First of all, look at the text on the bottom of the image … this was WLEX’s “Big Story.” That means the biggest piece of news they had for the day. That’s like this being the biggest headline above the fold in a newspaper. WTF??? (This is why I hate television news – I guarantee you, unless it was some rinky-dink-every-couple-of-days-small-time-small-town paper, this would never make it above the fold. Or probably even on the front page.)
Now, onto the story…
He claims his beard was cut off and stuffed in his mouth and that he was ordered to eat it last May.
Wha-huh? Sounds a bit like a slightly-censored take of one of my favorite South Park episodes. Chili, anyone?
Please tell me I'm not the only one who looks at the picture of this guy - who is, quite frankly, not a little dude - and wonder how big these guys were to hold him down and shave off his beard.
And that's only the beginning of what one Lawrenceburg man says he and his brother endured, all because of a fight over a lawn mower.
Just the beginning? Goody, this is gonna be awesome!
Harvey Westmoreland and his brother Joseph used to think highly Troy Holt and James Hill. In fact, they were friends. That was before that May incident on Willisburg Road, where Holt used to live.
Aww, they were friends, how sweet.
Elitist reporter/Grammar Nazi note: “That was before that May incident…” There’s too many uses of the word “that” in the sentence. I think it needs to be rewritten. Just replace the second “that” with “the” – problem solved. Excuse me, WLEX, do you have editors for your web content? (Bonus points if you noticed the missing 'of' in the sentence.)
"My brother was cleaning out the stalls out there for Troy, you know, working for him. They called and wanted me to come around there and when I got there, I realized they were already drunk," Westmoreland said.
So, let me get this straight – your brother worked for Troy cleaning out the stalls, and they (who is they … Troy and your brother? Or the hick-speaking aliens?) called and asked you to come over. When you got there, you realized they were already drunk.
Wow, was Westmoreland drunk when he said this? My head’s spinning from the redundancy that seems to be overly redundant in this statement.
Of all things to fight about, he said, punches started flying over a lawn mower.
Elitist reporter note: WAIT – where’s the transition here? We got to the point he realized they were drunk. No one said anything about a fight breaking out yet. Sequence of events people, sequence of events.
"Troy offered to buy it from me for two hundred and fifty dollars. I paid twenty bucks for it. He thought I was trying to cheat him," Westmoreland said. "One thing led to another, and before I knew it, there were knives and guns and everything just went haywire."
Elitist reporter note: What lawnmower? Where did the lawnmower come into play? Obviously in the ill-placed previous sentence. But what I’m not following is that Westmoreland was invited over to Troy’s place (I think, or the hick-speaking aliens), and now we’re talking about a lawnmower that Troy wants to buy from him. Did he ride it over to Troy’s? Or was it at his place and they were just talking about it? I really think there’s something missing here.
He says his brother had a mark on his neck, where a knife was held. But Westmoreland's loss was more permanent.
A permanent loss, how sad. :(
"They cut my beard and forced me to eat it," he said.
Westmoreland’s loss was more permanent – his beard??? His beard, which is body hair, which grows daily was a permanent loss? Is he some freak of nature who can only grow facial hair once – if it gets shaved off, he’s doomed to have a baby face forever? Hey, whoever wrote this story, Noah Webster called and he wants you to look up the meaning of the word permanent.
Westmoreland said Holt and Hill let them go, but threatened to kill them if they called police. That wasn't enough to keep the two brothers from calling 911.
Wait, where did Hill come into this story? Up in the beginning we talked about how they used to think highly of James Hill, but to my understanding (in what’s given to me here), James Hill never appeared in the sequence of events outlined above.
"I believe in the law. I believe that justice has been served, and it will be after Tuesday," Westmoreland said.
Excuse me? You mixed past tense and future tense in the same sentence. I’m confused. Was justice served before or will it be after Tuesday. (Side note: I know that as I’m writing this, the Tuesday to which he is referring is in the past, but it wasn’t when he made this idiotic statement.)
Sentencing for James Hill and Troy Holt will be next Tuesday morning in Lawrenceburg Circuit Court. Both Hill and Holt have pleaded guilty, and are expected to be fined and sentenced to supervision diversion.
WTF is “supervision diversion?”
By the way, I must say I was sorely disappointed because, when I first saw a headline of “Man forced to eat beard” and heard it was about a lawnmower, I was so hoping they shaved his beard off with a lawnmower and then forced him to eat it. This story is very anti-climatic. But it sure was fun to rip apart!
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