CHICAGO — Romeo Blackman was a third grader in Chicago’s violence-torn Englewood neighborhood when he participated in a “If I Were President for a Day” project describing what he would change if he had the power.

“I would stop the violence. I would make the police collect all the guns, so no one gets hurt,” the then-9-year-old Blackman wrote, according to his attorneys. “I would give money to the poor, with a new house and car. My family would always have a place to live. This is what I would do if I were president for a day!”

But the reality was much harsher. Born with cocaine in his blood from his crack-addicted mother, Blackman struggled with an abusive, absentee father, suffered crushing poverty and witnessed his good friend get shot in the head at just 13, court records show.

Soon after, federal prosecutors say, Blackman joined a small gang faction called the “Goonies” and literally shot his way to the top, terrorizing a neighborhood already beset by violence with near-daily attacks, including many that claimed unintended victims. By the time he was in his late teens, Blackman had become a killer himself many times over, according to prosecutors.

On Tuesday, more than three years after he was convicted of racketeering conspiracy, Blackman, now 30, stood in a federal courtroom to hear a sentence he already knew was coming: Life in prison without parole.

In handing down the mandatory life term, U.S. District Judge Robert Blakey acknowledged Blackman’s tragic upbringing and the contribution it undoubtedly made in the trajectory of his life. But he said Blackman’s direct role in “the taking of other peoples’ lives,” as well as corrupting other juvenile boys to join in wanton murder, made a life sentence appropriate — whether mandatory or not.

“The debt he owes to society is significant,” Blakey said, adding he put even more weight on the “need to protect the public from future crimes of this defendant.”

Blackman and two henchmen were convicted in July 2023 of racketeering conspiracy charges alleging the Goonies were responsible for as many as 10 slayings and six attempted murders in an 18-month span from 2014 to 2016.

According to prosecutors, the Goonie gang, with Blackman as its leader, terrorized the Englewood community through violence and fear, “shooting at rival gang members four or five times a day,” selling narcotics and trafficking guns.

Over more than a month of testimony, jurors watched killings play out on surveillance video, and saw social media posts where Goonie members allegedly kept a tally of victims and “rejoiced” in the death of rivals. They also heard testimony from a parade of cooperating witnesses who described each member’s alleged role in the organization, including one nicknamed “Steph Curry” for his long-distance accuracy — only with a pistol, not a basketball.

Unlike more traditional street gangs that were highly organized and focused on protecting drug turf, the Goonies allegedly engaged in a shockingly petty cycle of violence with rivals, where shooting at “opps” was an almost daily routine and killings were bragged about on Facebook and other social media.

The Goonies trial was part of a string of major racketeering cases brought by the U.S. attorney’s office aimed at the leaders of Chicago’s splintered gang factions that prosecutors say are driving the city’s rampant gun violence.

Among others: A federal jury in 2022 found the reputed leader of Chicago’s Wicked Town gang faction and one of his top lieutenants guilty of racketeering conspiracy involving a string of murders, shootings, robberies and narcotics trafficking on the West Side stretching back two decades.

And in 2024, five alleged members of the South Side’s “O Block” gang faction were convicted of racketeering for a pattern of violence that included the downtown slaying of Chicago rapper FBG Duck in 2020.

In Blackman’s case, meanwhile, prosecutors argued that a life sentence was richly deserved. In a sentencing memo, they highlighted several of the murders Blackman directly participated in, including the May 26, 2016, deadly shooting at an Englewood barber shop that left one patron dead and another badly wounded.

According to trial testimony, Blackman had found out a rival was getting his hair cut and headed to the shop with two others. While on the way, Blackman encouraged Trevante Reed, who was a juvenile at the time, to go in and shoot up the store, saying, “Make sure your shoelaces are tied tight” and “tie the hood tight,” according to prosecutors.

“Once they arrived in a nearby alley, Trevante Reed walked into Powell’s Barbershop and tried to kill the rival gang member, shooting while in the barbershop,” prosecutors wrote in the sentencing filing. “He missed, killed Gerald Sias and injured Steven Wilborn, who were simply there to get a haircut, and sent a mother carrying her young child running from the barbershop.”

Blackman’s attorneys, Christopher Grohman and Patrick Blegen, had argued strenuously that the mandatory life sentence that comes with the counts of conviction is unconstitutional, citing Blackman’s horrific childhood and studies showing brain development can be severely delayed under such circumstances.

“Mr. Blackman did not have the support in place to effectively deal with the trauma he faced during the course of every developmental period,” the defense attorneys wrote. “He did not have a safe, reliable family or a safe, supportive community. Without these supports, he was unable to process or recover from the trauma and losses he suffered.”

In court Tuesday, Assistant U.S. Attorney Simar Khera noted it was ironic that Blackman had shown “no regard for the lives of others, yet he is here today to ask the court to have regard for his.”

“He spent his career as a Goonie doling out life sentences without a second thought,” she said.

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