‘Bigfoot’ press conference reveals possum DNA
Promised evidence of mythical man-ape’s existence is not presented
By
BOB KEEFE
Cox News Service
Friday, August 15, 2008
PALO ALTO, Calif. — Supposedly, Bigfoot lives in North Georgia, and several of his relatives are still there. At least that’s what a pair of Georgia outdoorsmen and a California “Bigfoot expert” continue to claim.
But if they have definitive evidence to prove it, it wasn’t presented at a press conference here Friday where they had assured the world they’d make believers out of everyone.
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bigfootracker.com
An image of the alleged Bigfoot corpse discovered by Georgia woodsmen.
A second round of DNA testing on the remains of a 7-foot-7, 500 pound man-ape they allege to have stumbled upon while hiking in North Georgia is still being completed, they said.
Of three samples in a preliminary DNA test, one came back inconclusive, one contained traces of human DNA and one had traces of opossum DNA — probably from something the creature ate, they said.
They didn’t produce a body - that’s in a hidden location, they said. They won’t say where they found the creature and saw others. They won’t let anyone but their own hand-picked scientists examine the body, and none were present on Friday.
Still “we’re now the best Bigfoot hunters in the world,” said Matt Whitton, 31, who lives in the Atlanta suburb of Ellenwood. Whitton and his hiking buddy, 28-year-old Forest Park resident Rick Dyer, wore the promotional bigfootracker.com Web site hats to prove it.
Whitton, a Clayon cop who’s on disability and Dyer, a car salesman and tow truck operator, say they’re not sure how they’re going to make money from their alleged find; earlier they had said they wanted to run Bigfoot expeditions in the North Georgia mountains.
Tom Biscardi, a longtime Bigfoot enthusiast from Menlo Park, Calif. known for his questionable Bigfoot promotions in the past, swears it isn’t a hoax.
“This is as real as you’re standing right where you are, sir,” Biscardi said when asked point blank about it.
Others disagree.
“This is becoming like an alien autopsy,” said Jeffery Meldrum, a noted Bigfoot researcher and a professor of anthropology at Idaho State University. “It’s shenanigans.”