Just in case you haven't seen the memes trending on Facebook and Twitter or haven't kept up with national news lately, it looks as though we might have a zombie apocalypse on our hands.
The police and government officials are blaming 31-year-old Rudy Eugene's gruesome, cannibalistic daytime assault on the homeless 65-year-old Ronald Poppo on "bath salts.
"Surveillance videos from May 26 show that Eugene was ripping, chewing and ingesting Poppo's facial tissue for an agonizing 18 minutes before help arrived at the causeway. When armed police officers demanded that Eugene step away from his victim, he raised his head with pieces of flesh dangling from his jowls, snarled and resumed his meal.
An officer shot Eugene once as a warning. Eugene remained un-phased and continued to gnaw on his victim. Police officers shot several more times until Eugene was dead. By this time, 75 percent of Poppo's face was missing, either strewn on the pavement or inside Eugene's belly.
Oh, by the way, the perpetrator was naked this entire time, and he didn't die until he was shot in the head.
Poppo was immediately rushed to the nearest hospital. He currently resides in the ICU, and will require months of treatment to rebuild his features, though he will be permanently disfigured.
With Miami's infamous reputation for drug-related crime and rampant outbreak of untreated mental disorders, bath salts and hysteria make for a plausible motive.
Back in 2002, Cali-based rap artist Big Lurch was arrested for the PCP-induced murder of his 21-year-old roommate, during which he violently tore out her internal organs and devoured them before being arrested while walking down the street nude and screaming.
The very next day, 43-year-old Wayne Carter of Hackensack, N.J. was reported to have barricaded himself in his room with a kitchen knife and planning to harm himself. When police arrived at his residence, they knocked down the door and demanded he drop the weapon and exit the room. Ignoring the officer's presence and demands, Carter proceeded to stab himself in the neck, abdomen and legs.
The police tried to subdue Carter with pepper spray, but this only enraged him. Carter then proceeded to hurl pieces of his skin and entrails at the police officers, who quickly retreated.
That's how zombies infect others with the virus, in case you didn't know.
The Bergen County SWAT team was called in and successfully subdued Carter. He was taken to a hospital where he remains in critical condition. One of the police officers that responded to the scene reported that he believes drugs or mental illness may have led to this horrifying incident, but these details have not been confirmed.
In addition to these two bizarre acts of human behavior, three other cases of varying degrees of cannibalism have occurred this past week in Tokyo, Sweden and Maryland.
The timing of these incidents is uncanny, and with all of these men being labeled as druggies or lunatics or both, it's hard to not suspect a possible cover-up.
I'm not saying drugs and mental illness aren't the cause behind these recent attacks, but with the collective number of these gruesome assaults and flesh-eating incidents, the zombie apocalypse seems just as likely as any other reason the government feeds us.
Do you like this story? The Plainsman doesn't accept money from tuition or student fees, and we don't charge a subscription fee. But you can donate to support The Plainsman.
