Keith Burgess-Jackson, J.D., Ph.D.

4-13-89 Thursday. A University of Texas college student, Mark Kilroy, who disappeared a few weeks ago during a spring-break outing to South Padre Island, was found dead today in a shallow grave in Matamoros, México, across the Texas-México border. This alone is shocking, but several other bodies were found and authorities claim that the deaths were caused by members of a religious cult who engage in drug-running. Police found all kinds of religious paraphernalia in a shack on a Matamoros ranch. According to the suspects, who apparently confessed to the killings and have expressed little remorse, the victims were killed as part of a cult ritual. Kilroy, for example, was sacrificed in order to give the cult members strength and immunity from capture by authorities. Kilroy was hacked to death by a machete from behind. And get this: The cult members removed his brains, cooked them, and ate them. So we have not only drug-runners, but cultists and cannibals. The story is sickening. Police found cauldrons of goat heads, human brains, and other human organs in the shack. One suspect told them that they were ordered by the cult leader, who is at large, to apprehend “an Anglo” for sacrifice. Kilroy was the unfortunate victim. I wonder how this will affect next year’s spring-break celebration on South Padre Island. A student from, say, Texas A & M will have to decide whether a few days of fun in the sun is worth the risk of having his or her brains eaten. What a gruesome incident.