PANAMA CITY BEACH — Beach Police arrested a Georgia man for allegedly shooting himself and blaming a group of suspicious people.
Paul Anthony Odom, of Marietta, Ga., was arrested early Friday morning for filing a false report to law enforcement officers, according to a police news release.
Police responded to a shooting call at 2:37 a.m. at Edgewater Gulf Villas, where they discovered Odom, 18, with what appeared to be a gunshot wound to his foot. Odom told officers he was standing by an unknown group of people near Edgewater’s tennis courts when he heard a loud noise and felt a pain in his foot, according to police.
Odom was taken to hospital for treatment, but as the investigation progressed, police said they discovered Odom had been playing with the firearm inside the unit at Edgewater and accidentally shot himself.
After being treated for nonlife-threatening injuries and released from a local hospital, Odom was arrested and taken to the Bay County Jail.