Sarah Boone, The Suitcase, And The Longest Streak Of Bad Decisions In Florida True Crime History
Sarah Boone,
The Suitcase,
And The Longest Streak
Of Bad Decisions In
Florida True Crime History.
She zipped her boyfriend inside a suitcase. Filmed him begging to be let out. Laughed on camera. Went to bed. Told police it was hide and seek. Then fired nine lawyers, wrote the judge 58 handwritten pages, rejected 15 years for life, and is now on appellate attorney number four — who she has also filed paperwork saying she doesn't know. The receipts. In order. With commentary.
There are true crime cases that are complicated. Cases where the evidence is murky, the motive is unclear, the timeline is disputed, and reasonable people walk away with reasonable doubts. The Sarah Boone case is not one of those cases. The Sarah Boone case is a case where the defendant filmed herself laughing at her boyfriend while he begged from inside a zipped suitcase, and then explained to police the next morning — when he was dead — that they had been playing hide and seek. In Florida. In February 2020. After drinking.
The hide and seek defence. In a Florida court. In 2024. With two videos. Stored on her phone. That she filmed herself. While laughing.
What followed over the next four years — and continues today — is a case study in how to take a bad situation and make it methodically, repeatedly, almost artistically worse. Nine pre-trial lawyers. A 58-page handwritten complaint letter to the judge. A rejected 15-year plea deal. A life sentence. Four appellate attorneys. A filed motion saying she doesn't know who the current one is. We are going through all of it. Pull up a chair. This is Florida.
What Actually Happened —
The Part With The Suitcase
On February 23, 2020, Jorge Torres Jr. — 42 years old, boyfriend of Sarah Boone, resident of their shared apartment in Winter Park, Florida — got into a suitcase. This is not in dispute. What is in dispute is everything that happened next, and the disputing has now occupied multiple judges, nine lawyers, and approximately four years of Florida's court calendar.
According to Sarah Boone: hide and seek. They had been drinking. It seemed funny at the time. She went to bed thinking he could get himself out. She woke up, couldn't find him, remembered the suitcase, opened it. He was unresponsive. An unfortunate accident during an adult game of hide and seek. Very sad. Could happen to anyone.
According to the two videos found on Sarah Boone's phone — recorded by Sarah Boone, stored on Sarah Boone's phone, retrieved from Sarah Boone's phone by investigators: something else entirely.
She then went to bed. Jorge Torres died of asphyxiation inside the suitcase. Sarah Boone called 911 the next morning and said she hadn't known he couldn't get out. The two videos on her phone demonstrated, in some detail, that she had known. While laughing about it. On camera. That she had pointed at herself and recorded.
"She filmed it. She laughed on the recording. She went to bed. She told police it was hide and seek. The jury deliberated for ninety minutes. Florida."
— Brewtiful Living · Culture · True CrimeThe Nine Lawyers —
A Commemorative Florida Tracker
Between February 2020 and October 2024, Sarah Boone went through nine attorneys. Nine. The state of Florida has 67 counties. She almost outpaced the county count on lawyers. Multiple attorneys withdrew citing irreconcilable differences with Boone over her defence strategy. Others cited conflicts of interest. At one point she represented herself. The judge eventually ruled she had forfeited her right to counsel. Her ninth lawyer stepped in as a volunteer.
While representing herself during a gap between attorneys, Sarah Boone submitted a 58-page handwritten letter to the judge. Fifty-eight pages. Handwritten. Listing questions, complaints, and critiques about how her case had been handled.
For scale: The US Constitution is approximately 7,500 words. A 58-page handwritten letter is somewhere between 15,000 and 20,000 words. Sarah Boone wrote the equivalent of a novella to her judge about her lawyers. She did not use those 58 pages to offer an alternative explanation for the videos on her phone. She used them to discuss her lawyers. Florida courts have seen many things. They filed it.
The Plea Deal She Rejected —
Fifteen Years. She Said No.
Days before trial, prosecutors offered Sarah Boone a plea deal: plead guilty to manslaughter, serve 15 years. She would have been eligible for release at approximately 61 years old. She declined.
She made this decision with full knowledge of the following facts: there were two videos on her phone. The videos showed her boyfriend in the suitcase. The videos showed her laughing. The prosecution had the videos. The defence had the videos. The judge knew about the videos. Her ninth lawyer had seen the videos. Fifteen years for manslaughter was on the table. She said no thank you. She would take her chances at trial.
"Fifteen years for manslaughter. She had seen the videos. Everyone had seen the videos. She said no. The jury deliberated for ninety minutes."
— Brewtiful Living · CultureThe jury deliberated for ninety minutes. Guilty: second-degree murder. The sentence was life. The 15-year plea deal that would have seen her out at 61 was no longer available. This is, mathematically, not an improvement on the situation she was in before declining the offer. Florida has produced many true crime cases. Very few have this level of self-generated consequences at every decision point.
The Trial —
Every Choice She Made On The Stand
The trial ran ten days in October 2024. Sarah Boone took the stand in her own defence. This is the kind of strategic decision that defence attorneys generally counsel against when there are videos of the defendant laughing at the victim, but Boone had been through nine attorneys and had developed firm opinions about her own case management.
On the stand: No intention of hurting Torres. Self-defence. Battered spouse syndrome. Years of abuse. Perceived imminent threat.
On the video she recorded: Laughing. Taunting. "Yeah that's what you do when you choke me" — a statement prosecutors used to argue she was retaliating, not reacting to a perceived threat. Torres calling her name. Torres saying he couldn't breathe. Boone not releasing him from the suitcase.
The jury's response: Ninety minutes of deliberation. Guilty verdict. They had seen the videos. This was not a close call.
The battered spouse syndrome defence was a real legal argument made by a real lawyer based on real documented prior incidents between Boone and Torres. Court records confirm multiple previous domestic calls at their apartment. The complexity of abusive relationships is acknowledged. Both the Orange County Sheriff's Office and Officer Cpl. John Alden testified to prior incidents they had responded to.
What the battered spouse syndrome defence could not fully address was the specific content of the videos. Specifically the laughing. Specifically the taunting. The jury had both the complexity and the videos. They spent ninety minutes with both. They came back with a verdict.
The Sentencing —
December 2, 2024
Sarah Boone was sentenced to life in prison on December 2, 2024. At her sentencing hearing, Jorge Torres's family addressed the court. His mother spoke. His sister Victoria Torres said: "Sarah deserves to rot in jail." These are the words of a sister who watched a woman film her brother dying and go to sleep.
Sarah Boone addressed the court: "I hope that everyone can forgive me, the Torres family most of all." The Torres family had already spoken. Their position was not forgiveness. This particular hope is best described as optimistic given the available information.
"She's just in shock. We're, obviously, really disappointed. We did the best that we could, you know, in the time that we had to prepare. Sarah really liked the team, and we all got along."
He noted they got along. Every previous attorney had withdrawn citing irreconcilable differences. Getting along was, genuinely, an achievement. It did not produce a different verdict. The videos were still on the phone. The jury had still deliberated for ninety minutes. But they got along. In Florida, you take your wins where you find them.
The Full Timeline —
In Order, With Commentary
Pre-TrialProsecutors offer 15 years for manslaughter. Boone declines. Trial begins October 14, 2024. She takes the stand. Claims self-defence. Claims battered spouse syndrome. The prosecution plays both videos.
Sarah Boone zipped Jorge Torres inside a suitcase, filmed it, laughed on the recording, went to bed, told police it was hide and seek, fired nine lawyers, wrote the judge 58 handwritten pages, declined 15 years for manslaughter, received life for murder, and is now on her fourth appeal attorney who she has also filed a motion saying she doesn't know. Every decision point in this case had an option that was better than the one she chose. The hide and seek defence. The nine lawyers. The rejected plea. The stand. The appeal attorneys. Florida has produced many extraordinary true crime cases. Very few come with this volume of self-generated, self-documented, phone-stored receipts. The jury took ninety minutes. That is the whole story.
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