Dead man slumped on Balconey mistaken for Halloween decoration

Los Angeles Times ^ | 10/16/09 | Los Angeles Times

[AngelesCrestHighway]

A 75-year-old dead man sat decomposing on his Marina del Rey balcony for days because neighbors thought the body was part of a Halloween display and didn’t call police. Mostafa Mahmoud Zayed had apparently been dead since Monday with a single gunshot wound to one eye. He was slumped over a chair on the third-floor balcony of his apartment on Bora Bora Way, said cameraman Austin Raishbrook, who owns RMG News and was on scene Thursday when authorities found the body. Neighbors on the 13900 block of Bora Bora Way told Raishbrook that they noticed the body Monday “but didn’t bother calling authorities because it looked like a Halloween dummy," he said.

[AngelesCrestHighway]

Halloween dummy indeed!...

[Snurple]

My uncle passed out drunk (in his yard) one Halloween and they thought the same thing.

[Fiddlstix]

Ping

[HiTech RedNeck]

That’s grotesque.

[San Jacinto]

Suicide vest malfunction?

[skr]

Yet another good reason to drop Halloween.

[DManA]

I hate Halloween.

[AngelesCrestHighway]

That halloween display stinks!....

[pogo101]

That’s an extremely low crime area, the poshest part of MDR. Suicide, or murder by someone who had access ...?

[HiTech RedNeck]

Physicians will examine the body today to determine the cause of death.

As if it would be something other than "getting shot"?

[HiTech RedNeck]

If suicide I would expect the gun to be on the scene, you don’t just shoot yourself in the forehead then walk out on the porch to die!

[SouthTexas]

Know of a guy that hung himself in his ex-wife’s front yard on Halloween. About the same results.

[KeyLargo]

Was this the guy?

[AngelesCrestHighway]

You know you can’t put 2 and 2 together until the train runs you over...

[a fool in paradise]

Balconey mistaken for Halloween decoration, AngelesCrestHighway wrote: Halloween dummy indeed!...

"Ya big dummy!"

[OldDeckHand]

"That’s an extremely low crime area, the poshest part of MDR. Suicide, or murder by someone who had access ...?"

Who shoots themselves in the eye? The temple or mouth maybe, but the eye? That sounds more like a message being sent, to me.

[HiTech RedNeck]

So do I. It’s gone way beyond the cartoonish witches and ghosts of my childhood. I can’t get away from that stuff in the nearby drugstore — they have it all over the place, looking like they just walked out of vivid nightmares.

[Pharmboy]

Coroner’s officials were called to the complex at 6:42 p.m. Thursday, according to Capt. John Kades of the county coroner’s office. Physicians will examine the body today to determine the cause of death.

Lemme enter a guess: gunshot to the head.

[T. Buzzard Trueblood]

[KeyLargo]

Just a preview of a patient under Obama Care.

[AngelesCrestHighway]

And no one heard a shot?....He was killed somewhere else or a silencer was used.....

[TexasCajun]

1st Clue:

[ReneeLynn]

Oh, good Lord! And no shots were heard? Flies weren’t gathering? Bizarre.

[pogo101]

Agreed, very fishy. Whether it’s a message (in targeting the eye) or not, it seems more like murder than an extremely strange suicide.

[HiTech RedNeck]

Maybe he was sitting out there when a drive by shooter came. It is posh, but it isn’t gated is it?

[Pajama Blogger]

Lead poisoning?

[J40000]

[pogo101]

The big “hair roller” circular condo towers there are gated and camera’d, but this may not have occurred at that building. Can’t tell without an address. Still, it seems very odd that no one would report a shot. Silencer — and a rifle? (Unless the porch, here, was at a low level. Some of those buildings are ~15 stories.)

[pogo101]

Know what, I’m WAY off. this is NOT the poshest part of MDR; that’s up north. (I lived there 1993-96 but obviously got mixed up looking at a map today.) 13900 block of Bora Bora is apartments and moorings for small “yachts” (under 25’ i’d say). Not cheap, but nowhere near posh.

[Malsua]

Who shoots themselves in the eye? The temple or mouth maybe, but the eye? That sounds more like a message being sent, to me.

Well, if you were going to shoot yourself in the head with a .22 caliber round and wanted to be sure you did the trick, the eye is probably the sure spot. It'll go through the back of the eye socket and fly around inside and kill you instantly.

People have shot themselves in the mouth and the round deflects off the upper pallet and exits out the neck and they live. People have shot the front of their face off and lived. Shot in the temple and it goes under the skin, flies around the outside of the skull and never gets anywhere important.

If you're going to shoot yourself and you really mean it...the eye is the way to go.

[mlizzy]

I hate Halloween.

I'm with you! I got our kids to do something other than Halloween when they were little. Most Halloweens it worked out. Isn't life scary enough already, and why or why do kids need all that cavity inducing sugar? I'm a big bah humbug when it comes to Oct. 31st.

[WOBBLY BOB]

actually the best spot on the face is right at the tip of your nose-straight back(hits the brain stem , the size of a walnut).from the side it would be about the earlobe.
look at a human skull some time and you’ll see what I mean.

[NonValueAdded]

well, that evens things out a bit since I’ve mistaken more than one Halloween decoration for a dead man at first glance.

[Slings and Arrows]

Mostafa Mahmoud Zayed had apparently been dead since Monday with a single gunshot wound to one eye... Physicians will examine the body today to determine the cause of death.

I'm guessing lead poisoning.

[gusty]

Moe Green style

[packrat35]

My cat climbed on the table where we were giving out candy one Halloween and fell asleep. One girl said it looked real and I told her the cat was indeed a real cat.

She did not believe me and kept poking the cat till it looked up at her. Never heard such screaming before in my life. I still get a chuckle every year around this time thinking about it.

[metmom]

I hate Halloween. And for this sort of reason.

The displays in our area are awful.

[MotorCityBuck]

Cat's are great. :) LOL

[YHAOS]

"That sounds more like a message being sent, to me. "

I think so. A message to his family: "Keep quiet or you will be crying tears of blood."