NASHVILLE, Ga.  — The sheriff’s race in Berrien County has gone into a runoff.

At least, one of them has.

A strange set of circumstances involving timing resulted in Berrien County holding two separate, simultaneous sheriff’s elections Tuesday. One was a special election to fill just more than a month left in the term of former sheriff Anthony Heath, who was forced out of office in June after he pleaded guilty in federal court to charges of civil rights violations.

The other was the “regular” election which would have been held anyway, since the new term for sheriff was scheduled to start in January.

Ray Paulk, who had been chief deputy, became sheriff when Heath vacated the office and ran in both the special and regular elections.

Paulk won the special election against Rick Brown and Frank Swanson, carrying 55.46 percent of the vote, according to unofficial numbers from the Georgia Secretary of State’s office.

In the regular election, Paulk received the most votes, but at 48.93 percent, fell just short of the 50 percent plus one vote needed to lock up the election, forcing a runoff. The candidates were the same as for the special election, plus Democrat Ben Davis.

“We’ve never seen anything like this before,” said county elections chief Melanie Ray.

Her office had anticipated a runoff, but didn’t know if it would be for the special election, the regular election or both, she said.

“It would have been great if it was over,” Paulk said Wednesday.

The runoff between Paulk and Swanson is scheduled for Dec. 6, Ray said. 

SPECIAL ELECTION

Brown — 1,095

Paulk — 3,519

Swanson — 1,731

REGULAR ELECTION

Davis — 584

Brown — 1,008

Paulk — 3,176

Swanson — 1,723

Terry Richards is senior reporter at The Valdosta Daily Times.