A man in Galveston, Texas, has been charged in a bizarre case of home burglary and assault, tinged with gothic horror. The man, 19-year-old Lyle Bensley, broke into his victim’s apartment, slammed her against the wall and attempted to suck her blood. He was later found hissing and growling in a parking lot by police. Bensley, dressed only in his skivvies, informed police that he was a 500-year old vampire and need to “feed.” Unsurprisingly, Bensley is now in jail awaiting a psychological evaluation.
The attack has sparked a discussion of pop culture’s fascination with Vampire lore. Books like Anne Rice’s Vampires Chronicles, and most recently Stephanie Meyer’s Twilight Saga and Charlaine Harris’s Sookie Stackhouse series (as well as the movies and TV shows they respectively spawned) have certainly capture the popular imagination. But has the fascination gone too far?
Bensley is not the first criminal to follow a “vampiric” pattern. In 1996, a 16-year-old obsessed with a vampire role-play game enlisted 3 friends to attempt to kill the parents of his ex-girlfriend. In 1998, a San Francisco man claiming to be a 2,000 year old vampire slit the throat of four homeless people. Even as far back as 1949, an English serial killer reportedly drank a cup of blood from each of his victims.
Anne Rice is quoted as saying she believes, “the vampire is a metaphor for the outsider and the predator in all of us.” While a little bit of fictional fantasy is probably ok, even healthy, if you are really feeling some dark or predatory urges – best keep your fangs to yourself. The cops are not likely to believe you’re a thousand year old vamp, and going to jail? Totally bites!
Original article can be found here: http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/17/us-vampire-culture-texas-idUSTRE77G6I920110817
If you want additional information on Texas law, contact The Wright Firm, L.L.P. at 972-353-4600 or visit our website at www.thewrightlawyers.com
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