Harding player charged with resisting arrest

WARREN—An 18-year-old Warren G. Harding football player was arrested after leading police on a foot chase at Hampshire House Apartments on Fifth Street.

Police said they saw Bryon Stafford, who lives in the complex, handing another man a plastic bag on Tuesday, and when Stafford saw police he started to run. Police caught up and ordered him to stop and get onto the ground.

Stafford complied and then starting screaming he was on the football team, that he did nothing wrong, and that he didn’t know the other man except to see him at football games. He is a senior who plays both offense and defense.

The other man was identified as William Finnie, 22, of Cleveland, who struggled with police and was stunned with a Taser gun. He cursed at officers and kept shouting that Stafford was his brother.

Finnie was on the criminal trespass list for the apartment complex and had been arrested in the past for the offense. Finnie is charged with obstructing official business, criminal trespassing and resisting arrest.

Stafford is charged with obstructing official business.

The police report doesn’t say what was in the plastic bag.