Part of an anti-government movement or "sovereign citizen movement", Block and Sibley had renounced their citizenship and destroyed their birth certificates, driver's licenses, and Social Security cards. They refused to cooperate with their court-appointed attorneys, maintaining that they had acted in self-defense. They also maintained that Alabama did not have the authority to try them as it was not properly re-admitted into the Union after the American Civil War. Although it could not be determined who fired the fatal shot, they were both convicted of capital murder and sentenced to death.