No License, No Problem: Durmaz Drives Without One

Most people would never take the chance of operating an unregistered vehicle without a driver’s license.

But Barry Durmaz lives by another set of principles and a higher set of laws, basing his everyday life by living through God’s laws and Christian self-government.

The Intercourse resident, Army veteran, former small business owner, liberty activist and soon-to-be published author has not had a valid driver’s license for more than a decade. He recently gave up having an official state license plate on his car, instead having a custom license plate reading “Private, DOT exempt, for non-commercial use only.”

Durmaz, a married father of five children, said he looks at the driving issue as a right to freely travel without having to submit to unjust laws.

“This is a Christian witness,” Durmaz said. “This is being a witness for the true landlord here in America.”

Local Cases

On Aug. 3, Durmaz was headed out for a lunch meeting when he was pulled over by a Manheim Township Police officer for not having current registered tags on his license plate.

Durmaz said his car was given to him by his mother, and it still had the expired Oregon license plate. He was charged with driving an unregistered vehicle, driving with a suspended or revoked license and driving without insurance.

After being pulled over, Durmaz took off the Oregon plate and put the “Private” plate on his car. Durmaz said by having a state license plate on a car, it can signify that the government has the authority to regulate it.

“Even though it bothers me that this stuff happens, I’m thankful to the Lord because each time there’s an incident, it forces me to see something I didn’t see before,” Durmaz said. “So I now have my private plate on my private car. And now I’m stating upfront, this is my private property instead of the state plates that gives them some jurisdiction that they can regulate.”

Durmaz immediately challenged the three citations in District Court, sending the paperwork back to the court by arguing the charges were “defective” because there was no injured party in the case.

Durmaz said through other court cases he has learned that he must respond to the charges so that they can eventually move to a higher court. He said through a written response, he doesn’t have to appear before the District Court.

Rights such as the right to travel “are going to get violated at these lower levels,” Durmaz said. “They are the payment window for the insurance companies.”

Durmaz was found guilty on Sept. 28 by District Judge David P. Miller on the three summary charges, but he filed a summary appeal on Nov. 2, sending the case to the Court of Common Pleas. The notice of summary appeal was officially filed in the Lancaster County District Attorney’s office, and Durmaz said the case could take upwards of six months to be heard in the higher court.

Another summary trial date is scheduled on Feb. 16 in front of Judge Miller for a separate case in which he was cited on Jan. 4 for required registration and driving without a license.

“Even when something goes wrong, it doesn’t feel good, but the hard truth is that it is good if we can see what the Lord would have us do,” Durmaz said.

Other Challenges

When asked how many people in Pennsylvania are attempting to use the same arguments related to driver’s licenses, Durmaz said he knows of at least a couple others, including a man in Cumberland County.

Durmaz said he has been working with a woman in Luzerne County who is also driving without a license, helping her with her paperwork and her appeals process in court.

The woman was in her car and refused to get out of the vehicle when she was pulled over, Durmaz said, leading to a Berwick Police Department officer smashing her window. She was jailed for 34 days Durmaz said, with no phone call allowed for five days and no medical attention.

Durmaz said the woman is now suing the Berwick Police Department for several offenses in a counterclaim, including deprivation of human rights and false imprisonment.

Durmaz said he may file his own counterclaim if his current charges aren’t dropped in court.

“The DOT, they force and threaten you with force and it’s an adversarial relationship,” Durmaz said. “And I am no longer supporting these organizations that are defying domestic tranquility. That’s also one of our purposes of our government by the Constitution. Where is the domestic tranquility? And that’s what I’m bringing forward.”

Florida Cases

The Pennsylvania traffic charges aren’t the first time Durmaz has faced the court system.

While living in Florida, Durmaz said he had to deal with two different personal cases, including one where he was pulling a trailer for a farm and was pulled over for a light that was out on the trailer. He said he was able to win one of the cases but pled nolo contendre to another, accepting a guilty plea without admitting guilt and had to pay fines.

In another case, Durmaz was teaching his oldest daughter how to drive while hauling a weighted trailer with a van. He said the van started drifting onto the shoulder of the highway, and when his daughter over-corrected on the steering wheel it caused the van and trailer to flip on their side.

Neither of them were injured in the crash, but a police officer cited Durmaz’s daughter in the incident. Durmaz said he told the officer he would accept full responsibility for the crash, but the officer said Durmaz’s daughter was responsible and cited her.

Durmaz took the tickets and sent them back to the court, saying he responded to the charges as her father under his care. He invoked the law of coverture, a legal doctrine in common law dealing with women being tied to their husband legally.

The case was eventually dropped in court, Durmaz said, because the legal system didn’t know how to handle a long-established legal doctrine under English common law.

“I said, I’m standing in for my daughter, you’re not dividing up the family,” Durmaz said. “Basically, we are one whole family, and if you come against somebody, you’re coming against me as the head of the family.”

Giving Up His License

Durmaz said the concept of giving up his driver’s license came after he and his family moved back to the United States after living in Japan for three years. While living in Japan, Durmaz had already decided to stop paying taxes to the IRS, which has continued for the last 17 years.

“I took back my economic liberty, because Jesus gives you economic liberty,” Durmaz said. “And I decided that the next area to work on was travel.”

When he came back from Japan, Durmaz still had his Oregon driver’s license. He said he was eventually pulled over for not stopping at a stop sign, but he argued that the stop sign was not valid because construction was being done at the intersection at the time and there was no oncoming traffic to necessitate a stop sign.

The deputy sheriff who was sitting at the intersection waiting to pull drivers over told Durmaz to get back in his car after being stopped. Durmaz refused, and he was arrested, spending four hours in jail.

“These guys are tyrants, and they’ve lost sight that they’re a public servant,” Durmaz said.

Before going to court to fight the charges, Durmaz said he studied the Oregon vehicle code to formulate his defense. He argued in 11 minutes of testimony that the stop sign was not legitimate according to their own code because it was not officially in operation.

Durmaz said the judge still found him guilty, and he was told that, “If we let everybody do that, we would have chaos.”

“That was a beautiful case for me to learn this,” Durmaz said. “He couldn’t tell me what’s wrong and that I wasn’t guilty. He found me guilty, but I wasn’t.”

Durmaz never renewed his license after the incident. He said he eventually lost the physical Oregon driver’s license when he left it in a coin pouch while shopping at a Costco when he moved to Florida.

Living Free

Today Durmaz runs a website, www.libertyisthelaw.us, where he advises people on their legal rights and to search for the “liberating power of Christ to govern your family, your business, and your church body.”

Durmaz is also working on publishing his first book, “What Is An American: How the Virtuous Government of America’s Unseen King Deals a Death Blow to the Evils of Socialism, Marxism, and Communism.” He argues that the liberty of households is the key to freedom in America.

“The inherent weakness of law is to think you’re going to have a law for every nook and cranny of life,” Durmaz said. “That’s what the lawyers try to do. And that’s the pagan view of law – pagan as a false god. The true Lawgiver only has a handful of things – ten, and really two. Love God and love your neighbor. And if you love, you fulfill the law as it says in Romans 13.”

And as far as facing the consequences of going without a driver’s license, Durmaz said he is willing to face any punishment. “Sometimes you have to go to jail, because that’s the price of freedom,” Durmaz said. “Look at Jesus. He had a secret trial. That’s criminal. And no evidence to crucify him. So in God’s economy, we have no arbitrary law. We have no good government because God does not rule without His law of liberty.”