‘King of Germany’ jailed over self-issued driving license
A notorious activist, who has proclaimed himself ‘King of Germany’ and counts 3,500 among his faithful subjects, has been jailed for three months after police stopped him for speeding and found he was carrying a driving license he had issued himself.
Peter Fitzek, 48, claims to rule a nine-hectare kingdom outside Wittenberg in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, which he founded in 2012. He prints his own money, issues his own passports and insists on using the Royal ‘We’ in communications with German authorities.
His Royal Majesty is fond of driving fast, and he has racked at least 24 traffic offences. In 2012 he gave up his German driving license in favor of a document he authorized himself as head of state.
In January, Fitzek was caught by police driving 116 km/h in a 70 km/h zone in his BMW. He produced the home-made license and refused to pay a 2,400 euro fine for the violation, which eventually brought his case to a court in Neustadt in Lower Saxony.
The self-proclaimed monarch appeared for the hearings in a shirt featuring his micro-nation’s coat of arms and insisted that the license he carries is valid. But Judge Thorsten Steufert didn’t show any awe in the royal presence, German media reported.
“You have built a fantasy world with a fanciful political worldview,” the judge told the defendant on Thursday before giving him a three-month term with no right for parole.
Fitzek said he will appeal the ruling, because German courts’ jurisdiction “does not apply to other heads of state,” Bild newspaper reported.
The former cook and video store clerk has a long record of confrontation with German authorities apart from his driving habits. The king was fined for forging a license plate for his car, attempted to ‘arrest’ an official in Wittenberg and then a judge, who was reviewing battery charges filed against him.
He also had a quarrel with teachers at a school, where his son studied, over sex education classes, which resulted in police being called in.
