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Another teacher in trouble?
Man with same name as educator arrested
| Saturday, Dec 8 2007 10:20 PM
Last Updated: Saturday, Dec 8 2007 10:51 PM
The man who tried to grab an officer's gun during an arrest Wednesday may be a teacher.
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A man by the same name, Elliot Hardamon Jr., is listed as a special education teacher on the Web site for Curran Middle School in southwest Bakersfield.
Principal Kim Edwards declined to comment and directed calls to Bakersfield City School District spokesman Steven Gabbitas.
Gabbitas could not confirm if both men were the same person.
Hardamon could not be reached for comment.
Hardamon, 53, driving a 1988 black Mercedes Benz, refused to stop for a police officer at 10:45 p.m. Wednesday in the 3100 block of Stine Road, a Bakersfield Police Department news release said.
He led officers on a chase through southwest Bakersfield that ended at the dead end of Art Street, near Calloway Drive, where he drove through the dead end, up a dirt embankment and over railroad tracks, disabling his car.
Officers ordered Hardamon to put his hands up and get out of the car, the release said. He refused. Hardamon reached several times toward the car's floorboard, and officers, thinking he might be reaching for a weapon, twice deployed a Taser, the release said.
Even after police broke the car's window and pulled Hardamon through it, Hardamon continued to fight, grabbing an officer's holstered gun and partially removing it, the release said.
The officer was able to keep control of the gun, and a Taser was again deployed, which is when Hardamon complied and was taken into custody.
Officers later found a loaded revolver on the front passenger floorboard, the release said.
Hardamon was charged with the felonies of evading a peace officer, removing a peace officer's firearm and carrying a concealed/unregistered weapon, along with the misdemeanors of carrying a concealed weapon in a vehicle, carrying a loaded firearm in a vehicle and driving under the influence, according to the Kern County Superior Court Web site.
If Hardamon is a teacher, he is the third educator to get into trouble with the law over the last two weeks.
Jeff Scheidemantel, a Shafter High chemistry teacher, was arrested last weekend after Bakersfield police said they found recipes to make methamphetamine and weapons in his home and precursor chemicals needed to make the drug at the school.
Tom Vincent Adame, a Foothill High history teacher, was arrested and charged Wednesday after he offered to trace his penis on a piece of paper for two female students, according to Kern County Sheriff's office. He faces two misdemeanor counts of annoying a child.
-- compiled by Californian staff writer Emily Hagedorn.