Saggy pants wearer tries to elude police

If you haven’t seen as many individuals around Cairo wearing saggy or baggy britches there is a good reason.
Cairo City Police are enforcing the city’s saggy pants ordinance, that was adopted late last year, with the most recent case being made after a police foot chase in the southwest portion of town last week.
So far, four citations have been processed in municipal court this year with three of those violators deciding to pay the $25 fine up front. The fourth defendant chose to go to court, where he was ordered to either pay the fine or spend 10 days in jail. Ultimately, he chose to pay the fine.
The most recent case was made last Wednesday night, May 24, when an alleged violator was seen with his boxer shorts showing just one day after being warned for the same offense by Cairo Police Officer Thornton Anderson.
Officer Samuel Almodovar approached the offender standing near Holder Park around 7 p.m., Wednesday and asked him to follow him to his police car so they could talk. Almodovar describes in his police report that the subject, a 22-year-old male, became nervous and began to look around. After giving the officer his name, the man dashed from the scene, running East towards Fourth Street Southwest.
Almodovar chased him behind several residences and then across Third Street Southwest into a patch of woods. Officer Anderson took the subject into custody in the wooded area. The offender was charged with a disorderly conduct – saggy pants and interference of lawful occupation of another and taken to the Grady County jail.
The Cairo City Council voted unanimously to adopt the new ordinance last November.
The ordinance is patterned after similar ordinances adopted by the city councils of Albany, Bainbridge, Dawson and Donalsonville.
According to the ordinance, “It shall be unlawful for any person to appear in public wearing pants, shorts, or skirts more than three inches below the top of the hips (crest of the ilium) exposing the skin or undergarments.”
Law enforcement officers will instruct violators to pull up their pants, shorts or skirts and, if they comply, the warning will be the penalty for the violation. The maximum fine is $200.