Allan Menzies
Wikimedia CommonsPoster art for the film Queen of the Damned.
In an attempt to explain his brutal 2003 murder of Thomas McKendrick, Allan Menzies stated that the vampire Akasha from Queen of the Damned had ordered him to do it.
Then 22-year-old Menzies, a citizen of Scotland, stated that he had watched the film over 100 times. When his friend Thomas McKendrick, 21, insulted Akasha, Menzies snapped. He proceeded to repeatedly bludgeon McKendrick in the head and face with a hammer before stabbing him.
Menzies admitted to police that he drank some of McKendrick’s blood, and “ate a bit of his head.” He buried his friend in a shallow grave on Fauldhouse moor.
Menzies pleaded guilty to culpable homicide, but denied the murder charge. Nevertheless, a jury unanimously found Menzies — whom at age 14 had been sentenced to three years for stabbing a student — guilty, and sentenced him to a minimum of 18 years in prison.
Not even the prospect of prison seemed to deter Menzies of his ultimate goal of becoming a vampire, however. Throughout the arrest, trial, and sentencing, Menzies sent letters to his home, wherein he provided the Queen of the Damned character with updates on his life.
One reads, “Dear Akasha, Everything is going as planned. I will kill for you again soon. These humans are nothing but animals, fodder for us.” Menzies signed the letters “VAMP,” in what appeared to be blood.
The so-named “vampire killer” did not live to serve out his sentence. Menzies committed suicide in his cell about a year after the murder.
