Turn Around Bright Eyes
Having the breath knocked out of her, she could no longer scream. By now, all the boys circled around her, taking their turns kicking at her small body. She laid there limp, heaving from the momentum of each kick. They say a person beaten to death, reaches a point where their brain disconnects from the pain, caused by a rush of adrenaline. This was not one of those moments. She felt one of the boys tear her wig from her scalp pulling chunks of hair from the braids she created with her own hair to hold the wig in place. The older man in the group pressed his kneecap into her chest, proceeding to punch her face one solid blow after another. She could not see anything. Her eyes swelled, her five foot six frail frame twisted in the parking lot. It is at this point, a person prays that Cassandra had died. Any rational person would beg for this to be the moment where Cassandra could feel nothing. Nothing on earth sounds similar to a heavy chain dragging across corrugated metal of a truck liner. Cassie’s limp body fell still as the boys proceeded to tie this rusted brown towing chain around her waist while they screamed derogatory terms into the still calm air. According to the Phoenix police reports the following day, the violence started at the nightclub, situated on Seventh and West Marshall Avenue. It is estimated by the Maricopa Sheriff’s department, that the unknown suspects were traveling south on Seventh Avenue at such a great speed that the body was no longer dragging, but bouncing violently across the pavement. Body pieces slowly separated for six blocks until the torso finally snapped at the intersection of Seventh Avenue and Colter, leaving a dismembered victim. An hour later, an unsuspecting neighbor, walking down Colter Avenue, stumbled upon a three-foot section of a body best described as the chest area. Unaware of its relationship to a human body, he left the scene to walk back home. The concrete, and the friction of the tumble, shaved the arms and head from the torso. The jerking of the chain eventually stressed the torso, snapping it in half as the white truck disappeared into the night. Slowly, the white truck vanished past Camelback Road, leaving By Steve Hammond
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By Todd Kachinski-Kottmeier