Making a Monster

When twelve-year-old Jesse Pomeroy tortured seven small boys in the Boston area and then went on to murder two other children, one of the most striking aspects of his case was his inability ever to answer the question of why he did what he did. Experts tried to explain his horrible acts -- and distance the rest of society from them -- but the mystery remains. This book details the crimes and explores the two reigning theories at the time -- that he was shaped before birth when his pregnant mother visited a slaughterhouse and that he imitated brutal acts found in popular dime novels. The author then offers a new theory: that Pomeroy suffered a devastating reaction to a smallpox vaccination which altered his brain, creating a psychopath who revealed the human potential for brutality.