In the movie she’s a rampaging 500lb beast ‘on a rampage for blow and blood’ but in reality the story is much tamer.
The female bear that inspired the upcoming film ‘Cocaine Bear’ likely died after doing just a few lines of the drug which was a deadly 95 percent purity, DailyMail.com can reveal.
Dr. Kenneth Alonso, the medical examiner who inspected the bear, said she would have suffered a heart attack after inhaling a small amount of cocaine when it found duffel bags full of the drug in a Georgia forest in 1985.
Cocaine sold on the streets typically has a purity of around 50 percent meaning the bear – which presumably had no history of drug abuse – would have died quickly.
Alonso admitted there is ‘no question’ that the bear did try the cocaine but the idea it went berserk as the forthcoming movie depicts is ‘just PR’ or more likely BS.
A mall in Lexington, Kentucky, claims to have had the bear stuffed and mounted, but according to the medical examiner who inspected the bear, it was too decomposed when it was discovered
Dr. Kenneth Alonso, the medical examiner who inspected the bear, tells DailyMail.com the bear would have suffered a heart attack after inhaling a small amount of cocaine when it found duffel bags full of the drug in a Georgia forest in 1985
In the trailer for the new movie the bear is pictured happily gulping down a bag of blow
He also revealed that law enforcement asked him to conduct an autopsy in case drug traffickers tried to make the bizarre claim that the bear ingested all the cocaine and they weren’t responsible for taking it.
Cocaine Bear – ‘Inspired by true events’, according to its trailer – is due for release in theaters on February 24. It stars Ray Liotta in one of his last performances before his death and Keri Russell and is tells the tale of a group of strangers who face down the marauding 500lb black bear after it goes on a ‘murderous rampage’ in a Georgia forest after eating cocaine.
Cocaine Bear is due out in February and is about a group of people who face down a 500lb black bear after it goes on a ‘murderous rampage’ in a Georgia forest after eating cocaine
The inspiration for the story was a one-paragraph New York Times story published in December 1985 – three months after the incident.
It told how a 175lb black bear died of an ‘overdose of cocaine after discovering a batch of the drug’ in the mountains of Fannin County, Georgia, just south of the Tennessee border.
The cocaine was dropped from a plane piloted by former cop Andrew Thornton, who, while serving with the Drug Enforcement Agency, turned to crime.
After being convicted and spending time in prison for drug smuggling, Thornton, a polo-playing, private school-educated son of a racehorse trainer, was on another drug run in September 1985 when he and a partner parachuted from the plane.
The weight of the drugs he was carrying was too much for his ‘chute and he got tangled in it and fell to his death in a driveway in Knoxville.
Thornton, 40, was found in a bulletproof vest, with night vision goggles, gold Krugerrands, $4,500 in cash – and wearing Gucci loafers.
Around his body were several weapons and a bag containing 35kg of cocaine.
The bear – subsequently nicknamed Pablo Escobear after the famed Colombian drug lord – was found in the forest over the border in Georgia with around 40 unopened plastic containers with traces of cocaine nearby.
Three days after Thornton’s death, the Georgia Division of Forensic Sciences received evidence including a parachute and several canvas and nylon bags sealed with Italian-made locks which contained dozens of taped containers full of cocaine, reads a report obtained by DailyMail.com .
The lab also analyzed a ‘green pillbox containing hair removed from bear’ and a glass vial with ‘section of bone from bear’, the report states.
The decomposed matter from the bear and bone sample were positive for cocaine and benzoylecgonine, which is formed in the liver when a person – or animal – ingests cocaine meaning the bear definitely tried it.
The report states that the drug was 95 percent pure which is a concentration far in excess of what would be sold on streets and could be fatal even to seasoned users.
The total weight of all the drugs was a staggering 762lbs, though this appears to include the drugs found around Thornton after his fatal fall.
Police prepare to remove the body of drug smuggler, Andrew Thornton, which was found in the front yard of a Knoxville man’s residence
Dr. Alonso tells DailyMail.com that while the bear did try the cocaine, the idea it goes on a murderous rampage as the forthcoming movie depicts is ‘just PR’. A clip from the Cocaine Bear trailer is shown
Cocaine Bear stars Ray Liotta and Keri Russell. The bear attacks anyone who might get in his way in his drug-fueled rage
According to the movie’s publicity, the bear was ‘on a rampage for blow and blood,’ but the true story is far different.
Dr. Alonso, a Professor of Pathology and Clinical Medicine at the University of Medicine and Health Sciences, said: ‘Months after Thornton’s body was found hunters in the woods came upon the duffel bags of cocaine.
Andrew Thornton was a Lexington narcotics police officer turned drug smuggler who offloaded the cocaine from his plane while flying over Georgia in 1985
‘Nearby was a dead bear that was badly decomposed. There was almost no bear left, just some bones and a little bit of fur, nothing to speak of.
‘The question arose: did the bear ingest the cocaine?
‘It was a 175lb female bear around four years old and we concluded that it tasted the cocaine, there is no question about it’.
Alonso, who was chief medical examiner for the state of Georgia at the time, said that the 70kg of the drug was stuffed into two duffel bags that had been slit open with a razor when hunters found it.
‘Let’s be clear – the bear did not do that,’ he said.
‘It obviously died the same way people do when they have too much cocaine: a heart attack or a stroke.
‘It would have needed a very small dose like somebody not used to taking cocaine.’
Alonso said that the only reason his office was asked to examine the bear in the first place was in case a defendant came up with a ‘bizarre story that the bear consumed all the cocaine.’
Country singer Waylon Jennings, who died in 2002, supposedly gave the remains of the bear to his friend Ron Thompson
He said: ‘The thinking would be that if the bear consumed all the drugs then the traffickers were not involved.
‘But the packages had been cut open with a razor and that’s beyond bear capability,’ he said.
‘Human beings went to that drop site and picked up the cocaine. That’s the whole point. You can’t blame it on the bear.
‘Our task was to remove any extraneous explanation, no matter how far fetched.’
Dr. Alonso said he wasn’t planning to see the film and had no idea if anyone was playing him in the movie.
He said: ‘The bear died. Anything else is PR’.
The Kentucky Fun Mall in Lexington claims to have the stuffed bear on display. It tells a long convoluted story, claiming country singer Waylon Jennings bought the bear and had it stuffed for his friend ‘Las Vegas hustler’ Ron Thompson who knew Thornton.
After Thompson’s death in 2009, the mall claims, a man called Zhu T’ang bought it for $200 at auction and used it as decoration in his Chinese medicine shop in Reno. When T’ang died, his widow gave it to the mall.
The mall says they knew they have the right bear because there is a long scar on its abdomen the result of the autopsy, carried out by Alonso.
But the man himself says such claims are ‘ridiculous’.
‘There was virtually nothing left of the bear when it was found,’ Alonso said.
