Runaway bride mows lawn to work off community service

Runaway bride Jennifer Wilbanks mows the lawn of a gov-ernment building, Tuesday in Lawrenceville, Ga. (AP Photo/Gene Blythe) LAWRENCEVILLE, Ga. — Seventeen-year-old Michael Powell thought the woman who was cleaning bathrooms with him for court-ordered commu-nity service looked out of place.

‘‘I said ’Whoa, what’s a girl like you having to do 120 hours of community service?’ She said, ’I told a lie,’’’ Powell recalled about his first meeting with the 32-year-old woman.

‘‘I said, ’It must have been a pretty big lie,’ and she laughed, saying ’Haven’t you heard of the runaway bride?’’’

Runaway bride Jennifer Wilbanks also has been mowing lawns, picking up litter, wash-ing public vehicles and clean-ing government offices as part of her sentence for lying to police after she ran off days before her scheduled wedding.

Wearing an orange commu-nity service vest, a ballcap bearing the slogan ‘‘Life is good’’ and running shoes, Wilbanks seemed upbeat Tues-day as she pushed a powered mower by a swarm of reporters and photographers. She briefly spoke when the mower’s engine died in some tall, wet grass.

‘‘I’m doing well,’’ said Wilbanks, who has been under-going mental health treatment. She admitted with a laugh that it had been a long time since she had mowed a lawn.

‘‘I need to get back to work. I don’t want to get into trouble,’’ she added.

Her lawn mower then kept dying in the grass, each time prompting her to repeatedly yank on the pull cord to get it started again. After the eighth time it quit, she let out a big sigh.

In all, she was ordered to do 120 hours of service. Wilbanks had already completed 24 hours of her sentence by clean-ing probation offices and wash-ing public vehicles.

Powell said Wilbanks would occasionally be asked by passers-by if she is the run-away bride, and she would politely stop and answer their questions.

‘‘She never got agitated,’’ Powell said.