Nelson "Jerry" Cannon[1] is a retired military general and the former sheriff of Kalkaska County, Michigan.
[4] After graduating from high school in 1967, Cannon served in the Vietnam War as a Marine and was honorably discharged as a sergeant in 1970.
In 1977, Cannon enlisted in the Michigan Army National Guard and joined the Kalkaska County Sheriff Department.
[5] In August 2013, Cannon announced that he would challenge Republican Congressman Dan Benishek in Michigan's 1st congressional district.
[5] Cannon came under public scrutiny in November 2018 after a widely shared online police body camera video depicted Cannon offering to "take responsibility" for Midland County Sheriff Scott Stephenson - after he had been found drunkenly slumped over in his car on the side of a Kalkaska County Road - in an apparent attempt to stop Stephenson from being arrested and jailed for drunk driving.
[17] The body camera footage depicts Stephenson begging the responding Kalkaska officer and Cannon, the Garfield Township Police Chief who was off duty at the time, to not send him to jail.
After Stephenson's pleas, Cannon can be seen stepping away from the scene to make a phone call, only to return and explain nothing could be done, saying: "I'm not the sheriff anymore...[a]nd the old days and ways are gone.