JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- Community leaders gathered Tuesday on the spot where a 13-year-old boy was shot walking home from a high school football game last month. They met to unveil a new book aimed at stopping such violence.

"If These Chains Could Talk" is written by young people in trouble with the law, collected and published by Duval County school board member Betty Burney.

"As I'm writing to you this letter, I am looking out the window and I see freedom," Jimmy C. wrote in the book. "I am on the 6th floor of the Duval County Jail. I am 17 years old, charged as an adult for first-degree murder."

The editor said the book is unique in that the authors are all young and all admitted to committing serious crimes -- many involving guns and violence.

"They have what I call peer pressure on steroids," Burney said.

Joseph Wise, Duval County superintendent of schools, and other school leaders believe so much in the power of these words, they want to put a copy in the hands of thousands of middle-school students.

"(It's) powerful because it's a Jacksonville school board member, Jacksonville students -- many who are still in the juvenile justice system -- and Jacksonville students learning from those who've chosen some things with very bad consequences," Wise said.

"Stealing, robbing and breaking into houses was the wrong way to go about life," contributor Brandon wrote for the book. "Skipping school, smoking and drinking ended up hurting me in the long run. I robbed myself of a better life, getting a decent education and evolving in this world."

Officials are hoping to raise enough money to print 10,000 copies and given them to eighth- or ninth-graders in hopes of keeping them on the right track.

"I know for a fact that it will help," Burney said. "I've gotten so many testimonies from parents, from teachers talking about how it helps."

Burney has designated a portion of the book's proceeds to the Juvenile Jail Program for the establishment of a foundation dedicated to intervention and recidivism.