DEATH OF INNOCENCE

by Peter Meyer ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 26, 1985

An investigator termed it ""the most vicious crime that had ever been committed in Vermont"": the brutal rape/murder attack on two twelve-year-old girls (one survived to testify) by two teenage boys, the younger of whom received only token punishment due to his juvenile status. The crime outraged the quiet Burlington suburb of Essex, ""a model town within a model state,"" and massive police efforts soon focused on two prime suspects. By turns ""eerily quiet and violently explosive,"" Louis (the Hulk) Hamlin was not your normal 16-year-old: an accomplished burglar and car thief, Louie had previously stabbed his brother, assaulted a U. of Vermont coed with a knife, and allegedly tried to rape his sister (""I ain't sayin' I did, and I ain't sayin' I didn't""). His friend and accomplice, 15-year-old Jamie Savage, was a ninth-grade dropout with a first-grade reading level. (The cops had trouble questioning him on the rape charge until they figured out he didn't know what ""intercourse"" meant.) The precise facts of the killing may never be known--at first Jamie blamed it on Louie, then switched his story and claimed sole responsibility--though prosecutors remain convinced that Louie was the actual murderer. A jury agreed, and sentenced Louie to 45 years-to-life. Jamie, still a ""juvenile"" by quirk of birthdate, could be incarcerated only until his eighteenth birthday, an outcome that spurred new Vermont legislation permitting children as young as ten to be tried as adults. Though Meyer handles the basic material capably and sensitively, two final wide-angle chapters (""The Violent Juvenile Mind"" and ""The Injustice of Juvenile Justice"") offer only potted summaries of researchers' findings (nature vs. nurture, etc.) and bland generalizations (""Somewhere along the way the violent child failed to acquire the ability to. . . feel guilty about his actions, feel empathy toward others""). Louie's own family background--including his father's incestuous relationship with Louie's younger sister, his father's alleged rape of Louie, and the fact that both parents had themselves been abused as children--says more about the origins of juvenile violence than any study. Meyer's statement-making pretensions aside, then, a solid crime story, though not for the squeamish.

Pub Date: April 26, 1985

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Putnam

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 1985

Categories: NONFICTION