Lehmark impersonator suspended from holding gov’t positions for 2 years for forgery, felony perjury

TYMBARC, Tym. (Versmark National) — Yesterday, Sarah Nolan, Chief Magistrate of the Court of First Instance, sentenced Baraka Mtajiri to be suspended from government office for 2 years, and was prohibited from running for public office for 180 days. The case marks the first official criminal sentence in the Sovereign State of Versmark.

The sentencing, read out officially by Josh Ford, Minister of the Interior and of Foreign Affairs, on behalf of Magistrate Nolan, found Mtajiri guilty of third-degree forgery & an added charge of felony perjury, and not guilty of attempted misdemeanor fraud & misdemeanor harassement. This came from Mtajiri’s attempt to forge a treaty of mutual recognition between his Second Empire of Lehmark and the Versmarkian government. It also took into account claims by Mtajiri during the proceedings, which stated that he was “the legitimate Emperor and Autocrat of Lehmark”; Magistrate Nolan found that these statements were “provably false”, given prior diplomatic contact between Versmark and the Empire of Lehmark, led by William Lehman.

Further, the sentencing discussed claims made by Mtajiri in court, claiming that Versmarkian courts could not put him on trial as a micronational leader, and claiming diplomatic immunity by extension; the sentencing report stated that Mtajiri was a Versmarkian citizen (a status he had tried to revoke midway through the proceedings), and that no active treaty of mutual recognizition existed between Mtajiri’s Second Empire or Lehman’s Empire of Lehmark.

The sentencing document can be found in full here. The National has previously reported on further context surrounding Mtajiri and his purported claim to Lehmark here.

Corrected after comments from the Ministry of Justice.