Florida Zombie Apocalypse Attack: Man Eats Victim's Face in Another Cannibal Case in Sunshine State
Florida might be the stomping grounds for zombies after a man was caught eating another man's face Monday night, just four years after the rumored "zombie apocalypse" attack scare in the sunshine state, where police shot down Ronald Poppo in a similar cannibal case.
Police caught 19-year-old Austin Harrouf eating a dead man's face near Fort Lauderdale Monday night. Authorities rushed to the scene when they heard of a "random" attack outside of a couple's house, Miami Herald reports.
Police say Harrouf stabbed the couple and wounded their neighbor in the attack. When they arrived on scene, John Stevens and Michelle Mishcon were already dead, and it took four deputies to pull him off of the dead man as he continued to eat his face.
Harrouf is being held at a hospital and is not expected to survive after officers used a stun gun and their K-9 dog to initially stop the attack.
In a similar incident in 2012, police killed a man they caught eating another man's face in Miami. The man had already eaten the victim's nose when cops arrived on scene.
The cannibal attack sparked rumors about a zombie apocalypse approaching the U.S., because the scene looked like something from a thriller movie. Officials later blamed the use of synthetic drugs as the root cause of the attack.
At the time, a new form of LSD called "bath salts" or "flakka," became popular amongst drug users. In the psychosis state of the drug, the user can develop super-human strength and hallucinate, causing them to attack others and use their jaws as weapons.
Today, police are testing Harrouf's blood for flakka to see if that was what caused his state of "excited delirium." Family members said he had rushed off when he suddenly became agitated that his food was taking too long to come after placing his order at a nearby restaurant.
His lawyer says he was working at home for the summer and that there were no signs of drug use.
"There are mental health issues that will have to be investigated here, we don't know if anything is going to show up on toxicology reports, there's a lot of unknowns and unanswered questions and things we may never know," attorney Michelle Suskauer said.
The synthetic drug was popular in South Florida in 2012 which is probably why the attack happened then. Today, the popular drug is K2; a synthesized marijuana that has similar effects of heroin.
Harrouf had no criminal record.
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