Ron Book’s guilt satiated by hatred for sex offenders
By Shelly Stow . . . I watched the film Untouchable through live streaming as it was shown at the RSOL National Conference that has just concluded in Atlanta, Georgia.
This film could well have been named, “Portrait of a bitter, angry man.”
Ron Book’s daughter Lauren was sexually assaulted by a nanny the family had hired for Lauren. The abuse went on for many years. She kept Lauren from revealing the truth to her parents through threats and intimidation.
Of course he was angry to learn the truth – devastated, actually. Any parent would be. Of course he is bitter that his little girl suffered pain and horror for so many years.
Rob Book, as an outlet for his anger and his bitterness, has made himself a juggernaut whose purpose is to destroy every sex offender in the state. Involved even then in Florida’s political scene, he has become arguably one of the most powerful men in the state.
He is responsible for legislation that created the Julia Tuttle Bridge scandal. He is almost single-handedly responsible for law after law whose sole purposes are to punish everyone on the Florida sex offer registry to the furthest degree possible. He openly and proudly announced that Florida was “scorched earth” to any registered sex offender.
He revealed that he is closely watching the progress of Lauren’s abuser toward a release date and that he will be there to hound her every second he can.
He cites unrealistically high sexual recidivism rates and makes outlandish statements about the surety of registrants to commit new crimes and their extreme danger to society. When questioned about research study after research study all showing the opposite of everything he has said, he brushes it aside like an annoying gnat. All lies, he said, trumped up figures, nonsense.
It is not until the last few minutes of the film that another motive for all of his actions, all of his hatred, emerges. He is seated behind his desk, and an off-camera interviewer asks him which, if any, of all the laws on Florida’s books today, laws whose existence he is responsible for, would have, had they existed years ago, saved Lauren.
He stumbles only a little when he says no, most likely none of them would have made a difference. None would have protected Lauren from her abuser. And then he says something remarkable.
He says, stumbling a bit more, that the only thing that would have saved her is if he and her mother had, when she was young, educated her about what to do in such a situation. Told her that she could tell them anything. Told her that secrets are not forever. Told her what to say to them, her parents, if anyone hurt her or scared her. He said that she might not have told them the first time it happened, or maybe not even the second, but that he is sure she would have told them soon — if only they had taught her that she could.
And with those words, the truth about what motivates Ron Book was revealed. Yes, he is angry. And bitter. And vengeful. But that is not what drives him.
What drives him is guilt.
(Re-published from With Justice for All)
Yea, I would agree completely with the “guilt” assessment related to mr. Book. In fact, it is a major factor behind a lot of crimes. Many people grow up resenting society for things that happened to them, and many are not aware of the resentment consciously.
For instance, if a person was subjected to events as a child, it would have a direct effect on their ability to maintain healthy borders related to certain activities. Say for example being taught to distrust or hate certain types of people. Conciously they may grow up thinking they have no biases towards those people, but subconsciously they would and may use rationalizing as a way to ignore those biases. They may even attempt to outwardly appear to go out of their way to prove they are not biased, and that would be the “guilt” association.
Others can be related to rejection, humiliation, and other forms of abuse a person may have been subjected too as a child, adolescent, or adult. The scientific basis for this rule is often stated as “what comes around goes around”. This is one of the primary failures of the public school system, it completely fails to discuss the consequences of emotional and physical abuse, and does not prepare anyone for such events, and its the failure of parents as well. Since they are often times the culprits of the abuse or condone it.
But this is the nature of the human condition, as is demonstrated by statistics, and $&*t happens in life, and those acts result in crimes. Good article.
Well stated here, Rick, with the cause and effect. What you said should be shared further so it is known by many, many others to understand their actions at earlier and earlier ages.
Its not worth the effort, all the education in the world cant stop crime, it just changes with education. The laws of this world cant be stopped. Its like diseases, you fix one, another one pops up. Like this guy book, a crusader putting lots of money in his pocket at the expense of others, you can get rid of one but then another one takes his place. Like that awful woman nancy grace, another crusader in a long line of them.
Now I see why heroin addiction is so powerful, it demands total compliance or death. A singular direction making a person oblivious to wll other concerns. Like these crusaders, it becomes an addiction, lol. Just ask any politician in this country.
We’re one of the most educated countries on this planet, and one of the most insane as well, do you see what I mean. The answer is simple, if you want to stop crime, stop breeding and making humans, otherwise kiss my #% $@.
In the meantime I think I might try to use the 6th circuit decision and mosy on down to the local small claims court and sue these scum again for making me pay to go to see cops and see how quickly the case gets dismissed, lol.
It will go nowhere but at least it will cost them money since they will ignore all of the legal issues. What a world, lol.
Cause and effect? I submit the following:
“The FBI said it is “continuing to gather facts” about allegations against Brad Pitt regarding his children while aboard a private jet.”
“According to the LA Times, the FBI was informed of “a child welfare incident.” According to the report, citing a law enforcement official, the incident involved unruly behavior by Pitt while his children were present. The source also told the LA Times that the Los Angeles County Department of Children & Family Services is conducting an investigation into Pitt’s behavior.”
This statement is not a movie script about the future. This was front page news on my internet service this morning. You can call it Nazism, Socialism, Legalism, Draconianism, or any “ism” that disregards any and all things in order to fulfill the mandate of “if we can protect just one, it is worth it”.
By the way, which political party of lawmakers do you think will run to the rescue? My vote is: None!
I will pray for Ron Book.
As a father, I can only begin to imagine the pain and anguish this man must feel in his heart. Yes, he has caused us all tremendous amounts of suffering and pain with the results of his anger yet I forgive him. No one is all good or all bad. I can only hope that one day he can rest his heart and mind and see the truth.
John 8:7
And as they continued to ask him, he stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone”
Scorched Earth policy – A scorched earth policy is a military strategy that targets anything that might be useful to the enemy while advancing through or withdrawing from an area. Specifically, all of the assets that are used or can be used by the enemy are targeted, such as food sources, transportation, communications, industrial resources, and even the people in the area…Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scorched_earth
Ron Book is a fine example of what not to be as people age when they have not dealt with their grief, anger and guilt. He went though a tragedy involving his child that no parent should have to ever experience. For that, he should receive sympathy. No child should experience what the nanny did. The act on the child should never be condoned.
Despite that, he should not be badgering and lashing out through his personal “scorched earth” policy. This policy is truly a military strategy and should not be a public policy by any means because it is dangerous to everyone, e.g. recovering victims, those convicted and trying to recover, and friends & families of both. His “if I have to suffer, you too shall suffer as long as I do” or “let me drink poison while I wait for others to die” will only continue to result in negativity across many spectrums for him, those like him who feel the same and others.
He has used his bully pulpit long enough to advance counterproductive agendas to help him feel better about the guilt. Politicians are scooped up in the related wave of emotion and use it to further their own agendas. Together, irreparable harm is created and power is inflated.
However, in reality, Ron cannot progress forward and will hold himself and others back trying to move forward because he won’t acknowledge the data, the professionals, including several from Florida, and those who are in the know of what really is the situation regarding recidivism, etc. It will be a better day when he decides to listen, read and understand these numbers, people and situations.
It would be a better legacy for Ron if he decided to help all who are impacted in Florida and nationally on this topic instead of being vindictively one-sided. He has some of the best lobbying skills as detailed online with his firm, so use them to help all…..help ALL.
Until then, Ron Book will continue to be an example of what is wrong about our society and its continual fear mongering, sky is falling, let’s go get’em mentality.
(P.S. John Walsh, politicians, the court system and others would be served best if they did the same, but that is for another day…)
If these laws are not based on truth and rather on emotions and made up numbers, then whey is it allowed to push people who are labelled as sex offenders to extermination? If following a law means ones extermination, what’s the use of following them?
I dont think sympathy for mr. Book is appropriate, pure hatred is all i have for him. I feel for his daughter, but I wonder how she has dealt with what happened. I’ve had to deal with fear, hatred and anger my entire life but I’ve never wanted to pass laws to single out any particular type of person, thats what criminal laws are for.
As for people like mr. Book he’s just a power hungry criminal using his daughters experience as a means to achieve his level of criminality. Im tired of legitimizing peoples anger, it wasnt enough to have the nanny punished hut then he wanted to punish everyone. Typical of a sociopathic personality as far as im concerned.
Sexual dysfunction is a hallmark of this society, its in every family and erson in this nation as well as a lot of other mental health issues. All the laws in the world wont and cant stop it. All I know is that soon there will be millions of so’s on the registry who cant work or live freely and the majority of them are adults, and that doesnt include the millions who havent been publicly exposed. Maybe one day they will be able to pass laws banishing people who hate like mr. Book does.
Remember they all came from the same stock mr. Book does. I wonder how many females this guy had sexual relations with before he was 18. If he is a norjal guy im sure he c could have been classified as a sex offender statutorily. People like him arent wrth the time f day to discuss, hes just a hypocrite.
You can find out how his daughter is doing and what she has done to deal with it and move on by searching for her online: Lauren Book
She has turned it into a positive for everyone impacted!
How has she turned it into a positive? The state gives her thousands of dollars of state money for Lauren’s Kids and if you look closely at their advocacy they are more “reactive” than “Proactive” and with that Ron can continue to lobby for GEO Corp. the largest private prison company based out of Boca Raton Florida.
When WAR and some independent advocates did the Rally in Tally we tried to reach out and meet with Lauren and her executive director but they would not acknowledge WAR. Now Lauren is going to be a Florida state senator and in the film the Florida legislators pretty much acknowledged Ron Book runs the legislature….
It was meant to be a sarcastic positive…..hard to convey that sometimes in messages
Thanks for the info update on the both father and daughter in what they are doing…..
Wow this Ron Book guy is some piece of work. so he’s the one that lobbied for the shanty town back up his mistake by trying to be a hero. I would have to say he is guilty of abuse of suggestion and lack of knowledge. A sex offender coming out of prison doesn’t need anything like a causway. Its scary to even think about how man treats others. I will forgive that man but its the though of it all. That Book dude has millions of dollars from his lobbying on this and that but the truth is he is just as guilty for instilling the thought into those civil minded juries.
We are all sinners just like that heartbroken guy said, but when authorities go beyond the authority of God in a lot of these ordeals than human authority has to be called out on that. Consider this do authorities have a crystal ball to say who will offend and who will not?
I’m sure all have made mistakes in life. Authorities are actually playing the devil in a lot of this sex offender delimna. (Food for thought) RSOL your doing good work..
Agree here 100% with what you write…..well said James
Education is the answer. We are educating children to report crime. That is a progress. We need to educate adult to seek erotic services and educate about consequences of molestation on children.
Someone correct me if wrong, but I believe because of him many SO’S are living under a bridge in Miami? How can this happen in the USA? War Criminals are treated with more respect. How come he can be a lobbyist and no one challenge him? If RSOL or the appropriate organization would train me well, that I would be sure that I am sure of what I am presenting, I would be a lobbyist for for sex offenders rights after they have paid the price to society. Today, the Governor of NC quotes the constitution when asked about sharing with the public the police tape of the recent police shooting. Well what about the constitutional rights for us here? This man disgusts me. Fate had his daughter be a victim and because his lack of probably a mental report on this nanny, now everyone must pay. This confirms my point that anyone can harm a child . Why don’t we all ban together and demand our Constitutional rights? Why doesn’t Miami provide housing for these Offenders? This is very disturbing.
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that.
—Martin Luther King, Jr.
Professional victim
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Here we go again in nys, another nutty senator from rockland county wants residency restrictions. I bet he is like his predecessor, a corrupt senator headed for a federal indictment just like dean skelos, the creator of the nys sora. Like I said, you cant get rid of these crusaders and their sanctimony. They are really sick people who believe they own this nation, hell if they are so afraid, let them move out, damn cowards.
Ron Book and wife (does he have one, did he?) must have been completely absent in the rearing and raising of their children. Too much into BSing their way into some government sponsored money making scheme of some sort or another.
Yea, private prison industry …. money.
Ron Book sold his soul. Same demons that fill him have found residence in Lauren.
Evil. This man and his offspring are pure evil.
Now they are coaching children (Lauren’s Kingdom) to turn in anyone who disciplines them or makes anything unpleasant as an abuser.
Excuse me, but life is plain unpleasant many times for all people living in reality. That is why it is called a ‘fallen’ and a ‘cursed’ world.
Parents who want to raise their children to not be spoiled brats better take cover.
Does anyone besides me get Ron Book and Donald Trump mixed up with each other? For me, the similarities far outweigh the differences. Just sayin’…