A Kentucky man has been arrested after disturbing residents with a vile Halloween yard display showing what body bags labeled with the titles of local government officials.
Stephan Marcum, 58, of Stanton, was arrested Saturday and charged with terroristic threatening after a local prosecutor reported the display to authorities.
The grim scene, set up outside Marcum’s home on Court Street, featured several black plastic bags shaped like corpses, each tagged with the names or positions of city leaders.
Shocked residents and community leaders said it looked less like a Halloween prank and more like a direct threat.
‘This is something you just don’t see every day,’ Powell County Judge Executive Eddie Barnes told WKYT, adding he was stunned when he saw the display for himself.
‘At first I didn’t know what to think about it because I actually drove by and saw it in his yard and thought, wow, that’s kinda harsh.’
Barnes, who said he has known Marcum for decades, described him as someone who ‘can be a good person’ but said he completely disagreed with how he chose to express himself.
According to police, the fake decorations were seized and taken to Kentucky State Police Post 8 in Morehead as evidence. Marcum is being held at the Powell County Detention Center on a $5,000 bond.
Kentucky State Police removed the mock body bags and other decorations from Marcum’s yard as evidence after residents described the display as threatening
Police say Stephan Marcum, 58, was taken into custody after displaying fake body bags labeled with the titles of local officials outside his home in Stanton, Kentucky
Stephen Voss, an associate professor of political science at the University of Kentucky, told WKYT that while Americans have broad protections under the First Amendment, threats are not one of them.
‘If you’re actively threatening someone in a terrorizing way, that may not be covered by the general right to free expression,’ he said.
Voss told KBTX that rising political tensions have made the public far less tolerant of violent imagery. ‘We’re seeing less tolerance for violent communication or violent imagery because there seems to be a greater risk people will enact it or carry it out,’ he said.
He added, ‘A display or statement that might have been taken as tongue-in-cheek or almost a joke in a less polarized, conflict-ridden age may not be seen as funny or innocent these days.’
Police have not released a motive, but local officials said the incident highlights how political anger in small-town America is increasingly spilling into the public square – sometimes in disturbing and dangerous ways.
Last October, a children’s soft play center in Gloucestershire, England, apologized after hanging fake body bags as Halloween decorations that left parents horrified.
Rugrats and Halfpints in Cirencester removed the props after complaints. Photos showed black bin bags tied to resemble human bodies, some wrapped in tape marked Caution and Danger.
Powell County Judge Executive Eddie Barnes said he was shocked when he saw the display, calling it ‘kinda harsh’ and ‘deeply inappropriate’
One mother told Sky News she ‘did a double take’ and didn’t want to explain the display to her child. The center said it ‘wasn’t meant to cause distress’ and took it down immediately.
Weeks later, Liverpool mother Caroline Ashley said she was ordered by the council to remove two inflatable body bags from a tree outside her home after a neighbor complained.
She shared the saga in a Facebook group asking, ‘Are the body bags too much?’ – sparking thousands of comments, most encouraging her to add fake blood.
