This has been blown way out of proportion. He didn't mean nothing by it."
A headless black mannequin with a knife in its hand raised eyebrows in a rural corner of Ooltewah Monday – with neighbors concerned the dummy was meant as a racist gesture – but the mannequin’s creator said he never intended to offend anyone.
Gary “Bubba” Couey pieced together the mannequin a few days ago from parts he found in an old shed near his home on Smith Lane, he said. He screwed the arms into the shoulders and dressed it in green pants and a black cut-off T-shirt. Because it had no head, Couey slapped an orange wig, helmet and mask on top of the creation, which he named “Buford.”
He propped the mannequin up on the back of a trailer in his front yard and stuck a knife in its hand as a finishing touch. Why?
“It just fit in the hand,” he said, and grinned.