Jesse Pomeroy - The ‘Boston Boy Fiend’ Who Became American History’s Youngest Serial Killer
Jesse Pomeroy - The ‘Boston Boy Fiend’ Who Became American History’s Youngest Serial Killer
In 1874, Jesse Pomeroy became the youngest person ever convicted of first-degree murder in Massachusetts. He was only 14 years old, but his crimes were horrific, violent, and bloody, and he would spend the rest of his life in jail before dying in 1932.

An impoverished youth of Charleston, Massachusetts, Jesse Pomeroy didn’t have it easy. A birth defect that covered his eye in a thick white film saw him bullied at school and savagely beaten at home. But neither his family nor the law could fully explain what Jesse would become.

When her 13-year-old son began beating and sexually assaulting young boys, Pomeroy’s mother, Ruth, simply moved the family to South Boston. However, his penchant for violence only worsened with another assault sending him to reform school in 1873. But within a year, children began to vanish.

Police were shocked to find four-year-old Horace Millen nearly decapitated and 10-year-old Katie Curran decomposing in the basement of Pomeroy’s mother’s shop. His trial caused a sensation because of his age and brutality. At the time, no one knew what to make of a boy who kills children. But today, Jesse Pomeroy is known as America’s youngest serial killer.

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