Bringing Adam Home audiobook

The story of Adam Walsh's murder is tragic and frustrating.I remember bits on the news at the time, but was a teenager and didn't really think much about it. But the media was different then, we didn't hear much about these type of things - they seemed distant and outside our world view really.A boy, snatched from a sears store while his mother was in a different part of the store -- looking back NOW puts an entirely different perspective on it. When we were kids we would often hang out in the toy section while our parents were in another section. I even remember Christmas shopping with me and my younger brother shopping on our own with a meet up time and location with my parents at a food place in the mall. Oh - how times have changed. And really as a major result of this horrific crime.A parent now would be horrified at leaving their child unattended and would come down like a hammer on poor Reve' Walsh (who probably comes down harder on herself than any other person ever could). The fact is, even though abduction/murders of children did happen, we never heard about it. And the idea of a predator like Ottis Toole who did it on a whim was just too unbelievable to comprehend.So, this book chronicles the investigation from the beginning and tells the story of why the crime was not 'solved' and Toole charged in the killing, despite numerous confessions. It does not shine a good light on the Hollywood police department and others.What makes it different from John Walsh's own book on the murder of his son is that this book was written by the man who repeatedly was shut out of the case over the years, and is the one who finally put the pieces together and found the evidence to close the case once and for all.

This is most likely the most difficult book I've read. When six year old Adam Walsh was abducted and murdered in July of 1981, America changed. As a child, my sisters and I could let the screen door slam and told our mother that we would be back later. There was no fear that something could happen to us, no fear that a pedophile, and very sick man by the name of Ottis Toole would lure us into his vehicle and violently rape, chop our heads off, and partake of some of our bones while he burned and buried the remains.But, since this occurrence, nationwide, parents learned of just what could happen if children weren't kept by their sides and kept close.ReVee Walsh took six year old Adam to a local Hollywood, Florida Sears store. While she looked at lamps for a few minutes, Adam was left with other children who were playing video games at the Sears store. When she returned, he was gone. As she panicked and continued to call for Adam, seeking help from mangers, little did she know he was already headed ten miles away where he was tortured and murdered.Another travesty occured when the detectives time and time again missed or buried the truth that a man on their radar was indeed the killer. Toole had bragged to numerous sources what he did to little Adam. But, the men in charge, simply refused to take Toole at his word. When Adam's 34th birthday occurred, finally, under the direction of Detective Sergeant Joe Matthews, who painstakingly spent countless hours going over each and every document, tracing the dots and all the errors that were made and was finally, without a doubt, able to prove that Ottis Toole was indeed the man who killed Adam.By then, Toole had died, a victim of liver failure, he cried on his death bed to God that he was so very sorry about that little boy. However, the Walsh family finally had the legal team on their side and the state attorney's office made the decision once and for all the Toole was the murderer.Through their grief and pain, the Walsh's worked to host a TV show, America's Most Wanted, which advocated for missing children, and was responsible in bringing many of the FBI most wanted to trial. I wonder if I would have been as strong and brave as the Walshes. The crime was horrifying, the written description of what happened to Adam was very difficult to read. But, I was reminded why to this day when my granddaughter is ten minutes later than she said she would be, I try not to panic. But, still my mind wonders What IF!While I rate this five stars, it was indeed incredibly hard to learn the details.

I am so freaking mad at the world right now. How can these police not have been charged? Taking someones retirement away is NOT punishment. Letting someone resign is NOT punishment. This country is going to hell and apparently is has been for some time now. I knew there was a problem with our judicial system long before Casey Anthony got away with murder but I had no idea just how incompetent police really can be. Florida especially it seems. They need to fire each and ever police officer and up in that entire armpit of the earth and have another state hire a whole new police force because I have had direct experience myself with them and they're idiots. I can't put into words how utterly pissed I am right now. Excuse me if I ramble, I made notes in the book - many of them - and don't want to forget anything. I probably will anyway so you should read the book yourselves and see how badly these "police", these so-called "protectors" messed up this little boys case.The letter that this piece of shit Toole wrote to Walsh from prison is beyond effing words. I hope he was tortured in prison every single day he was there. He had the audacity to tell Walsh he'd lead him to his son's bones if he paid him. He told Walsh his son was a "prick teaser" and that he "dumped his smelly ass into the canal". He said he was a "sweet little piece of ass". I can't believe I just typed those words in relation to this. I cannot fathom, as a parent, the hurt that would come from reading this assholes words. And yet the cops do nothing, like always.One of the incapable detectives, Hickman, took Walsh aside and told him, after handing him a religious pamphlet, "I know how you feel. But if you'd take Jesus as your savior, your son will return." How DARE he say anything like that to this man. He knows how he feels? Did he deal with a son being kidnapped, murdered, and then a wholly incapable police force pretending to catch the killer? Did he? There was so much information in this case that wasn't unearthed when it could have been, that wasn't investigated thoroughly, and that was actually hidden and not entered, that it's astounding. I guess Florida likes it's child killers to stay free and not be prosecuted. Remind me, as if I needed it, not to ever go to that armpit of a state again.The fact that these police were not charged is as upsetting as can be. How can they have gotten away with this so easily and after keeping this going so long? Do the John and Reve Walsh have no rights as citizens of this country? Did Adam not? These parents had to deal with the absolute worst thing that could ever happen. Just for one second - ONE SECOND - imagine having to deal with and KNOW your baby was kidnapped, raped and sodomized as he screamed for his Mommy, tortured, beheaded and thrown in a canal like a piece of damn trash. Then imagine knowing some monster - who the police couldn't care less about finding and charging - some monster THREW YOUR BABIES SEVERED HEAD ON THE FLOOR OF HIS CAR AND PROCEEDED TO DRIVE AROUND WITH IT. That if - and it's a BIG if as anyone who reads this knows - he didn't sexually abuse Adam's head after he severed it from his body. Go ahead. Imagine it. Now imagine a police force that you have to put your trust in not doing a Goddamnned thing. How these two didn't commit suicide I'll never know. They have to be the world's strongest people in my opinion because I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that I could not have handled it.When the prosecutor was finally shown pieces of evidence, like the letter Toole wrote to Walsh so many years ago, he had never ever seen it or heard of it before. He told Walsh he could have gotten a conviction on the letter alone, never mind the volumes of other evidence the police had which was only a fraction of what they could have had with proper investigating. How freaking sad. The picture are hard but as any t.c. reader knows, there are some hard ones out there in the midst of all the "shocking" photos of a school or house. The Sears game display is shown, where Adam was last seen by his Mother, a picture of Adam is happier times, the missing poster his parents made. The next page shows the prick Hoffman, (the detective that hindered the case the most), his prick partner Hickman, (second place in hindering IMO) and Martin, the Hollywood chief. The third page shows a picture of John and Reve leaving for Good Morning America and also at a memorial service for Adam. The next page is a pic of Toole with his stupid looking ass, a horrible picture he drew while in jail, and a piece of the letter he wrote to Walsh from prison. The canal where Adam's head floated to the surface and was found is shown, Toole's car and the run-off road where Toole dismembered and beheaded Adam is also shown. Then it gets real bad.Toole's machete is shown in regular light, no luminol. Nothing seen but rust and the rape he wrapped on the handle. Then we see a pic of the luminol enhanced machete with the tape having been taken off and the luminol is lit up on the handle. (Cops never once took of this tape prior to Matthews getting involved. A child would know to check for blood underneath the tape. Then we see the driver side floorboard of Toole's car, regular light, no luminol. And with luminol, we can see to clear bloody footprints.The last photo is frightening. I haven't been able to get it out of my mind since I first laid eyes on it. The last photo is a picture of Adam's head... outlined in blood. Toole took Adam's head, threw it behind his seat and drove away before thinking better of carrying it around and threw it into the canal. While Adam's head laid there, the blood soaked into the carpet in the outline of Adam's head. I don't think I've ever seen anything more frightening than this picture. Just imagining how this image came to be is terrifying. The fact that Adam's mouth is open is can be seen, his nose and eyes can be seen. It's awful. And John and Reve Walsh have seen this photo. There is evil in this world and if you ask me, Hoffman and Hickman and every other cop who hindered this investigation are only a half of a step down from Toole himself.

The abduction and brutal murder of Adam Walsh went unsolved for 27 years. This is the story of the determination of one dedicated detective who would not let the case rest until a monster was brought to justice.A powerful, well written account that is heartbreaking, infuriating, horrifying and finally inspiring.Highly recommended.

A really excellent, if grim, read. Fills in all the gaps left by TEARS OF RAGE and explains a great deal about how the investigators into Adam Walsh's hideous murder dropped the ball, not once but over and over. This also serves as a kind of study in how to fcrew up a police 8nvestigation without really trying. Well worth your time.

My opinion: Wow, where to begin. I think it's safe to say everyone knows about the Adam Walsh case; I remember hearing about it growing up and I used to watch America's Most Wanted all the time. However, I really never knew the details of the case. I was under the assumption that all of those years there were just no clues as to who might have kidnapped and murdered that 6 year old boy. Obviously I was wrong, because about 2 years after he was murdered, a man by the name of Ottis Toole confessed to the murder, numerous times in fact. Due to mistakes or just blatant negligence on the part of the police department this man escaped being tried for this crime for over 25 years. There were many detectives and officers that were guilty of ignoring or destroying evidence, but none so much as Detective Hoffman. I was outraged by all of the things he overlooked, the interviews that were not thorough enough, the interviews that were ignored completely, and evidence that either disappeared or was never looked at. The fact that the Walshes had to suffer all of these years, not knowing for sure what happened to their son (the police department hardly ever kept them informed on any progress, or lack there-of). If it were not for Detective Matthews continued effort to solve this case and bring peace and justice for the Walshes, it might never have been solved. Even at the beginning, it seemed as though Matthews was the only one interested in actually solving the case, instead of just pinning it on the first suspicious person. Over 25 years went by with the case not going anywhere because they didn't have "hard" evidence that Toole actually commited the crime. Finally the Walshes personally ask their now friend Detective Matthews to personally investigate and find out once and for all who murdered their little boy. And so Detective Matthews sets out to help bring some sort of closure to this family.This book was amazing! It brought me to tears at parts, a few parts made me laugh, but mostly I was shaking my head asking "why?" Why wasn't more done to put the killer away, especially after he confessed to the murder multiple times? It's like they didn't want to go through all of the trouble to follow up on it, so they just swept it under the rug. Of course like any loving parents, the Walshes could not let this go and because of their efforts through all of these years, many new laws and alerts have been developed to help protect and find lost children. As a mom, I can't imagine what Mrs. Walsh went through after Adam disappeared; I'm sure she felt responsible, but like the book says, at that time people weren't worried about their kids being taken, it just didn't happen. Everyone should read this story; it was an amazing read, horrifying and enlightening at the same time. My rating: 5/5 stars

Adam Walsh was a big deal when I was a kid. He was kidnapped a few days after my 5th birthday, an hour and a half south of where I lived with my mom. His head was found a few weeks after that an hour north of where I lived. I've thought about it since -- about this lone car, driving through my town late at night while I was sleeping, with a little boy in the trunk. There was a change after that, in my mom and in the parents of my friends. They watched us closer. We were always made sure doors and windows were locked. When we went shopping, they were on us like hawks. We knew all about stranger danger and had special guests come to class to talk to us about strangers. There's a picture of my in my grade school yearbook getting my fingerprints taken as part of such an initiative by the local police force. Things changed.I knew what all this was from a kid's point of view -- I'm really looking forward to reading this book from an adult's point of view, and espeically by such a great author as Les Standiford. His non-fiction work is spectacular, and I know I won't be disappointed.

Bringing Adam Home is a grisly unflinching account of six-year old Adam Walsh's murder and the long jinxed investigation that followed. Many of you might be familiar with the name Adam Walsh - son of America's Most Wanted host, John Walsh and his wife, Revé. He was abducted one day in 1981 from Sears, where his mother left him for a few minutes at an arcade stall and came back to find him missing. He was then murdered by a serial killer, Otis Toole. What follows is a badly put investigative effort that should have solved the case in 1983, but instead neglects evidence, abandons proper interviewing techniques and has an incompetent detective who is more worried about his reputation than in solving crimes. This book details much of that evidence - Otis Toole himself coming forward multiple times to confess, the crime scene photos that were never printed (the biggest evidence of all was in these photos), and not following up with or giving any importance to the eyewitnesses that came forward.Right from the first page, this book hooked me in. I like reading about true crime - I've thoroughly enjoyed reading In Cold Blood by Truman Capote, which features a cold-blooded killer, Perry Smith. Columbine by Dave Cullen was a favorite read from last year, it featured two teen misfits, who went on to make Columbine a household word forever. Otis Toole, Adam's murderer is a drifter and a very "strange man" with "strange eyes" - he has a very low IQ, several learning disabilities, and a troubled upbringing. He was the only suspect in the murder right from when he first confesses, but he was never charged. Detective Sgt Joe Matthews was pulled in to help on the case initially but Jack Hoffman, the arrogant detective in charge dismissed him soon. Since then, Matthews' repeated attempts to help were always botched, even though he always made some new finding.Les Standiford writes a well-researched book, that never once reads like a boring crime report. Instead, although the reader already knows the outcome of the whole investigation right in the first few pages of this book, I never once could put the book down - and took to reading it at every spare minute I got. Les Standiford attributes Detective Sgt. Joe Matthews for all the research, but it cannot be denied that he has shared all that research with the readers in a compelling style. This book is a reader's dream - a true crime, psychopathic or remorseless killers, the anxious wait for justice. This book is also a person's nightmare - a true crime, psychopathic or remorseless killers, the anxious wait for justice.Adam Walsh's murder is another one of those defining events that can be said in terms of before and after. Before the murder, children enjoyed plenty of freedom, they would play out all day without adult supervision and be back as promised before dinner. Parents hardly batted an eyelid when their child requested if he/she could play someplace else in a mall, while they went shopping. After Adam Walsh's murder, though, "Few parents would ever again leave their children alone or unattended in public places". I belong to the After era. I've never known life otherwise, so some parts of this book evoked plain disbelief in me. I wanted to ask many times, how Revé and a lot of parents left their children unattended. I grew up hearing every day from my parents - there are bad people out there, don't talk to strangers, don't go anywhere without telling us. That's the same thing I've told every younger cousin of mine and also my nieces and nephews. I had to suspend my current conditioning to accept that times used to be safer for kids at one point. There weren't any pedophiles or serial killers who targeted kids, rapists or abductors then, like there are plentiful now.As I mentioned earlier, this book is a grisly and unflinching account of the murder. There are many aspects described vividly (Adam Walsh is the only child Toole murders. But he confesses to it many times.) There is supposedly a photo shared in this book (it was absent in my review copy, but I saw it online), that I couldn't stop staring at. It was horrifying once you understood what the picture was but it wasn't obvious (a layman glance didn't help me much). But this book is not so much about the grisly murders as it is about the investigation. It is also a testament to the Walshes' work towards ensuring stronger laws and legislation to protect kids. In Matthews' words, their work made sure that "From the moment a child goes missing, no matter what, everybody drops what they're doing". It is also an ovation to Sgt. Matthews for finally providing the Walshes an answer to the twenty-five year old question regarding what happened to their child. In the end, this is an impressive documentation of how things changed so much - from the days when kids could easily go anywhere so long as they promised to be back before dark, to the current unwritten rule of never leaving a child unattended.

Les Standiford's book about the Adam Walsh kidnapping-murder, written with Joe Matthews, the retired police detective who finally tracked down all the results from nearly 30 years of slipshod investigations and lost evidence and proved that the man who first confessed to killing Adam in 1983 was indeed his killer.This book is engrossing not just because of the horror of Adam's murder or even the hard work of his parents in creating The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and his father's TV program, America's Most Wanted. The very minutia of the investigation, the thousands of phone calls, the hundreds of interviews, the shoeleather required to gather information in a case like this is engrossing in itself. Add to that the gross incompetence of some of the people who ran the investigation over the years, including its cold case re-examination, and the failure to develop film from the car in which the murdered boy was transported and you find yourself rooting for the detective to finally settle for the Walsh family what happened to their son and who was responsible.The book is cleanly and tightly written with no sentimentality and no attempt to titilate the reader with details about the obviously horrible murder. It settles for good a crime that should have been settled in 1983 or 84 and brings to an end the particular suffering of the boy's parents that comes from not knowing for so long who did this dreadful crime. It satisfies our quest for justice when the law enforcement and judicial system pronounce the case truly closed.2011 No 45

27 Years of Legal & Police Incompetent Bungling Almost everyone who watches TV is aware of the famous celebrity, John Walsh, and the well-publicized disappearance of his young son, Adam. However, it’s doubtful that many know the horrific fatal circumstances that the child was subjected to and the details of how he was found, as well as why it took so many years before the murderer finally was officially determined, while“getting away” with the crime. This extremely shocking well-written book explains it all in novelistic prose that’s hard to interrupt as you read with growing anger and teary eyes. The story is horrifyingly gut wrenching, leaving you seething not only over what happened to the boy but also for the prolonged agony his parents endured during the unnecessarily long years of law enforcement pussyfooting before final closure. The brutality in this book is somewhat reminiscent of “The Iceman,” by Philip Carlo but that nonfiction story involves numerous adult victims while Adam Walsh was just an innocent, helpless, beautiful child, which makes “Bringing Adam Home” even more upsetting.

Not a complete telling of the Walsh case but a decent recap of how the investigation was bungled. The chapter told from Toole's perspective is lurid garbage; it could easily be left out. There is also not enough explanation of the presence/absence of the relevant prosecutor's offices in the years evidence against Toole was gathered but no charges filed (the author seems to misunderstand the concept of corpus delecti; there were mountains of evidence against Toole and the decision not to prosecute clearly had nothing to do with sufficiency of evidence). Still worth reading.

Very sad story!

Me: "The book I'm listening to is REALLY pissing me off!"Friend: "Then why are you still listening to it?!"Me: "It's really good!" It seems odd to give four stars to a book that angered me so much but this is a pretty powerful book! As a child of the 70's and 80's, I was aware "America's Most Wanted" host John Walsh had a little boy who disappeared. But as a child, I had more important things to worry about than whatever happened to him. So, it was likely natural curiosity about the little boy I grew up vaguely knowing about that led to this book landing a spot on my TBR list.On July 27, 1981, Reve (Rev-A) Walsh took son Adam to a lamp sale at Sears. Leaving him to play at an Atari display, she headed over a couple of aisles to pick up the lamps. That was the last time she ever saw Adam alive. Two weeks later, his severed head was found in a drainage ditch; the rest of his body would never be found. For the next 27 (!!) years, Reve and John Walsh would be left to wonder what had happened to their son before finally getting closure in December of 2008, thanks in large part to Detective Joe Matthews.Joe Matthews was working as a detective in Miami when Adam was kidnapped and murdered. Loaned to Hollywood, he quickly dismissed the prime suspect pegged by lead detective, Jack Hoffman. And that's when things went south. I tried to keep in mind I did not know the bias of this book's author as I listened, but man, was this case bungled after the family friend Hoffman wanted to fry was cleared! With Adam's severed head as the only physical evidence, the case went cold until 1983 when Ottis Toole, while being investigated for another murder, confessed to killing Adam Walsh as well. This would start off a long series of twists and turns in this case with the end result the same at each one: Toole, despite knowing things that were never made public, was never arrested for nor tried for Adam's murder due to lack of physical evidence. As Standiford stated, it's like the Hollywood police department was going out of their way to prove Toole innocent, even though he would ultimately be revealed to be a serial killer!Over the course of the years, evidence would be found, "lost," not processed, left out of the case file, etc. Clothes matching the description of what Adam was wearing that fateful day were found where Toole hinted his body may be. They were not shown to John and Reve for identification until 15 years later. The ransom letter from Toole John Walsh had the foresight to copy before handing over to the police was never put in the file. Eye witnesses who did not realize at first they had witnessed the abduction and who could positively ID Toole were dismissed. Crime scene photos were never processed - until Matthews, acting as a private investigator in 2008, asked for copies of them. The list goes on and on. As I told my friend, it's like Hoffman decided that since he couldn't have his way, he took his marbles and went home.I think the thing that made me the most upset about this is there were no repercussions for the long line of officers who so badly mishandled this case. Standiford speculates that rather than face the embarrassment of having botched this so badly, Hollywood just tried to make it go away (to which I thought "Hey! Solving the case would make it go away!") As Matthews would ultimately prove, this case could have been definitively solved in 1983. Not 2008. 1983. TWO years after Adam Walsh was murdered. But instead his parents had to wait TWENTY-SEVEN years for closure. I can't imagine the anguish of having someone who has intimate knowledge confess only to never be prosecuted because those in charge of the investigation basically just didn't want to do it (as the book makes it sound). Seriously, how the Walshes did not sue the department is beyond me!Of course, there is good to have come from this senseless crime with the introduction and passage of several laws surrounding the kidnapping and exploitation of missing children. VICAP was created to assist the FBI. "Code Adam" was enlisted by big box stores to mobilize employees when a child is reported missing. And, of course, "America's Most Wanted" has been instrumental in catching well over a thousand fugitives, included several from the FBI's Most Wanted list. As angry as I am as to how this investigation played out over the years, a part of me can't help but wonder if all this good would have still come if the case had been solved quickly?