Bruce Bennett is the local Alcoholic Beverage Control agent, a job that in earlier days was known as Revenuer.
Some years ago Bennett and other law officers conducted a raid in Bell County in which a still was seized and the moonshiner arrested. The raiding party discovered the whiskey making apparatus by relying on Bennett's nose - He literally smelled the mash (A fermented mixture of corn, yeast and sugar.) from several hundred yards away and sniffed his way to the still site.
In due course the moonshiner wound up in Federal Court and Bennett was on hand to testify against him.
The moonshiner had had his still located in a hog pen, hoping to disguise his operation. His defense was to be that the mash was not what Bennett had smelled; rather it was the droppings in the hog lot.
The prosecuting attorney planned to introduce Bennett as an expert in mash and moonshining and have him describe how he had smelled the 'shine operation. The judge, however, questioned Bennett's expertise in that area, wanting to know how - by smell alone - he could determine the substance was mash and not the droppings in the hog lot.
Bennett explained to the court that he was just a good ol' country boy from the Right Fork of Straight Creek; that he had grown up around hog lots; and that he knew what a hog pen should smell like.
So...the judge certified him as an expert.
But not as an expert in mash.
Bennett, by order of a Federal Judge, is certified as an expert in hog manure!
-- September 6, 1990
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