EUSTIS, Fla. - What started as a role-playing game for a group of
teen-agers turned into a cult
of self-proclaimed "vampires," who cut their bodies, drank blood and now
face charges of murdering
one members' parents.
The five teens, aged 15 to 19, have been extradited to Florida from
Louisiana for the slaying of a Eustis
couple bludgeoned to death in their home last month.
The mother of the accused ringleader of the group told Saturday of how she
played a "vampire" game
with her son and how she thought it was just fun and make-believe.
But police say Sondra Gibson's son Roderick Ferrell, 16, became lost in a
delusional world of
"vampire" rituals and conspiracies that led to the horrific double murder of
Richard and Ruth Wendorf
on Nov. 25.
Police believe the murder weapon was either an ax or claw hammer and that
the deadly blows were
inflicted by at least three different people.
The Wendorf's daughter Heather, 15, was among the group. She, Ferrell, and
three others -- 19-year-old
Dana Lynn Cooper, Howard Scott Anderson, 16, and Charity Keesee, 16 -- were
arrested Nov. 28 in the
murdered couple's car while checking into a Baton Rouge motel.
All the teens except Wendorf are residents of rural Murray, Kentucky, a
small, predominantly Baptist
town where Ferrell's interest in a role-playing board game, "Vampire: The
Masquerade," turned into an
obsession, according to police.
Ferrell had recruited Wendorf, his girlfriend, into the game, his mother said.
"There didn't seem to be anything wrong with it," Gibson said in a
telephone interview.
"I played it with him. It's hard enough to find something you can do with
your kids today, and the game
was fun. It was something, anyway."
Ferrell moved to Murray from Florida in 1995 to live with his mother and her
boyfriend, Kile Newton, a
tattoo artist who changed his name to "Kile," a word self-styled vampires
are said to use to describe
someone who "crossed over" to become "one of the undead."
The game is similar to the better-known Dungeon & Dragons in which players
adapt character names
and are led through a series of adventures by a game leader, or storyteller.
Ferrell and Gibson met other Vampire players, most of them teens, after
moving to Murray. Over time, a
group of about 30 youths began trying to live out vampire identities.
Gibson said the game had remained a fantasy. "It was a thrill, sure. But it
was still role playing. People
pretended to do stuff, but didn't really do it," she said.
Gibson faces misdemeanor charges of trying to seduce a 14-year- old boy as
part of a vampire ritual.
Calloway County, Kentucky, prosecutors have released a letter in which she
writes, "I long to be near
you ... to become a Vampire, a part of the family immortal and truly yours
forever."
Gibson scoffed. "All part of the game," she said.
Ferrell began wearing black shirts, black trousers, a long black jacket and
black cowboy boots. He died
his blond hair black and painted his fingernails black. He began to call
himself Vesago, after a character
in a novel by Ann Rice, an author known for her books about vampires.
In September, Ferrell was suspended from school, after which, Gibson said,
he did not go back,
sleeping all day and going out at night with his vampire friends.
Calloway County authorites said Ferrell and the other would-be vampires
gathered at a ruined building
painted with messages like, "Please deposit dead bodies here," but also
littered with empty liquor
bottles and signs of drug use.
"It's pretty easy to tell who's been a vampire for any length of time," said
Calloway County Sheriff Stan
Scott. "Most of them are going to have self-inflicted razor cuts or knife
cuts. They like to drink each
other's blood."
In October, Ferrell and Anderson were charged with breaking into the county
humane society, beating 40
dogs and mutilating two puppies. One dog's hind legs were torn off.
Greg Fountain, an executive with White Wolf, of Clarkson, Georgia, which
markets "Vampire: The
Masquerade", said the game could get intense, but that it was not a cult.
"It can be quite intense," he said. "The core premise is personal exploration."
