“The Guy Don’t Have A Leg To Stand On.”

The exact quotation of Captain Tracy Ledford of the Maiden, North Carolina Police Department commenting on the department's decision to return a human leg to its previous owner. (Regular readers will remember the postings about this incident here and here.) The leg was amputated from a Mr. John Wood after a plane crash. He kept it because he wanted to be buried (or cremated) "whole". Mr. Wood fell on hard times and was unable to pay the rental fees where the leg was - for unknown reasons - kept in a barbecue smoker. The goods were auctioned off and a Mr. Shannon Whisnant had discovered the severed appendage. This caused a great deal of excitement and Mr. Whisnant contacted the police and gave them the leg. Mr. Wood was notified and was to retrieve his leg.

That is until Mr. Whisnant discovered he could charge people a modest fee to view the leg's former residence, the barbecue smoker. The PT Barnum instinct kicked in and Whisnant announced he wanted the leg back - ostensibly because he could then make more from his grisly display. A legal battle over who owned the leg was in the offing. We'll let the latest article pick it up:

The dispute over the leg John Wood lost in an airplane crash three years ago was apparently resolved when police decided the buyer, Shannon Whisnant, had given up ownership by calling authorities and asking them to take it away.

"The simple fact is that he said he didn't want it," said Capt. Tracy Ledford of the Maiden Police Department, who chuckled his way through an interview about the case that has made for lively gossip in the small North Carolina town.

"The guy don't have a leg to stand on," Ledford said. "He's not getting the leg back."

The charming Mr. Whisnant is quoted as saying: "It's a hell of a conversation piece," he told the Greenville News. "I bought it. It's mine." There is, of course, a solution. Mr. Whisnant could contribute a portion of his anatomy to the display. Well, except for his heart. He hasn't one.