FAC,
I agree with your statement. I find our court system filled with deep pockets and corruption. I believe that most on this site had “Public Pretenders” parading around as lawyers. They were wet behind the ears, fresh out of law school…. and being paid by the State ! That in-itself is a conflict of interest.
Some came to the court system from some traffic clinic. I found out from Sam Halpern (the public pretender that did NOT represent me in his full capacity–or any capacity) told me that for Murder cases, the State allows him 3 days of investigative discovery and $350 for “tests”.
Now, in the Broward phone books he touts himself as a “attorney who specializes in sex crimes cases”.

MY POINT….
As long as MONEY has rule over the court system; as long as we (the people) vote in corrupt people to run said courtroom and have people pretending to be lawyers, paid by the State, lady Justice will always be blinded.
Time to take off the blindfold.
Even the playing field.
Give proper qualified representation to the people who cant afford it… NOT a State-run “plea bargaining system”.

Somewhat agree with you on the State court system down here. The Judges are elected and we know what that means.

That said; the challenge is important and as it moves up the ladder to superior courts (if necessary) it begins to migrate away from South Florida and the deep pockets of Ron Book.

In reality, the substance of the restraining order is that you stay 1000 feet or 500 feet or whatever away from Lauren Book’s home or office. Really?!?! you live over 1000 MILES away from all that! I don’t think anyone with an ounce of common sense actually bought into the credibility of her argument. If this were actually about the restraining order, I’m sure we’d all just let it go because it’s immaterial.

What this is really about is a politically powerful person using the courts to censor someone with a viewpoint that opposes theirs. The First Amendment guarantees the right of the people to petition the Government for a redress of grievances. That’s straight out of the text!

If you didn’t have a valid point and you didn’t have an assembly of people who share your viewpoint, Lauren Book would not have bothered. But you do. It did not threaten Lauren Book, but it threatened Lauren Book’s political agenda and pocketbook and that’s what she was afraid of.

Whether it’s this TRO or a smokescreen blocking your peaceful protest in Tallahassee (literally, I believe there was a pink and blue smokescreen blocking you guys), these are efforts to suppress your message.

Whether one’s message is about registered sex offenders, same-sex marriage or save the whales, it should (and is supposed to be) protected by the First Amendment.

I am grateful to FAC, Bill Dobbs, and the others who pulled out a miracle I couldn’t replicate if I had a decade to raise funds for my own defense. I just simply have extremely little faith in the Book-friendly courts. We could dig up Johnny Cochran, make Perry Mason, Phoenix Wright, and Matlock real attorneys, maybe convince F Lee Bailey to take one last case, and even then I’d still have my doubts, not because of the skill of the attorneys but the fact that we know these court are in the back pockets of the Book Crime Family. Still, I’m in it to the bitter end.

For the moment, however, my focus is on making my first public awareness campaign since the lawsuit a success. I need to hit a home run to rebuild my confidence, quite frankly.

Hey Derek – because there were a couple of court appearances and they were long. You pay for the person’s time in capturing what was said, in transcribing it into a readable format and then a per-page cost. As the one bringing the appeal, it’s on you to furnish the copies, etc. It was more than $4K in just transcripts!

When people ask “why can’t FAC bring…”, it’s because they don’t realize that it can very easily be tens of thousands in just costs even if a lawyer does it for free!

That’s why we’re so desperately trying to raise funds to fight all of these fights, but getting donations is tough!

The biggest thanks, in your case, needs to go to Jamie Benjamin of Benjamin, Aaronson, Edinger & Patanzo ,PA. Jamie has also bent over backwards to help FAC. You should also give a big thanks to Bill Dobbs of The Dobbs Wire. He’s been coordinating the effort to encourage people to pitch in to pay for the transcripts and he got it done!

I only mention this because I must hear, 5x a day, “why doesn’t anyone do anything to help us?” when there are so many people who do so much to help registrants. Whenever someone asks; I check our donor and volunteer lists to see what they, themselves, have done. Its usually no surprise.

Good luck on this appeal, Derek. You have our full support. Any effort to suppress one’s First Amendment right to oppose government is something that needs to be fought.

Correct – though in the case of Lauren Book she got her injunction, which is why there’s an appeal.

As most of fully know from the position that we are in. If we had had enough money to go to trial with good legal representation quite a large number of us would not be RSO!

They say that you can’t fight city hall (and win anyway) and when you have deep pockets and can afford lobbyists like Ron Book to lie for you it is virtually impossible to win…even when the US constitution is on your side unfortunately!

So to recap. Deep pockets, lobbyist (Ron Book), lobbyist’s family member in government with ability to assist these deep pockets (Senator Lauren Book) to get these bills passed = Snow ball’s chance in Hell.