Zombie CSU

by Jonathan Maberry

  And if they then resurrected afterward as a zombie?

  “At that point they probably don’t fit anyone’s definition of human anymore,” says David Chiang, a military legal advisor. “We might have to make some retroactive changes in the law once the crisis was over, but in the face of a crisis of this kind once the person has died the body—awake or not in the case of zombies—is a disease vector and not a human being. The rules would change.”

  If someone killed a zombie—prior to a change in the law allowing such an act—would that be considered justifiable homicide? “That depends,” Campbell says, “on whether a Zombie is considered human life at this point? Probably not. It’s an oddity, it’s unnatural, and I think it would be treated as if killing a dangerous animal, so I don’t know that this type of suit would hold up in a criminal court.”

  Plague of Zombies— photo by Elizabeth Lopez

  An attack of zombies would be viewed much the same as a terrorist attack—with an emphasis on “terror.”

  Steingold agrees. “A zombie is a disease vector, not a person. A lawyer could easily argue that destroying one would be in the best interests of public safety. I don’t believe it would be viewed as an act of violence. However…if this were to happen in the earliest stages of a zombie plague, and if there is insufficient supportive evidence, either through eyewitness testimony or inarguable forensic evidence, then the person who kills the zombie might actually be charged. The same would hold if a person believed his next door neighbor to be a vampire or werewolf. If, after the killing, there was no evidence to support the claim then that person would, very rightly, be charged. Otherwise anyone with a grudge could say that the annoying neighbor next door was Dracula and that killing him was a public service. Some degree of proof is always required.”

  Chiang also agrees on this point. “In fact, not killing the zombie might be seen later as a crime. Of course, you could simplify the dilemma by tying up the dying so that if they reanimated they wouldn’t be an immediate threat to anyone. Disposal could then be handled later when minds are cooler.”

  Other aspects of liability play into the situation. If a person knows themselves to be infected with a highly contagious disease (in this case a zombie virus), what is his or her legal responsibility? Does he or she have to inform others? Is he or she required to turn themselves in to authorities?

  Steingold says yes. “Such a person has a moral and legal responsibility to inform the authorities, either medical or legal…if possible, depending on the circumstances.”

  “We only have to look to the most recent debacle with the TB carrier traveling on an airplane,” Campbell says, “and the mad hunt for him, the rounding up of people he had contact with, and his subsequent commitment to a hospital. This is also not technically criminal law but I think would be under a federal code for endangering the public.”

  “In the event of a zombie plague—or even a potential zombie plague,” Steingold adds, “there is also the potential for imposing martial law. The government would be very forceful in its efforts to prevent a mass epidemic.”

  “Martial law,” Campbell explains, “is government by military authorities when the normal machinery of civilian administration has broken down as a result of disaster, invasion, civil war, or large-scale insurrection. It is not to be confused with military law. Any trial of civilians held by military authorities under martial law would not enjoy the status of a court martial. This is a federal mandate and supersedes other state laws. Martial law may also be established within a state itself in substitution for the ordinary government and legal system during serious disturbances. Again, in this event, justice is administered by military tribunals. Usually while the military authorities are restoring order, their conduct cannot be called into question by the ordinary courts of law. After the restoration of order, the legality of the military’s actions might well be theoretically capable of examination.”

  Would the government act quickly enough?

  “Well,” says a skeptical Steingold, “we have a spotty record with that. I think that our national intentions are almost always for the best, but between knowledge and action there is bureaucracy and that can slow things down to a crawl. Or in the case of zombies, slow it to a shuffling walk. Sometimes we’re right on the mark with rapid response, and then we have something like Katrina and the FEMA debacle.”

  Jason Broadbent, a civil engineer from Baton Rouge, takes a surprisingly more optimistic view. “Katrina was a total bureaucratic mess no doubt; but all of us are learning from it: The people, the local and state governments, and the Feds. We’re going to be looking at the Katrina thing for years. Laws will be written and rewritten because of it. Nothing in U.S. history has ever painted the government as clumsier or more ineffectual. Even the delays and screw-ups in the response to what was happening during 9/11 pale in comparison. And yet…I honestly believe we’re learning from that. God forbid anything else hits us again—be it planes flying into skyscrapers, hurricanes or the living dead—but I think the Feds would step up and do a better job.”

  In many of the zombie stories, the culprit is some testing facility—a lab5 working on a new virus, some toxic waste being mishandled. I asked my experts to comment on what kind of legal response would ensue.

  Campbell says, “This is a federal CDC function but I would imagine that the offending institution would be up the creek without a paddle.”

  “Every administration loves a scapegoat,” says Steingold. “We’re very, very good at going after them like the Mongol Horde. If a crisis of this kind occurred, and we survived it, someone would have to pay. It would strengthen the government—and to a very real degree increase its effectiveness and the trust in which the people place in it—to have a non-governmental institution be at fault. The entire weight of the government, backed by intense public outrage, would smash them flat. I’ll bet you’d even have the liberal left calling for public executions.”

  And if it turned out to be a runaway experiment from a government testing facility?

  Campbell’s view of this is understandably dim: “Hey, the American Veteran’s Association is still trying to figure out why there is a history of experimentation at their facilities.”

  Steingold believes such a revelation would be traumatic. “In that case I think every American, right or left, man, woman and child, would suddenly find themselves embracing the concept of anarchy. That would be far worse than any mass of zombies. That would be a civil war to end all civil wars; and we’d probably get the most severe kind of sanctions from other countries.”

  How severe?

  “Think ‘nukes,’” Steingold warns. “And who could blame them?”

  The Zombie Factor

  Zombie pop culture takes a mighty dim view of how the government and law enforcement would handle the crisis. Cops are usually shown as inept, undertrained, and unable to properly respond to the situation. For the most part, government officials are not even included in zombie stories, except as brief talking heads on a TV. One thing that’s fairly consistent in the pop culture view of the government handling of a crisis is that they would bungle the job or somehow use the crisis to further some dark agenda.

  In his books Down the Road: A Zombie Horror Story and Down the Road: On the Last Day, author Bowie Ibarra paints a dismal view of how FEMA and similar organizations would handle things. As he sees it, the government has not, in fact, learned from their mistakes. He says, “Look at how forces controlled by the government have responded in critical situations: the WTO protest in Seattle; in my opinion, government-sponsored anarchists were sent in to disrupt the peaceful protest, trash the place, and then were led away, providing the excuse for the storm troopers to come in and rough up the peaceful protesters. Then look at Katrina. Not only was it an example of government incompetence, but an example of how humans would respond when holed up in a large space with little to no supplies or supervision (i.e., child rapes, fights, murders). There is a conspiracy claim that most o
f FEMA’s budget money is actually spent on creating prisons/camps for future use. REX-846 is an interesting piece of legislature. Bottom line, the government forces would be told to try and secure citizens by any means necessary. The zombie infestation would only be half of the problem.”

  Author Tim Waggoner takes a different stance. “I think that—assuming the zombie contagion spread fast enough to create multitudes of zombies—that there would be a lot of chaos and a temporary breakdown in society, but the apocalypse wouldn’t occur. Humans would adapt to their new circumstances quickly, learning how to prevent the spread of contagion, disposing of dead bodies quickly and efficiently, and learning how to protect themselves from zombies through barriers and shelter. Plus, humans would go out hunting zombies. How many animal species have humans hunted to extinction without even trying? We’d wipe the zombies out in time and, even if the zombie contagion still existed, we’d learn to prevent any mass outbreaks. I wrote a story called ‘Provider’ in the zombie anthology The Book of Final Flesh7 which deals with some of these ideas.”

  Horror movie actress Nicole Blessing (Doomed to Consume) sees things as dim but hopeful. “There are so many instabilities in the world at play already. Power politics suggests that many nations would attempt to use a zombie uprising to leverage their status in the world. Society as we know it would fall, but all empires are destined to fall given time. We wouldn’t be completely obliterated. Humanity is very resilient, and once we managed to adapt to the threat, what’s left of humanity would survive.”

  “Certainly some cultures would be more successful at dealing with a zombie holocaust than others,” suggests Bram Stoker Award-winning author and screenwriter Lisa Morton, “but we’ve become so globally interdependent that no country would withstand it completely. Here in the U.S., I think we’d separate into small barricaded city-states, each with its own food production and resource gathering.”

  THE FINAL VERDICT: THE LAW OF THE DEAD

  If zombies rose, the laws would change. Laws that permit self-defense would be reevaluated and probably strengthened. Laws limiting the ownership of guns would certainly take a hit. Curfews would be imposed, and martial law would almost certainly go into effect until well after the crisis was over. In heavily infected areas, it’s not unreasonable to assume that martial law might, to one degree or another, be kept in place indefinitely.

  Once the crisis had passed and things had either gotten back to normal or settled into what would be the new version of “normal”, the lawsuits would start. Lots and lots and lots of lawsuits. If there was even a smidgeon of evidence to suggest that the plague had started in a laboratory somewhere, then anyone adversely affected by the disaster would file major class action suits against the companies, personnel, and stockholders involved. If the government had been in any way involved, as in the scenario of a military bioweapons program gone awry, administrations would fall, heads would roll, cover-ups would be attempted, and monies would be spilled all over the place.

  There would also be some major litigation within families and neighbor to neighbor. Figure if the son of one family turns zombie and bites his buddy next door, the surviving family members will go to court over it. No doubt about that. If there’s anything we are more than predatory it’s litigious. There will also be tragically complicated suits built around euthanasia, as survivors have their lawyers try to settle the rightness or wrongness of killing the infected. Expert witnesses will get rich collecting fees to try and determine at which point a person is considered legally dead and at which point an infected person—alive or dead—became enough of a threat so that shooting them is justifiable. Within two years, there will probably be college courses on zombie law; within ten there will be degree programs. Even though much of the economy may receive mortal wounds, the legal and legal education systems will flourish.

  Oh, and ambulance chaser will take on a whole new set of meanings.

  Dead Aim

  The Zombie Fighter’s Arsenal

  Dead Aim by Jonathan Maberry

  “You got to bring enough gun for the fun, son.”

  —Old U.S. Army catch-phrase

  In Chapter 5 we discussed how law enforcement and the military might respond to a zombie attack. Now let’s discuss the weapons and equipment they could bring to the game.

  JUST THE FACTS

  Firearms

  Mike Witzgall, former Force Recon Marine and former Dallas SWAT member, thinks that the standard SWAT weapons would do the trick. He says, “Weapons are broken down into 3 categories. Primary Handgun, Backup Handgun and rifle or Sub-gun. The Primary Handguns carried by SWAT teams vary from team to team and sometimes, from teammate to teammate. Most teams have now standardized what the team carries. 9mm, 40 caliber and 45 caliber are weapons of choice, though makes and models vary from team to team. I personally preferred the 9mm Beretta (Italian made) 92F for close in surgical shooting on hostage rescues (headshots). Most people that have the higher caliber weapons are not secure in their marksmanship skill. Remember, if ya cannot shoot for crap, a higher caliber ain’t gonna help.”

  What about backup guns? “Backups,” Witzgall says, “are rarely carried in SWAT—when they are it is usually something like a compact Glock 9mm or a 9mm Beretta 92FC.”

  And long guns? “The choice of which sub-guns and rifles to use opens up a major can of worms,” Witzgall says, “because most SWAT teams cannot decide what they want to carry. Here’s a little history: Back in the mid 1970’s I was in Marine Corps Force Reconnaissance. We carried the Colt (223) C.A.R 16 which looked like a little M16. This weapon was the mainstay for Special Operations for many years. Around 1982 the H&K 9mm MP5 sub-machine gun came out and everyone loved it (it really is a very good weapon). Problem was, it was a 9mm that was great for close in fighting; but had poor range and poor knock down/stay down. Eventually the H&K 40 Cal. MP4 came out. Better range, better knockdown/stay down capabilities; but still had poor range. Then the bad guys started wearing ballistic vests and carrying AK’s. SWAT teams then adopted the M4 (223) Weapons System. Which is the C.A.R 16 revamped and made of better, lighter materials. So, until something new and nicer comes out, we are using the M4 Weapons System. In case you are wondering about the name ‘Weapons System,’ the M4 is just an M4 until you start adding a bunch of way cool (but useless in my opinion) do-dads to the weapon. Laser targeting, range finders, night enhancement scope and lights.”

  I asked him about the weapons used by SWAT snipers. “That’s almost always the sniper’s choice. Most carry a bolt action 7.62. Make and Model is up for grabs. I always liked the Remington 700 Police Sniper System. Straight out of the box, it’s about one of the best around. A skilled SWAT sniper could drop one zombie every five seconds = 60 seconds per dozen. There is generally one sniper element (two men—a sniper and a spotter) per each SWAT team. In Dallas SWAT, we had eight primary snipers and at least another five or ten SWAT officers that had the skill and training.” Put that kind of skilled manpower on some rooftops and it would truly be a shooting gallery.

  For advice on how to choose a handgun, I asked Vincent DeNiro, movie weapons armorer and defense industry consultant.1 “People that are not familiar with handguns believe what they see on TV; and many TV shows and movies are produced and directed by people that are not familiar with guns. In reality people don’t fly back ten feet when shot, guns don’t shoot forever without reloading, and no one shoots two handguns at the same time. Now, for picking an appropriate handgun, here are some things to consider:

  Size: Compact guns (in full-size calibers like 9 mm, .40, .45) are very popular now as concealed carry is allowed in every state except IL and WI).

  Feel: The gun must fit the hand.

  Weight: Polymer (plastic) frames are very desirable and metal-framed guns have now taken a back seat to Glock, Beretta Px4 series, Springfield XD, and Smith & Wesson M&P models as weight is a big consideration.

  * * *

  Hard Science: “Fire…Good!”

 
Let’s take a second look at the Glock 23C used by the security guard in the scenario described in Chapter 1 and match it against what we know of zombies. Romero clearly established in Night of the Living Dead that zombies fear fire (if fear is the right word). They shy away from it.

  Though all handguns emit some burning gasses when a shot is fired, compensated guns such as the 23C have two slotted ports on the topside of the barrel. We can presume that the shots were fired during the struggle. We also know that something spooked the zombie and made it run away. Since it’s doubtful that the arrival of the witness’s car had any real effect (though under other circumstances it would be like a pizza delivery to a hungry ghoul), we can deduce that the additional flame—repeated during the three shots the guard fired—are what made our zombie flee. Otherwise he would have lingered to feed on the guard.

  * * *

  Caliber: In years past, the .22, .25, .32, .38 Special, and .380 were considered sufficient stopping power, but this gave way to the 9 mm. Although the 9 mm is about the same strength as a .38 Special, it has the high-capacity fast reload feature, which the .38 doesn’t have. Over the past fifteen years, the trend is to go stronger than the 9 mm and calibers like .357 SIG, .40, and .45 are very popular now.

  Action: Semiautomatics or pistols have taken over revolvers as the choice for handguns since the 1980s. Semiautomatics allow for fast reloading with some pistol magazines holding 30 rounds. The revolver tends to have a much slower reloading time, and the user only gets to reload five, six, seven, or eight rounds. However, the advantage of the revolver is that revolvers can handle much more powerful ammunition like 454 Casull or 500 S&W. There are even revolvers that fire the big game rounds like the 45–70, which was a popular buffalo cartridge.