Article content

Kids frequently follow their parents’ passions. Be it baseball or Babushka’s Glitch Dungeon Crystal, parents can and should stoke a child’s interest.

Article content

Unless, of course, it’s something like vampirism.

Article content

Article content

Sondra Gibson liked vampires. A lot. A native of tiny Murray, Kentucky, Gibson was a sex worker with a young son, and she passed down her love of bloodsuckers to the boy. Born in 1980, her boy Rod Ferrell was enthusiastic. Mired in the socio-economic basement, they moved a lot between Kentucky and Eustis, Florida.

Vampire named Vesago

Tales around Eustis described Ferrell’s maternal grandfather as a twisted old hillbilly straight out of Deliverance. One story claimed grandpa and his overall-bedecked pals gang raped the little boy when he was five.

An aunt later claimed she and Sondra were also raped by grandpa, although he has never been charged.

By 16, Ferrell was deeply into vampirism. And like the Vampire Kids in South Park, per se, no mere neck biter was our Rod: He was a 500-year-old vampire named Vesago.

Article content

Article content

‘A reincarnated demon’

“There was one time when she told me that Rod believed he was some form of reincarnated demon, […] that he was this high power that she had to obey,” one associate said of his girlfriend.

Ferrell met troubled teenager Heather Wendorf when she was 15, who lived in Eustis. Her parents Richard Wendorf and Naoma Ruth Queen were pissed with Ferrell’s long-distance collect phone calls from Kentucky.

Back in the Bluegrass State, Sondra and her son were into the role-playing game Vampire: The Masquerade. And one vampire is never enough so Ferrell lured in three other teens: Girlfriend Charity Keesee, 16, 19-year-old Dana Cooper, and 16-year-old Howard Scott Anderson.

RECOMMENDED VIDEO

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

Play Video

Drank each other’s blood

They were typical vampire teens, hanging out in cemeteries, smoking, wearing black gothic attire and drinking each other’s blood. But on Oct. 14, 1996, Ferrell and one of his vampire kids vandalized an animal shelter, butchering two puppies in gruesome fashion and releasing dozens of dogs.

Article content

“We’re dealing with some sick individuals, and I want them caught,” Sheriff Stan Scott said. “This goes way beyond a simple breaking and entering. One of these animals was stomped to death, and the other had its legs either pulled or cut off. This is a case of absolute vandalism, and these people need to be caught.”

Cruelty to animals is almost always ground zero for the psychopath.

Heather Wendorf was desperate to be with the Vampire Clan. She allegedly told her nocturnal buddies her father was sexually abusing her. So Rod “Vesago” Ferrell, Keesee, Cooper, and Anderson drove to Florida.

And on Nov. 25, 1996, they struck. Ferrell and Anderson slipped into Wendorf’s home. Ferrell used a crowbar to bludgeon Richard Wendorf to death.

Article content

No defensive wounds

“Ferrell proceeded to strike Wendorf’s head repeatedly with the crowbar,” according to the court documents. “Richard Wendorf died as a result of blunt impact to the head with skull fractures and brain lacerations. Richard Wendorf suffered no defensive wounds. The position of his body was consistent with the fact that he was completely unaware of the attack.”

In addition, he had burn marks in the shape of a V. The letter was Ferrell’s symbol, which he accompanied with a dot for each person in his vampire cult.

Ferrell later admitted: “I just kept beating him and beating him and beating him and beating him, taking pleasure in it.”

But the vampire duo was stunned when Queen emerged from the shower. She threw scalding coffee on Ferrell and “scratched and clawed his face.”

Article content

“Naoma Queen died as a result of chop wounds of blunt impact to her head, which resulted in skull fractures and brain laceration [sic]. Queen’s brain stem was severed, which resulted in almost instantaneous death,” the motion continued.

‘Where did his face go?’

Their bodies were discovered the next day by their non-vampire daughter, Jennifer, who later detailed the trauma of finding her mother’s “brains scattered all over the kitchen” and wondering, “Where did his face go?” as she looked at her father’s lifeless corpse.

The Vampire Clan were now armed with Wendorf’s credit card and stolen Ford Explorer and headed to New Orleans 612 miles away. But Keesee called a relative when they reached Baton Rouge who in turn called cops.

Article content

They were arrested on U.S. Thanksgiving Day, Nov. 28, 1996, three days after the murders.

“In statements to Louisiana authorities and to Florida detectives, Ferrell took most of the blame for the crimes,” public defenders argued in his 2019 appeal.

At the age of 17, Ferrell pleaded guilty to two counts of first-degree murder. His prize was becoming the youngest American on death row. Next stop: The electric chair.

“I think you are a disturbed young man,” Circuit Judge Jerry Lockett said. “I think your family failed you. I think society failed you.”

‘Irreparably corrupt’

In 2001, his sentence was commuted to life in prison without the possibility of parole. A judge said he found Ferrell “irreparably corrupt.”

Wendorf was never charged in connection to the double murder of her parents while Anderson was sentenced to life in prison, later reduced to 40 years. The others were handed lighter sentences.

Later, it was reported that the 14-year-old brother of a Vampire Clan member received letters from Ferrell’s mother, Sondra Gibson. She told the boy she would be his bride for eternity.

They would make their own vampire family. She denied in court that she and Ferrell were more than mother and son.

Ferrell continues serving life at The Central Florida Reception Center in Orlando.

bhunter@postmedia.com

@HunterTOSun

Article content