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Miami "Zombie" Victim Recalls Face-Eating Incident
By
Garth Johnston
Published Aug 9, 2012
Modified Aug 9, 2012
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Miami-Dade Police Dept.
By
Garth Johnston
Published Aug 9, 2012
Modified Aug 9, 2012
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For the first time since he was brutally attacked by a Miami "zombie" who ripped off much of his face, Stuyvesant High graduate Ronald Poppo has spoken up about the incident. Well, a police interview he gave has gone online, thanks to CBS Miami and, fair warning, it is probably not something you want to read [PDF] (or listen to) over lunch. Because, yes, there are recent photos of Poppo and they are not pretty.
Poppo, who is homeless and was left blind by the attack, recalled the fateful incident like this:
He attacked me. He just ripped me to ribbons. He chewed up my face. He plucked out my eyes. Basically that’s all there is to say about it.
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.
Apparently his attacker, Rudy Eugene, "must have been souped up on something" and was "talking kind of funny talk for a while too" before the attack. It also appears that the attack may have had something to do with a missing Bible owned by Eugene—though it appears that a number of details from the incident will remain unclear as Poppo doesn't seem to be the most consistent interview subject. Well, unless he is talking about his injuries:
He mashed my face into the sidewalk. My face is all bent and mashed up. My eyes, my eyes got plucked out. He was strangling me in wrestling holds at the same time he was plucking my eyes out.
Eugene was shot to death by the police during the attack. Meanwhile his victim, after several surgeries at Jackson Memorial Hospital, was transferred to the Perdue Medical Center, Jackson’s long-term care facility located in South Miami-Dade, where he remains.
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