What He Say?

Last year Joe Larry filed a libel suit against the Sneezeville Sentinel. The suit has been working its way through the Stump County legal system for a couple of years.

Liar, Liar, pants on fire!

Actually, here in Stump County that would be “overalls on fi-yah”.

Here’s what is happening. Joe Larry, who is the biggest liar in Stump County, got mad about an article that referred to him as “one of the biggest liars in Stump County.” So he filed suit.  Iffen you ain’t from Stump County you should understand many of us have two first names. There’s Billy Bob, Bobby Lee, Ronnie Joe, Betty Sue and about 800 more. Then there are a bunch with just letters. EA, FP, CD and so on. The joke around here, which may not be a real joke, is that when we were born our parents just couldn’t afford a full name.

You should understand Joe Larry has a reputation for two things. The first being his absolute inability to tell the truth. If he says he had bacon and eggs for breakfast he’s lying. You can bet he had grits and sausage.

Joe is reliable. If he says it is a beautiful day, get your umbrella. Joe lies and then re-lies. The amazing thing is Joe will change his lies in the middle of a sentence and then swear he didn’t say what he said. When we showed him a video proving that he claimed the video was a lie.

Officer Bustah Butts says he could get a conviction on any crime in Stump County just by telling Joe he thought he didn’t do it. Joe would swear he did. The problem is two seconds later Joe would swear he didn’t say what he just said.

Stump County used to have a Liars Contest at the County Fair. We cancelled it because Joe always won even though he didn’t enter.  His claim that he didn’t lie beat everyone else hands down.

Joe also has another claim to fame. He is the only man in Stump County who has never quit a job. Joe has been fired from every job he’s ever had including volunteer jobs like working at the food bank, helping fix Main Street and painting the church.  When you get fired as a volunteer something just might be wrong.  Of course, Joe says it isn’t him. Everyone else is the problem.

We have a saying in Stump County that Joe Larry has been fired from every job he’s had except his current one.  Of course his current job changes every few months when he gets fired.  Last year Joe had held every job available in Stump County and had held some of them twice and got fired twice. Now he has to leave Stump County to find a new place to get fired from.

The hearing was held, we all presented our evidence and Judge Judge ruled in favor of Joe Larry and awarded him a dollar and 23 cents in damages.

Judge said the Sentinel had in fact libeled Joe Larry. The statement was incorrect. Joe Larry is NOT one of the biggest liars in Stump County.  He is the biggest and beats all the rest hands down. We apologize.