Adam Bosch, Times Herald-Record
An anti-government bully was sentenced Monday to five years in federal prison for using fake bills, bogus property liens and bizarre court filings to attack Ulster County bankers and government officials.
Richard Ulloa, 52, was sentenced on seven counts of mail fraud for using the U.S. Postal Service to deliver phony bills and liens that threatened to harm the credit of bankers and public officials.
The tactic is known as “paper terrorism.”
Ulloa remained defiant till the end. Even though he filed roughly $4 trillion in liens and bills against police, judges and county employees, Ulloa told a judge in Albany that it was he who lost more than anyone.
“I lost a job, I lost a business and I lost property,” said Ulloa, who once earned more than $180,000 a year as an IBM engineer. “I have lost more than anybody else.”
Ulloa, of Stone Ridge, is a member of the sovereign citizens, a national movement of radicals who do not believe the government has the right to create or enforce laws.
His anti-government scheme took many turns. It started in 2008, when the Mid-Hudson Valley Federal Credit Union began foreclosure proceedings on his Ridge Mountain Road home. Ulloa responded by sending a “criminal complaint” to the bank, demanding $46 million from its officers.
When the bank didn’t pay, he filed a $2.8 billion lien against bank CEO Bill Spearman.
The pattern repeated itself twice more, when Ulloa was issued traffic tickets in Rosendale and the Town of Ulster. He filed bills and liens against police officers and judges in both municipalities. He also filed bogus papers against Ulster County officials.
