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August 14, 2008 9:38 AM

I should have paid attention to this story from the beginning, but I ignored it. How many of us knew about this?

The Bigfoot Georgia hoax started back on July 23 when Matthew Whitton and Rick Dyer tried to convince local Atlanta television and newspaper reporters that they had a dead Sasquatch, but every reporter and TV station pronounced their claims a hoax.

Previously, Whitton and Dyer had posted videos on YouTube (since removed) that purported to show an interview with a Doctor of Pathology who verified that the Bigfoot was real.

Then it turned out that the “doctor” was really Dyerʼs brother.

And remember when Tom Biscardi described Mr. Whitton as a “hero” because he was on adminstrative leave after receiving a gunshot wound?

Whitton is currently on leave from his job as a sheriffʼs deputy after shooting himself in the left hand while responding to an armed robbery call in July.

With every new bit of information I find, the story plunges deeper into the absurd.

LATE UPDATE: Here’s a hoax video from back in May that uses the same bigfoot costume that resembles the GA Bigfoot. If you go to the Youtube page, you’ll notice that they claim to have put it in the freezer too.

Thanks to Drew at the BFF for the link. Also, see the costume in action here, from the same uploader at Youtube. (I remember this one because he had claimed it was inVA. You’ll see how laughable it is..)

TIMELINE UPDATE: Elevated from comments (thanks Anonymous, whoever you are!):

Basic timeline: Started making videos at the end of June. Not sure if they were published. Reason is the cop hasn’t been injured yet. He got shot on July 4th. First videos filmed were interviewing a guy who claimed to have shot a bigfoot. Interview with an ex-army ranger saying he’ll help the boys with expeditions. Video posted showing news story on tv showing Matt whitton is a cop and got shot, and shows him in hospital bed. Now he’s out of hospital, and another video of him talking about a dead bigfoot and holding up a 30.06 round. All of this is in mid july. Clayton county daily posts article July 23rd saying cop claims to have dead bigfoot. That and fayette daily are the only news orgs to post articles. The boys get abc, nbc, cbs affiliates to come to their house. they are interviewed but believe they are hoaxers and nothing is ever published. They continue to make videos mocking loren coleman and matt moneymaker. Eventually they end up on squatch detective radio. Steve Kulls aka squatchdetective had put out videos saying its all BS and invited them on his radio show. He quickly changed his opinion of their story. On radio they claim body is 8’8” and they sold it for 10 million to a private person. They invite 3 guys to view body. Steve Kulls, Tom Biscardi, and Chris Harper. Biscardi in interviews is lieing when he said on fox news yesterday that all they wanted was the real bigfoot hunter to come down. They invited 3 guys. Anyways that radio show happened on 7/28. That friday Biscardi flies out. Sat. quick video saying he’s got DNA sample. Interesting on 8/1t hey added a “for entertainment purposes” label on their tracker site. Also on 8/1 all videos start disappearing. 8/2 video up for a few hours proclaims dna given to biscardi. Then on monday squatch radio show 8/4 Steve Kulls announces a “gag”order for all parties involved. Lots of critical youtube videos start disappearing with threats from Biscardi of lawsuits. Lots of silence for a week. Until this week with the body photo and circus that is now ensuing..this is a very quick “history” of this whole affair.

HERE’S A LINK to the Clayton County Daily story from July 23. I don’t know if the story will be up forever, but I’ve saved a copy of  it for future use.

LIKEWISE here’s a link to the Fayette Daily News story referenced above. I’ve saved a copy of it too.

LINK to a new Daily Mail (of UK) article that goes over the same old same old. I think the Daily Mail is another “rag” but someone set me straight about that. I do know it’s a big paper, though.

LINKAGE to the Washington City Paper website and a short snippet from Bill Dranginis. There is ALSO (and this is BIG for those of us joining the party late) a link to one of the original videos that the GA guys put up (this is the one where the “scientist from Texas” comes to view the body, but of course it’s no scientist at all but one of the GA boys’ brother). The same uploader, Bigfootpolice, has collected six of their videos — probably a treasure trove of stuff that we who have come along late will not have had a chance to see.

EVEN MORE LINKY GOODNESS: Here’s a link to Jeff Meldrum’s take on it all, via Scientific American’s website. As you might expect, he’s extremely skeptical. About the DNA evidence, he says:

I spoke to Curtis Nelson (a biologist from the University of Minnesota) who is doing the DNA tests, and he all he could say is that there are no results yet—he can’t say anything more due to a nondisclosure agreement. Apparently Curt just received a vial of tissue in the mail, and there’s no chain of custody, no validation that this tissue came from the corpse in question. Since there is no known Sasquatch material to compare it to, he may just end up with a sequence that doesn’t match any other primates, at best.

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