Jesse Pomeroy

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Jesse Harding Pomeroy (born November 29, 1859 in Charlestown , Massachusetts , † September 29, 1932 in Bridgewater , Massachusetts) was an American murderer and the youngest murderer in the history of Massachusetts.

background

Jesse Pomeroy was born to Thomas and Ruthann Pomeroy in Charlestown , Massachusetts . He was the younger of two sons, his brother Charles was a year older. His father was very violent; so he often took him to her woodshed, where he stripped him and then gave him a heavy beating.

Jesse's face was noticeably deformed from childhood. Most noticeable was his right eye, which was "milky" white - some of his victims described it as looking like a white-marbled marble - and which seemed to float in his eye socket. His mother blamed a smallpox vaccination, but a viral infection in babies is more likely. His head, ears and mouth were disproportionately large in relation to his body. He also suffered from recurrent epileptic seizures . All of these qualities made him a popular target for other children to ridicule as a child, and it is likely that this constant ridicule contributed to his anger and aggressiveness towards children. Even as an adult, he always reacted very sensitively to the looks of other people who, according to his biographer Harold Schechter, "could hardly look at him without shuddering away" .

The raids of 1871 and 1872

According to reports from 1871 and 1872, boys in Jesse's vicinity were persuaded on various occasions to go to remote places, where they were then ambushed by a boy who was only a little older. These attacks are said to have been so incredibly brutal that the boys were permanently damaged. The perpetrator was never arrested. If Jesse Pomeroy was responsible, which is widely assumed today, he was only 12 or 13 years old at the time of the acts.

In 1872, his mother separated from the brutal father and moved the children to South Boston . Since Jesse repeatedly assaulted younger people and his actions became more and more brutal, he was finally arrested. Thanks to his minority, he was only admitted to a "reformatory for boys" in Westborough, Massachusetts. Even the Boston Globe took over its history, the last line was this article: "It is gene rally Concluded did the boy is mentally deficient." ( "It is generally believed that the boy is mentally retarded." ) Despite the seriousness of his crimes he was released after 15 months. After Pomeroy's subsequent murders became known, the police and the court were heavily accused of this.

Harold Schechter , a professor at Queens College, City University of New York and an expert on serial killers , wrote the book Fiend on Pomeroy, in which he stated that never before has a youngster in Massachusetts been linked to a crime of such seriousness.

The murders

In February 1874 Jesse Pomeroy was on probation discharged and allowed to his mother, who now had her own tailoring, and sold his brother newspapers.

On March 18 of the same year, ten-year-old Katie Curran suddenly disappeared. Eyewitnesses report that she was last in the Pomeroy's shop. On April 22nd, the body of four-year-old Horace Millen was found in the swamp of Dorchester Bay; she had been mutilated. The throat was cut, 18 stitches were found on the chest, one eye had been gouged out and attempts had apparently been made to castrate him. The police immediately brought Pomeroy into connection and when he was found with a scratched face, bloodied clothes and muddy boots, the perpetrators were clear and he was arrested.

On July 18, the body of little Katie Curran was found in the basement of the store under a pile of ashes. Here, too, despite the progressing decomposition, it was still clear to see the brutality with which the murderer must have proceeded, for example her head was severed.

The negotiation

After his arrest, his interrogation resulted in him being taken to Millen's body and asked about his guilt. However, during the investigation of the coroner Pomeroy, the right to a lawyer was denied.

Before the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court found then on 9 and 10 December 1874, the negotiations The Commonwealth vs. Pomeroy instead. The attorney general called for a first-degree murder conviction . During the closing argument, however, the charges were changed to “murder with extreme atrocity,” a Massachusetts state criminal offense that differs from murder only in the absence of treachery . On December 10, 1874, Pomeroy was found guilty. However, the jury supplemented the verdict with the request to show consideration for the youth of the accused. In such a case, grace could only be granted by the governor . At the time, the judge was obliged to pronounce a death sentence if he was found guilty of first-degree murder.

His attorney, Charles Robinson, appealed twice, but both times were denied. In February 1875, Jesse Pomeroy was sentenced to death by hanging by the judge .

After the negotiation

The governor should now sign the death sentence and set the date of execution. This refused, however, and so there were three votes in the next year and a half. The first two were against commutation, but the third, held anonymously in August 1876, commuted his sentence to life in solitary confinement. On September 7, 1876, Pomeroy was transferred from Suffolk County Jail to Charlestown State Prison, where his solitary confinement began. At this point he was just 16 years and 10 months old.

In 1917 his sentence was changed again and so he was now also granted the privileges that other prisoners had with life sentences. At first he resisted and asked for nothing less than an acquittal . Later he adapted to the new circumstances and even became part of the prison's own theater group. In 1929 he was transferred to the Bridgewater Hospital for the Criminally Insane , where he finally died on September 29, 1932 at the age of 72.

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personal data
SURNAME Pomeroy, Jesse
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Pomeroy, Jesse Harding (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American murderer
DATE OF BIRTH November 29, 1859
PLACE OF BIRTH Charlestown , Massachusetts
DATE OF DEATH September 29, 1932
Place of death Bridgewater , Massachusetts