More than 20 police and agents prevented the members from leaving, seized their cellphones, recording equipment, computers and fingerprinted them.<\/p>\n
The raid was in response to to legal summons sent by Republic of Texas members to a Kerr County judge and bank employee. The organization demanded the judge and bank employee appear before Republic of Texas court held at the Veterans and Foreign Wars building in Bryan on the day the police raided the meeting.<\/p>\n
State and federal officials say the chief justice of the international Common Law Court for the Republic of Texas had issued writs of quo warranto, mandamus<\/em> and a subpoena not recognized by county, state and federal governments.<\/p>\n \u201cYou can\u2019t just let people go around filing false documents to judges trying to make them appear in front of courts that aren\u2019t even real courts,\u201d Kerr County sheriff Rusty Hierholzer<\/a> told the Houston Chronicle.<\/p>\n The group believes the state of Texas was illegally annexed by the federal government and Texas remains an independent nation under occupation.<\/p>\n Police told the newspaper they did not want a repeat of a 1997 week-long standoff between the group and police.<\/p>\n