ASHEBORO — Saying it’s time to go, Major Barry Bunting announced his retirement from the Randolph County Sheriff’s Office, effective July 31.

“I have with much sadness announced my retirement,” he said in an e-mail to media outlets he deals with. “...I leave knowing the county is in good hands. ...”

In a subsequent interview, Bunting explained that he decided to leave the Sheriff’s Office after 28 years so he can spend more time with his wife Lisa and their son Aaron, who is a rising senior at Southwestern Randolph High School.

“I want to get to know my wife again,” said Bunting. “Lisa is a teacher at Balfour School and she wants to travel in the summer.” He said a cruise is in the planning stages.

Calling Lisa “a saint,” Bunting said she had “never complained about my having to work.”

He said when he was asked to work during off hours, she would encourage him to go.

Aaron is not only deciding on a college after graduation from SWRHS but also expects to play baseball for the Cougars once again. Bunting said he wants to be there for him.

“I missed out on a lot of baseball games when Aaron was little,” he said. “I feel like it’s time to spend time” at the ballpark.

There will also be some “me” time as well as “adjustment back into society.” Bunting said he’ll be looking for job opportunities during the coming months.

“I’m not too old I can’t learn,” said the 50-year-old. “I’m willing to learn.”

He’s expecting to spend more time on the golf course and enjoys being involved in politics.

He’s vice chairman of the county Republican Party Executive Committee.

Bunting was born in Chicago and moved to Asheboro when he was in elementary school. He’s an Asheboro High School graduate.

Soon after graduating he went to Hendersonville to spend some time with his brother, Lee, who was chief of detectives at the Hendersonville Police Department.

He said Bill Powers, former police chief there, “kept telling me law enforcement was the career to get into. I didn’t know anything about law enforcement.”

But Bunting was hired as a loss prevention officer at King’s Department Store in Hendersonville and before long was promoted to director of security for the Western District.

“I loved it up there,” he said. “It’s a beautiful place. But I wanted to come back home.”

In 1981, he learned that a friend of his, Joe Farlow, was police chief at Randleman.

“He sent me a packet to fill out and I sent it back,” said Bunting. “He had a job opening as a patrolman. I thought, ‘It’s now or never’ and started in May, 1981.”

Bunting said he “loved working in Randleman. They’re nice people.”

But one morning, Sheriff Robert Mason asked Bunting to meet him for breakfast.

“He said he wanted me to come work for him,” Bunting said. With the chance to make $4,000 more per year, he couldn’t refuse and started work for Mason in August, 1982, on patrol.

“I worked for three sheriffs and couldn’t have asked for three better sheriffs,” said Bunting. “But the pleasure and honor is working with the people of the county. It’s a wonderful place to live.”

Bunting admits his time in law enforcement “hasn’t all been a bed of roses. The low point was Sheriff Mason dying in office.

“But it didn’t matter who the sheriff was because we were like family,” he said. “When Bob died, it was like part of the family left. But it was so easy when Litchard (Hurley) was appointed to fill out the term. He was one of the family.

“It was the same when (current Sheriff) Maynard (Reid) took over,” said Bunting. “It was just like another member of the family took over.”

Bunting said that over his career he has worked in every department except as a school resource officer.

The majority of the time he was in investigations before being promoted to captain in 2003 and moving into administration.

He’s over personnel, training, equipment, criminal investigations, evidence and identification, courthouse security and civil division.

Early on in his career with the Sheriff’s Office, Bunting said he patrolled in Archdale, which “nobody wanted” since most of the calls came from that quadrant.

“But it was a challenge to me,” he said.

He was still relatively new on the county force in the winter of 1982 when, during a snowstorm, he was called to meet a High Point officer on Old Thomasville Road in regards to a missing person. The two officers pulled into the car lot where the man worked.

“We saw blood dripping from the back of the building,” said Bunting.

Pulling up the door they found the bodies of two persons who had been shot in the head.

“It unnerved me,” said Bunting. When he called Central, the sheriff himself asked what was wrong. “I said, ‘we had a double homi-homi-homicide.’”

Bunting said some of his older colleagues still remind him of his stuttering on the radio.

He recalled that Barbara Martin, who was covering the murders for High Point’s Channel 8, asked him for details.

“I told her I couldn’t tell her much about the homicide but could give her a helluva weather report. We laughed about that.”

Old people and children who have been victimized are what Bunting calls “a weakness for me. When you  see some of the older citizens victimized, it breaks your heart. And young people hurt, lost, in wrecks or drownings – it’s difficult to work.

“I think the hardest thing you have to do is tell someone their loved one was deceased,” he said.

“People look at us like we’re different,” Bunting said. “But behind the uniform, the badge and the gun is a human being. People think we’re not supposed to show emotion but we do.”

Soon that will be behind Bunting as he leaves the Sheriff’s Office for other pursuits. But part of him will remain.

“Now is the time to write the next chapter in my book,” he said. “But I will always care about  this place. I gave my life to this place. Now it’s time to turn it over to a younger generation.

“My daddy told me you’ll always know when it’s time to do something,” said Bunting. “It’s time.”