Ronald Poppo, the victim of a viscous attack in Miami where a naked man threw him down and chewed off most of his face, described a scene where a guy he had never really met came up to him on the street and started talking to him before he threw him down and brutally attacked him.  Poppo described the scene in police interview tapes obtained by CBS Miami that were recorded on July 19th.

Poppo described the awful attack and then thanked the police for saving his life.

Poppo told police,

“He just ripped me to ribbons. He chewed up my face. He plucked out my eyes… And basically that’s all there is to say about it.”

Rudy Eugene, the man who attacked Poppo, left his victim blind in both eyes and his face a puzzle of mangled flesh.  Eugene had been walking on the MacArthur Causeway on May 26th when he approached Poppo, who was laying down under the causeway.  Poppo said that Eugene approached him in a friendly way before strangling him and throwing him on the ground and attacking him.

Poppo told police,

“For a very short amount of time I thought he was a good guy. But he just went and turned berserk. He apparently didn’t have a good day at the Beach and he -– he was coming back. And I guess he took it out — took it out on me — or something. I don’t know. What can provoke an attack of that type. I certainly didn’t curse at the guy, or say anything mean or nasty to him.”

The 18 minute attack was recorded on local surveillance cameras.  They show how for 18 minutes Eugene ate Poppo’s face and plucked out his eyes.  Eugene was thought to be high on some type of drugs, possibly bath salts, but only had marijuana in his system.  Although experts are saying that toxicology labs are not able to keep up with all the new formulations of the drugs that keep coming out.

Police who responded to the scene shot and killed Eugene.

Ronald Poppo: Cannibal Victim Speaks For The First Time is a post from: The Inquisitr

Despite biting off his victims nose, mouth and eyes there was no human flesh found in Eugene’s stomach.

A law enforcement officer tells the The Miami Herald that marijuana was found in the dead man’s body and several undigested and yet to be identified pills.

It will still be weeks before the official toxicology report is released by authorities.

The attack which occurred on May 26 in broad daylight left chunks of the 66-year-old homeless man’s flesh strewn across the ground.

Authorities still believe Eugene may have been influenced by “bath salts” which can cause delirium and violent behavior in users and which can be purchased in both pill and powder form.

Police are still trying to paint a portrait of Eugene’s life leading up to the attack, they known from verified reports that just before he began attacking the homeless man a 911 caller reported that he was “completely naked” and swinging from the top of a light pole on the MacArthur causeway. Directly before the attack Eugene was seen stripping Poppo before attacking his face with his own mouth.

According to one 911 caller:

“He’s beating another man. It’s a naked man beating another man. He is going to kill that man. I promise you.”

Miami-Dade prosecutors will review all findings before the autopsy report is released to the public.

Miami Face Eater Chewed But Didn’t Swallow [Preliminary Autopsy Report] is a post from: The Inquisitr

Zombies have been a whispered about topic in recent weeks after a few bizarre and horrifying high-profile incidents hit the news involving cannibalism and attacks attributed to the newish drug known as bath salts. (The CDC even addressed the issue of zombies in a statement.)

While everyone (for the most part) doesn’t really believe in zombies, the similarities between the profile of the attacks and the hallmarks of zombie films cannot be ignored. Flesh eating, imperviousness or lack of concern toward severe bodily injury and growling are all behaviors we’ve come to associate with our walking dead tropes, so it’s natural some enterprising businessperson would take advantage of the viral headlines. (Heh, viral.)

Are you surprised that there are places now marketing zombie bullets as a just-in-case or curiosity following the several stories in recent weeks that seem to involve walker-like behavior?

According to CBS News, Hornady Manufacturing is doing just that, shilling ammo as particularly well-suited for taking down shooting-resistant zombies, and the company’s site proclaims:

“Be PREPARED – supply yourself for the Zombie Apocalypse with Zombie Max ammunition from Hornady! Loaded with PROVEN Z-Max bullets… MAKE DEAD PERMANENT!”

Hornady’s spokesman Everett Deger explains that the bullets are for shooting targets, not people, dead or alive. Of the zombie bullets, he says:

“After it gained some acceptance among some of us here in the company got on board with the idea we decided just to have some fun with a marketing plan that would allow us to create some ammunition designed for that … fictional world.”

Does anyone know if any states have stand your ground against zombies laws?

Zombie Bullets For Sale After Spate of ‘Bath Salts’ Attacks is a post from: The Inquisitr

Ronald Poppo, best known as the victim of a brazen cannibalistic attack, which left the nation questioning the existence of zombies, has a long-lost daughter, who has not seen him since she was two-years-old.

CBS News reports that Poppo’s daughter, Janice Poppo DiBello, 44, did not even know her father was alive until The New York Daily News tracked her down to ask. DiBello told them that:

“Since I was 2 years old, him and my mom got divorced and there was no — like how normal divorces are, where you see your father. Nobody ever heard anything from him, so I’ve never met him.”

She called up her mother, who confirmed that the man she saw on the news was indeed her father. Poppo dropped out of college in 1966, according to The New York Daily News, about two years before his daughter was born. His ex-wife stated about him that:

“I have nothing to say. We were divorced, probably in 1970. And nobody’s heard from him since then.”

Ronald Poppo’s daughter is still in shock at finding her father alive, especially after she enlisted the help of a police officer friend and looked through public records to search for him about 15 years ago, according to CBS News. She stated:

“It was a complete shock, because like I said, I’ve never had a relationship with my biological father. I have never heard from him. I have no idea what happened to him.”

Poppo’s life after the divorce spiraled out of control quickly with heavy drinking and arrests. In 1976, he found himself homeless and was treated for a gunshot wound at the same hospital where he is now trying to recover from his face-eating attack. CBS News reports that about 80% of his face is now gone, thanks to Rudy Eugene, the man who was shot to death after refusing to stop his gruesome attack.

When her mother relocated the two to New Jersey and remarried, Janice Poppo DiBello was 5, and considers her step-father to be her real father. When The New York Daily News asked if she would make the trip down south to see her father, Ronald Poppo, she stated that she wasn’t sure, and that, “I’m still in shock about everything.”

Ronald Poppo: Miami Cannibal Victim Has Long-Lost Daughter is a post from: The Inquisitr

Okay, if you hadn’t felt the last few days were just like the beginning of a zombie apocalypse movie, then perhaps the CDC coming out and saying everybody stay calm, there is no zombie apocalypse will perk your ears up.

Seriously, is there anything that says “we have zombies” more than the CDC denying we have zombies? The web chatter started in earnest last weekend, when a gruesome story out of Florida went viral, in which an apparently psychotic man attacked another, chewing the second’s face for nearly twenty minutes before police were forced to fire off a full clip at the assailant, eventually killing him.

(It was reported that the attacker carried on chewing his victim’s flesh after having been shot, which is a behavior many associate with zombie tropes on TV and in film.) But it wasn’t just the Florida face-chewing incident that got web searchers buzzing. Another incident involved a doctor who began spitting blood at arresting officers during a traffic stop and was difficult to subdue afterwards at the hospital, and a few incidents in which hazmat teams were dispatched to schools after reports of unexplainable rashes popping up among large numbers of students.

Oh yeah, and the intestines throwing guy. And radioactive sushi.

And now the Centers For Disease Control- also known as the initial villains and/or the agency of last resort in nearly every zombie apocalypse tale- is acknowledging the rumors, saying in an email to HuffPo that the dead have not begun to walk, no matter what you may be reading on the interwebs. The agency has been known to use zombie media to spread disaster awareness (such as in this list of rules from The Walking Dead), but the CDC maintains plausible deniability when it comes to the recent spate of walker-like incidents:

“CDC does not know of a virus or condition that would reanimate the dead (or one that would present zombie-like symptoms),” wrote agency spokesman David Daigle in an email to The Huffington Post.

But you know, just in case, the CDC who equivocally says there are no zombies would also like to remind you to stock up on gas, get a first aid kit and make sure your water is clean.

CDC Denies Zombie Apocalypse Internet Rumors, ‘Does Not Know of a Virus or Condition That Would Reanimate the Dead’ is a post from: The Inquisitr

The man gravely injured in the Miami face chewing attack that has been inspiring “zombie apocalypse” searches across the web for the past few days has been identified, and police say the victim, 65-year-old Ronald Poppo, is a homeless man who lived in the vicinity of the bridge where he was attacked in the horrifying incident over the weekend.

The face-eating attacker, 31-year-old Rudy Eugene, was eventually shot and killed by police after continuing to attack the helpless victim. Police attempted to subdue Eugene with a single shot, but were forced to shoot him a second time as he tore flesh from the victim’s face, resulting in disfiguring injuries.

The attack was not only cosmetic in nature- days later, Poppo remains in critical condition and authorities say that nearly 70% of his face was destroyed in the terrifying, middle-of-the-night attack. Sgt. Armando Aguilar, president of the Miami Fraternal Order of Police, describes a scene from a horror movie when he talks about Poppo’s injuries sustained in the face-eating incident, the violent nature of which left eyewitnesses palpably shaken days after the attack:

“He had his face eaten down to his goatee. The forehead was just bone. No nose, no mouth. In my opinion, he just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.”

Sgt. Javier Ortiz, vice president of the Miami Fraternal Order of Police, told press that the scene of the face-eating attack was one of the “goriest scenes [he's] ever been to.” Ortiz explained:

“It was not only grotesque, it was just very sad, the amount of blood. It was very sad to see what happened to this gentleman that had his face eaten.”

Ortiz also says the officer that was forced to fire on and kill Eugene was also “clearly shaken up” after the shocking incident.

Miami Face Chewing Attack Victim Identified, Gory Injuries Described by Cops is a post from: The Inquisitr

A zombie apocalypse is almost permanently on the lips and keyboards of web users worldwide, and for some reason the trope of impending armageddon is one that remains firmly entrenched in our collective psyche.

Zombie apocalypse is just one doomsday scenario of many that we consider (nuclear accident, plague and pestilence, or the election of Donald Trump to public office are other potential world-ending precipitates), and despite its relative implausibility, it’s one to which we return to plan our arsenal, bug out bag, escape route, and potential and sex-guaranteeing rescue of an object of our affection. (See Shaun of the Dead.)

So it was with no small measure of nervous giggling a series of zombie apocalypse-esque stories have been trending on social media in recent weeks, and despite the gruesome nature of many, Facebook and Twitter users can’t help but make references to the seemingly imminent arrival of Z-Day.

The most zombieriffic story to trend this week of course was that of the face-eater in Miami who continued eating a man’s face even after he was shot once by police, police who presumably have watched Zombieland and know to double-tap.

Then there was the man in New Jersey who began throwing bits of his own entrails at police officers, and was not subdued by pepper spray.

Two stories that really do sound like the start of Jersey Shore of the Dead to be sure, but wait, there’s more. Also in Florida, a doctor was arrested and began spitting blood at the officers taking him into custody, also impervious to standard methods of restraint.

Also, there is the radioactive sushi. I don’t know about you guys, but if a police chief that looks like George Romero gets on the news and tells me that reports that the dead have begun walking are internet rumors, I’m stocking up on baseball bats and scythes and heading up to Woodstock, who’s with me?

You can read a collection of all this month’s terrifying, zombie apocalypse signaling news over at this guy’s blog, via Gawker.

Zombie Apocalypse is Nigh? Blog Post Lays Out the Evidence is a post from: The Inquisitr

On Sunday we reported a story about a naked man who was shot to death while eating the face off another man in Miami, now the name of that crazed killer has been revealed. The flesh eating cannibal was 31-year-old Rudy Eugene.

Even before Sunday’s crazed attack that ultimately led to his death by gunfire Rudy had a criminal record. According to the Miami Herald he had previously been arrested for a battery charge when he was 16, and was then arrested seven other times between 2004 and 2009. Rudy’s charges were mostly petty, for example vending near a school, trespassing, and marijuana-related offenses. However a woman he was married to for one year also claims he became extremely violent towards her.

Rudy’s ex-wife who filed for divorce in 2007 told local affiliate WPLG:

“I wouldn’t say he had mental problem, but he always felt like people was against him. No one was for him, everyone was against him.”

Eventually Rudy lost his home in foreclosure but according to the new tenants he would show up uninvited looking for mail.

Police believe that Rudy attacked his victim because he was having a bout of cocaine psychosis or was suffering from an overdose of “bath salts,” a synethic drug police say is being used as a new form of LSD.

In the meantime Miami police are asking that any potential witnesses who have not yet stepped forward regarding the incident to call the local police station at 305-603-6350 to report any further details about the attack to investigators.

Miami’s Face Eating Cannibal Identified By Police is a post from: The Inquisitr