Man bites chunk out of deputy’s head inside robot at music festival, Florida officials say
A man accused of chomping down on a Florida deputy’s head inside a giant robot at a music festival is now going to prison, authorities said.
James Michael Anderson, 37, was a volunteer at Vortex Spring, where the Sol Festival EDM music event happened in May, according to the Holmes County Sheriff’s Office.
“He’s a farmer and a family man,” his attorney, Mitch Stone, told McClatchy News. “He’s not the type of guy to go looking for trouble.”
Stone recounted that a deputy climbed up a ladder into the belly of a giant robot that was set up as a command center and DJ booth. Anderson followed him up because the space was supposed to be limited access, and prosecutors said a fight broke out when Anderson reached for the deputy’s gun.
Stone said he doesn’t have reason to believe his client would have reached for the gun, but during the ensuing fight, prosecutors said Anderson bit the deputy’s head down to the bone, exposing his skull.
He resisted the effects of a Taser, and it took backup law enforcement to subdue him and get him down from the robot, McClatchy News previously reported.
Investigators reported Anderson was on “PCP, LSD, ketamine, mushrooms and ecstasy” at the time, although Stone denied his client tested positive for those drugs at a hospital.
He described Anderson as a nonviolent “gentle giant” who had never been in trouble before.
Anderson pleaded no contest to aggravated battery on a law enforcement officer, and a judge sentenced him to six years in prison, the State Attorney’s Office for the 14th Judicial Circuit announced March 10.
“This is the most severe bite wound I have ever seen in my career as a prosecutor, and this defendant is going to spend the next several years in prison paying for his violent actions,” prosecutor Jacob Cook said.
Anderson was facing the possibility of a decades-long sentence had the case gone to trial, Stone said.
He’ll also pay restitution to the deputy.
Holmes County is in the Florida Panhandle.
This story was originally published March 11, 2025 at 6:02 PM with the headline "Man bites chunk out of deputy’s head inside robot at music festival, Florida officials say."