VERO BEACH, FL – Kevin Adorno was on the final stages of his bike ride down the East Coast when he stopped in a McDonald’s and was stabbed to death by a mentally ill homeless man who thought Adorno was trying to have him killed.
Adorno, 28, was only two days and 100 miles away from completing his trip from Maryland to Miami. His girlfriend was to meet him 20 miles from his destination so that she could finish the trip with him.
What she didn’t know was that once in Miami, Adorno had planned to propose to her.
Unfortunately, Adorno crossed paths with 59-year-old Rene Herrera Cruz, a mentally-ill homeless man, when he stopped at a Vero Beach McDonald’s to grab something to eat and use his phone.
Cruz was in the parking lot of the McDonald’s and was under the impression that people were looking for him and trying to kill him. To protect himself, Cruz pulled out a 12-inch filet knife. He then noticed Adorno in the restaurant looking at him before Adorno stepped outside to use his cellphone.
Cruz thought Adorno was taking pictures of him and “directing people to go after him,” so Cruz used the knife to attack Adorno, stabbing him in the arm and several times in the chest. Adorno managed to get back inside the McDonald’s where he collapsed near the bathrooms.
Of course Adorno wasn’t on the phone instructing people to kill Cruz. He’d actually been on the phone with his girlfriend, who later told police that her conversation with Adorno was interrupted by the sound of his cell phone dropping; she never heard Adorno argue with anyone.
Despite witnesses at the scene applying pressure to Adorno’s wounds, he would be pronounced dead shortly after being rushed to Indian River Medical Center. Police would find an engagement ring in his pocket.
After stabbing Adorno, Cruz discarded two knives before running to a Burger King across the street where he was apprehended by police. Cruz admitted to attacking Adorno, explaining he thought Adorno was trying to have him killed.
Police were at the same Burger King the night before after Cruz called from there to report people were after him. Cruz has been charged with first-degree murder and is being held without bond.
Since we will never force adults to take medication, and there is an extreme lack of options when dealing with the mentally ill currently making up around one-third of the US homeless population, crimes like this will continue to happen with no real way to stop it.
Thanks to Medicaid, the Lanterman-Petris-Short Act, Ronald Reagan’s Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act that repealed the Mental Health Systems Act signed by Jimmy Carter the year before, overall loss of funding over the last 40 years and the Great Recession, the US now finds itself with more than three times as many seriously mentally ill people in jails and prisons than in hospitals, and 14 psychiatric beds in public and private hospitals per 100,000 people — the same ratio as in 1850, for fuck’s sake. (*takes a deep breath*)
But by all means, let’s keep not educating about mental illness and ignoring the absolute shit job we do helping the mentally ill. Just keep focusing on gay people getting married and passing laws to restrict gun ownership. I’m sure that will solve everything and the mentally ill will just quietly disappear under the rug we sweep them under.
This article was written by Morbid for The Dreamin Demon - the Internet's self-appointed buzzkill.