Born and Raised to Murder: A Failure of Foster Care

"In this book, Judge Sullivan skillfully 'pulls back the curtain' to illuminate the circumstances that led Leo Boatman to kill two college students within a few seconds of exchanging pleasantries with them along a park trail. This book is as compelling as it is disturbing; it is a masterful account that helps the reader to understand the murderer without excusing his behavior."

-- Kathleen M. Heide, Ph.D., Distinguished University Professor, University of South Florida; Editor of The Routledge International Handbook of Juvenile Homicide

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When Florida juvenile judge Irene Sullivan read about the arrest of the young man who killed two college kids camping in the Ocala National Forest, she took action-in a surprising way. She began writing to Leo Boatman, 19, determined to understand what led him to commit such a random, violent act. She shares their correspondence, and examines many other cases of delinquency and its destructive trajectory, in her first book, Raised by the Courts: One Judge's Insight into Juvenile Justice.

Here, in Born and Raised to Murder, Sullivan continues her exploration into a foster care system that abuses, neglects, and incarcerates children, like Boatman, who seem unable to break free from a cycle of crime. Through her singular relationship with Boatman, she offers a rare insider's view into his background, not as an excuse for his crimes, but as a way to understand how a bright bookworm of a child ended up a killer on death row.

You'll read about Sullivan's role as a defense witness in Boatman's trial, enlightening perspectives from juvenile delinquency experts Kenneth Wooden, Dewey Caruthers, and Dr. Adele Solazzo, as well as Boatman himself.

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"I want my story to be told so what happened to me never happens to another foster kid. If you want to create a pit bull, put a kid in solitary confinement in a juvenile prison, without books to read and taunted by prison guards." -Leo Boatman