to.” Bonnie Straight goes on to say that the
Supreme Court of the United States has ruled:
4. January 2023 Incident
David and Bonnie Straight’s latest attempts involved
two parents who self-identified as sovereign citizens.
These parents were arrested after a six-hour standoff
with police. The couple was charged with felony
kidnapping of their child (Brown, 2023). The night
before the arrest of the couple, Bonnie Straight posted
a message on Telegram, encouraging her followers to
contact the police to prevent them from “kidnapping”
the couple’s children. Numerous followers indicated
that they called the police and attempted to intervene.
Bonnie Straight also posted this message on Telegram
regarding the matter: “the people have the right to
fight to the death against false arrest a US Supreme
Court has ruled that in a case called “Amasted”1 [sic]”
(The people have the right, 2023). After the sovereign
citizen couple was arrested, Bonnie Straight alerted
her Telegram followers that the couple was (allegedly)
arrested illegally their children were “kidnapped” by
1 This statement probably relates to the 1841 Supreme Court of the
United States decision of United States v. The Amistad, 40 U.S. 518.
...you have the right to fight to the death against a
wrongful detention. I’m not going to recommend
that you use force but you make that decision for
yourself if it is required of you to defend your
children to the death because guess what they
have planned for your children. It is not good. It
is absolutely evil. They will jab them, your kids
will be dead.
(David Lester Straight, 2022).

ISSN: 2710-4028 DOI: doi.org/10.54208/1000/0006 135
• the submission of illegitimate court
documents
• challenges to the jurisdiction of courts and
government agencies
• unauthorized claims to act as someone’s legal
representative
• citation of irrelevant court cases
• misrepresentation of legal rules and
principles
• the claims that Texas is its own nation and
not part of the United States
• the conspiratorial claim that lawyers are part
of the “British Accreditation Registry” (i.e.,
“BAR” members) and therefore fraudulent
• accusing CPS of being a for-profit
corporation, and threats to sue CPS workers
and
• claims that one can copyright and/or
trademark their children’s names, and that
children are chattel property.
CPS to traffick them for financial reasons. Followers
of the Straights were encouraged to contact the news
agency who reported the story, and to threaten the
news agency with a lawsuit for printing “lies.”
F. Conclusion
Notably, these examples illustrate an increasing
intermixing of QAnon and sovereign citizen ideologies.
Until recently, these two sets of ideas remained
separate (ADL, 2022). Specifically, the QAnon ideology
contributes the idea that CPS trafficks children,
harvests their organs, sacrifices them, and performs
Satanic rituals. The sovereign citizen elements include:
In short, QAnon has contributed the mythical structure,
while the sovereign citizen movement provides a legal-
sounding scheme to respond to extraordinary, but
illusory, threats to parents and children.
IV. Specific Child Custody Cases That Involve
Individuals Who Believe In Both Sovereign Citizen
And QAnon Ideologies
The next section examines child custody cases involving
individuals whose beliefs span both sovereign citizen
and QAnon ideologies.
A. “Baby Cyrus,” Ammon Bundy, and the Resulting
Hospital Lawsuit
Ammon Bundy is a far-right, anti-government activist
who has long embraced sovereign citizen ideology,
and is now incorporating elements of QAnon beliefs.
In March 2022, Bundy was arrested outside St. Luke’s
Regional Medical Center in Idaho for misdemeanor
trespassing (Associated Press, 2022a). He was accused
of refusing to leave the hospital, in association with the
medical neglect of the grandson of one of Bundy’s close
associates, Diego Rodriguez (Neiwert, 2022a). Ten-
month-old “Baby Cyrus,” as he became known, was
removed from the care of his parents by police after the
parents refused to comply with CPS’s directions. CPS
investigators determined that the child was severely
malnourished.
Specific details regarding the medical condition of
the infant are not available due to confidentiality
requirements, but a lawsuit filed by St. Luke’s
Hospital System against Ammon Bundy and his
associates describes the course of events. According
to the lawsuit, the child was initially brought into the
emergency room by his parents, and was admitted.
The child struggled with oral feeding, yet the parents
repeatedly sought to take him home against the advice
of the hospital staff. After approximately four days
the infant was discharged. The hospital attempted
to arrange a follow-up visit, to no avail. The parents
did attend multiple follow-up appointments with a
provider not associated with the hospital. At one of
these appointments, the primary care physician (PCP)
asked the parents to bring the child back the following
day, but they did not comply. At that point, the infant
was determined to be in immediate danger. Authorities
were notified. The family refused to cooperate with
police, who concluded that a warrant was necessary to
forcibly obtain custody. While law enforcement sought
that warrant, the parents moved the child to a different
location. Eventually, police located the child, who was
taken into custody. Once at the hospital, the parents
refused to provide the medical information needed
for treatment. After being stabilized, the infant was
discharged to the parents for outpatient care (St. Luke’s
Health System v. Ammon Bundy, 2022).