Story Archive

Bush Whacked

Tommy Ford, the sheriff of Bay County, Fla., was on his way to lunch with Deputy Chief Joel Heape and Maj. Jimmy Stanford when they heard an emergency call broadcast: a man at a food store in Youngstown was armed, and maybe shot someone. The trio were closest, so they rushed to the scene. The man came out holding a hammer as if it was a gun, and retreated back into the store with the three law officers in pursuit. As they looked for the man in the food aisles, “I saw Jimmy poke his head out,” Ford said, and “the next thing I know he steps out with a can of Bush’s extra brown sugar baked beans and hits the suspect in the upper body.” He took a second shot — with another can of beans — and the other two jumped the stunned man, ending the standoff. After it was over and Justin Tyler Stanford, 25 and not related to the Major, was in custody, Ford offered his opinion as to why the arrest went so well: “It’s a can do attitude.” (RC/Panama City News Herald) ...Excuse me, sheriff: you make the arrests, I’ll write the taglines.