**This episode was originally released in June of 2021. I am re-releasing it due to the recent arrest of Lisa Jo Vanderlinden, the woman who spent less than a year in jail for Lucas's murder, on charges of abusing another child.**
In 2017, Lucas Call and his baby sister were removed from their biological mother’s custody, in part because she had a learning disability and was unjustly deemed an unfit mother. They were placed in the care of a woman who had previously fostered upwards of 40 children. She was also a trained nurse who worked with the county government’s child abuse investigation team. Sixteen months later, in August of 2018, that woman called 911, reporting 2-year-old Lucas was unresponsive.
After Lucas’s death was deemed a homicide caused by blunt force trauma, his foster mother, Lisa Jo Vanderlinden, was charged with his murder. After accepting a plea agreement, Lisa, who claimed to accept responsibility for Lucas’s death but never confessed to causing his injuries, received a sentence so shockingly inadequate that many have called for the judge’s removal from his position.
In this episode, I’ll tell you Lucas’s story, and you’ll also hear my interview with Lucas’s great-grandma, Peggy Thompson, who shared with me her anger over the injustice of Lucas’s case, as well as some of her fondest memories of this sweet little boy.
This is the infuriating story of Lucas Call.
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