Florida
Accused FSU face-eater: ‘I’ve got a psycho side and a normal side’
Until he exploded in cannibalistic rage
late Monday night, Austin Kelly Harrouff appeared to be a gentle giant:
a good student at Suncoast High School in Riviera Beach, a powerful
athlete on the wrestling and football teams. He was about to enter his
sophomore year at Florida State University, where he was studying
exercise science.
“Austin used to be a quiet kid,” a fellow student at Suncoast and FSU who knew Harrouff at both schools said in an email Wednesday. “He’s actually nice, which is why this is so shocking to everyone …not the type of person you would expect this from. Overall his life seemed healthy and on the right track.”
But there were also signs of trouble for the 19-year-old student. A YouTube channel containing multiple videos of Harrouff contains the statement: “I’ve got a psycho side and a normal side. I’ve lost my mind help me find it.”
“I know what’s right for me. I
don’t need drugs,” Harrouff says in a video on bodybuilding on the
channel, which features music videos under the name AustiFrosti. A
friend confirmed that the videos were of Harrouff.
“Austin used to be a quiet kid,” a fellow student at Suncoast and FSU who knew Harrouff at both schools said in an email Wednesday. “He’s actually nice, which is why this is so shocking to everyone …not the type of person you would expect this from. Overall his life seemed healthy and on the right track.”
But there were also signs of trouble for the 19-year-old student. A YouTube channel containing multiple videos of Harrouff contains the statement: “I’ve got a psycho side and a normal side. I’ve lost my mind help me find it.”
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On Wednesday, Harrouff, according to a spokesperson for the Martin County Sheriff’s Department, was stable and conscious and under armed guard in an unidentified Palm Beach County hospital, where he had hand surgery. Martin County Sheriff spokesperson Tricia Kukuvka said they were working to charge Harrouff with two charges of first-degree murder and aggravated battery on a Good Samaritan — Jeff Fisher, a neighbor of the Stevens whom Harrouff stabbed multiple times when he tried to help the couple.
The Sheriff’s Department said in a release that initial tests showed no sign of street drugs such as marijuana, heroin or cocaine. Harrouff’s blood, DNA and hair have been sent to the Florida Department of Law Enforcement for further testing, including testing for the synthetic drug commonly called Flakka. Test results normally take one to three weeks, although deputies have asked for expedited results. Autopsies of John and Michelle Mishcon Stevens showed the cause of death as multiple injuries and blunt force trauma, the sheriff’s department said.
Harrouff’s mother, Mina, called 911 after her son abruptly left the restaurant Monday. Harrouff’s mother told police her son had gotten into an argument with his father at Duffy’s and that he had been acting strangely for approximately a week, saying that he “was immortal,” had “super powers” and “was here to protect people,” according to the Jupiter police report.
“It’s like he just — changed,” his mother told the 911 operator.
He was last seen in white shorts, a blue polo and a red Make America Great Again baseball cap.
But Mina also told police her son did not have a history of mental problems and was not a heavy drug user; the mother as well as Harrouff’s sister told police he was a “nice young man who would not hurt himself or anyone else.”
That gentle portrait clashes with what happened Monday night. Martin County Sheriff William Snyder said Harrouff attacked the couple as they were relaxing in what they had called their “Garage-Ma-Hall.” The muscular student stabbed the 50-something pair multiple times with a large pocket knife he often carried, as well as other instruments he found in the garage. When police arrived, Michelle was already dead, and Harrouff kept tearing at Stevens’ face despite multiple Taser shots and the use a police K-9. The attack appeared to be random, Snyder said.
“I would be a great asset to your football team,” he wrote. “I love the competitiveness of the game and I have the drive to improve.”
But at FSU, home of the Seminoles, one of the country’s top college football teams, Harrouff did not play football or participate in any other sports team. He joined the Alpha Delta Phi fraternity, where the Instagram account for the FSU chapter features a video of a wild-looking “Animal House” party last April. A Twitter account registered to @AustinHarrouff has only eight entries. The FSU freshman became more outgoing. “He went from not saying a word to anyone to smiling and saying hi and talking,” his friend wrote in an email.
Harrouff’s father, an implantology and cosmetic dentist, has been disciplined four times by the State of Florida Board of Dentistry, for misdiagnosing or mistreating patients, with consequences that included fines and remedial courses. Wade Harrouff also has been arrested twice for DUI, in 2011 in Juno Beach and in 2012 in Lantana. In the Lantana case, he pleaded guilty, received a year probation and was fined, according to records from the Florida Highway Patrol.
Austin
Harrouff, in a 2015 Suncoast High School yearbook photo during his
senior year. Harrouff played nose tackle for the varsity football team
and was a member of the wrestling team. Harrouff is a Florida State
University sophomore.
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