Episode 86: Willie Bosket

Criminal

Vox Media Podcast Network

True Crime, Society & Culture, Documentary

4.7 • 38.4K Ratings

🗓️ 9 March 2018

⏱️ 28 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Before he was 10 years old, Willie Bosket had skipped school, started fires, picked pockets, and stolen a car. A psychiatrist at Bellevue called him the "saddest little boy she’d ever seen.” By the time he was 16 years old, he was known all over New York City as the “Baby-Faced Butcher." His crimes led to the passing of the Juvenile Offender Act of 1978 and changed how juvenile offenders are punished all over the country. This episode was reported in collaboration with a new podcast from WNYC about the juvenile justice system: Caught. Say hello on Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. Sign up for our occasional newsletter, The Accomplice. Follow the show and review us on Apple Podcasts: iTunes.com/CriminalShow. We also make This is Love and Phoebe Reads a Mystery. Artwork by Julienne Alexander. Check out our online shop. Episode transcripts are posted on our website. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	This episode contains descriptions of violence and language that may not be suitable for
0:06.5	everyone.
0:07.5	Please use discretion.
0:10.4	When Willie was very young, he didn't know anything about his father.
0:12.9	His mother made up a story that his father was in the military.
0:17.9	This is journalist Fox Butterfield.
0:20.2	He's talking about a little boy named Willie Bosket.
0:23.6	Willie Bosket was born in New York City in 1962.
0:27.6	And as Butterfield says, he didn't know his father.
0:31.6	If Willie asked about him, his mother and grandmother would say, he's a bad man and you're
0:36.6	just like him.
0:38.4	When Willie was about six years old, he found out the truth.
0:42.6	He was in his grandmother's apartment and he saw a picture of a man wearing pants that
0:48.7	looked like part of some uniform and he was lifting weights and Willie said, who's that?
0:54.0	And his grandmother told him, that's your father.
0:57.4	He sent this chilled out of spine.
0:59.2	I'm very excited.
1:00.2	And he said, well, what's he doing?
1:01.7	Where is he?
1:02.7	And she said, he's in prison.
1:05.0	And Willie said, what's he in prison for?
1:06.4	And she told him that he murdered two men.
	...

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