Pensioner’s ear and part of face ‘chewed off by young man at train station’
‘The injury was so severe that responders could see the victim’s skull,’ a police spokesman said.
An elderly man had his ear and some of his face chewed off in a horrific attack on a railway platform.
Witnesses reported ‘a lot of blood’ when they alerted cops to the incident in the Gresham suburb of Portland, Oregon, in the early hours on Tuesday.
Officers arriving on the platform at Cleveland Avenue discovered the attacker had ‘chewed off the ear’ from his 78-year-old victim, along with ‘part of his face’.
‘The injury was so severe that responders could see the victim’s skull,’ a spokesman for Gresham Police added.
The suspect, who gave his name as ‘El Baker’, was arrested and later identified through fingerprint records as 25-year-old Koryn Kraemer, who recently moved to Portland from his home in Georgia.
An emergency dispatcher had warned police the attacker was ‘still on top of his victim’, as they headed to the scene.
It’s a scary place in the mornings some days
‘There are people standing around not reacting to this,’ the dispatcher added, according to an intercept seen by US broadcaster ABC 15 News.
‘Unknown race, male, grey hair, blue beanie, tan coat, red socks.
‘Think he might be biting him now?’
Kraemer has been charged with assault in the second degree, and authorities are investigating whether drug abuse was a factor in the attack.
‘It’s a scary place in the mornings some days,’ said station user Sarah Seaborne.
‘I’ve come up to people sleeping half-naked and you don’t know whether they’ve been attacked or they’re sleeping on the sidewalk.’
The unidentified victim, from Hillsboro, Oregon, is in a stable condition in hospital and is expected make a full recovery.
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