According to the boys, Cryer chased them with the knife and said he would cut off their testicles, a police report says. Cryer admitted to police after the February 1991 incident, according to police reports, that he pulled out the knife and threatened castration.
But he said he was only kidding" and wanted to teach the foul-mouthed boys" a lesson, according to the reports.
Cryer was charged with two counts of aggravated assault. One count was later dropped when one of the boys became confused during pretrial testimony, says Pete Reinstein, a deputy county attorney involved in the prosecution of Cryer.
It made me mad when they dropped the charge," says the 13-year-old boy. They should have put him away."
Cryer's trial on the other felony assault charge stemming from the February 1991 incident is scheduled for next month. (No charges have been filed concerning the October 1991 incident.)
He just snaps," says Tammy Pelfrey, a mother of three who lives several houses down from Cryer. Pelfrey says she called the police about a year ago, after Cryer whacked her 12-year-old son, Josh, with a two-by-four. The police, says Pelfrey, had a talk with Cryer and then drove off.
If I had done that, Child Protective Services would have carted Josh away," says Pelfrey.
This particular incident centered on a dill pickle.
Cryer says Josh hit him with a pickle when he was on a walk, and that Josh screamed filthy-mouthed" things at him. Cryer admits going down to a home that was being remodeled at the time, finding the board and spanking Josh.
Josh, now 13, says Cryer was not hit by the flying pickle, and that Cryer wasn't the target in the first place. Josh says the pickle was intended for a friend, and insists he didn't taunt the old man.
But Josh admits that kids in the neighborhood call Cryer pervert" and tease him. Josh thinks the name is fitting. He claims Cryer invited him and other neighborhood kids to what the kids call his business room" to see his dirty stuff." Cryer himself admits he's clashed with kids-always, he says, because the kids are foul-mouthed." For instance, he admits that he once turned a hose on some kids who were taunting him. They turned the hose on me first," says Cryer.
JIM CRYER HAS LIVED in this neighborhood with his wife for 17 years. About five or six years ago, Cryer says, he retired because he had heart attacks that prevented him from working at his construction business. During an interview, he shows off blueprints of award-winning custom homes he says he built for wealthy people.
My customers send me things from all over the world," he says, pulling out his Mission Impossible!" key chain with pride. One of my customers even gives me a subscription to Playboy." Next to a pile of girlie magazines, he has another treasure in print, a yellowed copy of the Arizona Republic, dated December 15, 1981. The article details how Cryer helped a department-store detective hold down a thief until police came.
At the time, Cryer said the whole thing was an unreal situation." Then he added that he helped the detective because I think it's a citizen's duty."
I'm for the law," Cryer still says.
He says he cannot understand why he's having these clashes with his neighbors. Cryer says once he retired, he began taking numerous short walks around the neighborhood to lose weight. When the walks began, he says, so did the trouble with the neighborhood children.
As he tells it, he began drawing the ire of neighbors after a child dug into his pocket while Cryer was on a walk and found the nudie pen. It was the child's fault, he says, for digging in his pocket. After that, the children began lying to their parents about him, he says, and they began calling him the foul-mouthed" names.
I don't know why these children come up with lies about me to their parents," says Cryer, who adds that it's all the Ôcourt stuff" that really bothers him about the neighborhood movement against him. Their parents have never said anything to me. It's crazy."
Cryer says the war with neighborhood children has been very hard on his wife. She's miserable," he says. The kids have egged my car, got the car good. I didn't call the police on them."
Sometimes, he says, he daydreams of returning to Tennessee, where he says he has land with big timber, enough to build a modern log house." There's a creek full of big fish" that runs along one end of the lot, and maybe he could divert the creek into his property and create an artificial lake, he says. That would make fishing easy.
I could get away from all this," he says.
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