Curry County, Oregon
We must admit that the world of bigfoot has many, many unusual twists and turns with few easy answers. Why this field attracts some of the oddest stories is truly baffling.
Two months ago an Oregon based bigfoot website received an email from an individual that appeared to possibly be a Curry County Deputy Sheriff (Gold Beach, OR). He went into great deal describing an incident that supposedly occurred on 12/14/09 on the Chetco River. The person stated that they were on patrol and were dispatched to a call on a Forest Service Road near Pairsoll Peak on the South Fork of the Chetco River. They stated that they arrived at 1422 hours after receiving a cell phone call from a group of loggers indicating they had seen a large unknown species of animal looking over the side of the bridge.
The individual stated that a report was taken and they walked across the bridge and looked for signs of the animal. This is the next statement in the email, “There it was, a blackish hairy animal of immense size standing upright looking straight at me from the riverbank.” The writer states that their service weapon was drawn and they fired one round in the air to stop the forward advance of the animal. They called it an “ape-like” animal. They further stated that they had to see a, “goof ball shrink before going back to work.” They also stated that they had to respond to Gold Beach to report what happened.
Ok, that’s a pretty tantalizing piece of writing to go without an investigation. In the worlds that we come from any discharge of a firearm by a possible law enforcement officer is BIG NEWS. NABS contacted the Curry Pilot newspaper, reporter Chad Snyder. Chad did follow up and was told by a Lt. with the Curry Sheriff’s department that this never happened. We appreciated Chad’s fine work and we let the story die, but, the supposed deputy wrote again and this time he started to make allegations. They also stated that they were going to appear on CNN and let the world know what happened.
The people inside NABS are resourceful and know how to get to the heart of an investigation. We do know that if any police officer/deputy is going to be forced to see a psychologist (as this person claimed), their association is going to be involved for legal representation, so, we called the Curry County Sheriff’s department and asked to speak to their association/ union representative.
We were placed in contact with Deputy Joel Hensley. We explained the intimate story that was on the website and the associated allegations of a possible deputy firing their weapon and their supposed order to see a shrink. Deputy Hensley stated that he has been the union steward for Curry County Sheriff’s for quite awhile and he has never heard of this. He stated that if any deputy fired their weapon on duty, there would be an extensive investigation. He also stated that he would be notified and assist the accused deputy in legal representation. He stated that he has never been called about an incident such as this but he would gladly assist us to get to the bottom of it.
**Note- Union representatives for police officers/deputy’s are “one of the guys”. They will always side with the police officer/ deputy, they are under no legal obligation to back their department, they are 100% in the deputy’s corner. If this incident occurred, deputy Hensley would want to inform us of the details and save the deputy the embarrassment of going to a psychologist! The deputy was extremely professional and offered all the assistance he could legally extend. Deputy Hensley also informed NABS that it is against their department policy to discharge a firearm into the air as that is reckless discharge of a firearm, you don’t know where the bulet will land!
Deputy Hensley did put us in contact with Michael Brace. Michael is the County administrator in charge of their 911 System. All calls for service for the Curry County Sheriff’s Office go through Michael’s office. NABS made a formal written request for all documents, transmission tapes, etc, related to this incident and in this time frame. Within a short period of time Michael did respond to our request. He stated that he had reviewed all calls for service on that districts radio channel and associated dispatch log and there were no calls for service into that area at the time period. He further stated that they did not have a deputy named “Cory”, as the subject identified himself in a communication. Michael stated that I could gladly speak with the undersheriff about the incident as the undersheriff would like to know more specifics about the incident.
Approximately 30 minutes after speaking to Michael, Curry County Undersheriff Bob Rector called. Sheriff Rector stated he had personally reviewed all of the documents that Mr. Brace had forwarded and nothing was close to matching the allegations of a shooting by a deputy on the date in question. He stated that u>IF ne of his deputies had discharged their firearm, he would be one of the first people to know. He flatly stated that this was a complete hoax and he would gladly put it in writing, below is the email from Sheriff Rector:
Re: Your Request for Copies of Public Records dated 03/11/2010
Dear Mr. Paulides,
As we discussed on the phone, I am writing this e-mail at your request to debunk a rumor that there was a Curry County Sheriff’s Deputy involved in a shooting incident with a “Bigfoot” creature on December 4, 2009. No such incident ever occurred.
I also received your faxed request for copies of CAD (dispatch record) printouts for all dispatched patrol calls for the date/time period in question, 12/04/09 between 1300-1500 hours. In that request, you asked to receive any information regarding a possible incident at the 24-mile post on a forest service road near South Bridge on the Chetco River, where a Deputy would have been dispatched at the request of a logging crew regarding a suspicious animal that was bothering the crew, and that the Deputy supposedly confronted the animal and discharged his firearm during the confrontation. The dispatch records of all patrol activity in the Curry County (excepting Brookings Police Department, which has its own dispatch center) during that time period amount to nine (9) CADs that were created during that time frame, none of which contained anything remotely similar to the information you described and requested. I have copies of those CADs and am prepared to ship them to you once we receive the required administrative processing fees. Additionally, we have audio recordings of our dispatch activity and we can also make those available upon request and receipt of required administrative processing fees.
After receiving your request I telephoned you and we discussed the request. You told me that you were investigating what you believed might be a reported sighting of “Bigfoot”. You also told me that the information that is the basis of your investigation came via e-mail by someone claiming to be a Curry County Sheriff’s Deputy who reported in the e-mail that he was the Deputy in question and that he was involved in a shooting incident that day and that he (the supposed Deputy) was subsequently placed on administrative leave and forced to undergo psychiatric evaluation. Again, this information is untrue. None of our Deputies were involved in any such incident.
Finally, I would request that you forward to me any information that you have that might shed light on the reporter of this information. We would very much like to make contact with this person. Please do not hesitate to contact me if you should require additional information.
Undersheriff Bob Rector
Curry County Sheriff’s Office
PO Box 681, Gold Beach , OR 97444
The conversation that the sheriff had with NABS after our initial conversation centered on the possible crime that is taking place within the context of the allegation, impersonation of a law enforcement officer. He stated that his department was going to accumulate the correspondence on the website of the alleged incident, determine if a crime was committed and then pursue the perpetrator. The Sheriff knows that every computer has a personal IP address (like a fingerprint) and it is easy to track down the originator of the email. No, the perpetrator can do nothing now to conceal their crime, the roadmap is there!
Let’s make the results of this investigation perfectly clear. The Curry Pilot Newspaper conducted an investigation and found that this incident never occurred. The Deputy Sheriff’s Union of Curry County states that they have never heard of this incident. The Curry County emergency dispatch center (different then the sheriff’s office) states they never dispatched a deputy to the location on the date in question and has never heard of a deputy firing their weapon at a purported bigfoot. Finally, the undersheriff himself flatly states that this incident never occurred. This case is not closed. Curry County needs to investigate the incident, determine if a crime happened and if this is a hoax, prosecute the hoaxer of this information! f this incident did happen and it didn’t involve a police officer or deputy sheriff then the individual needs to make that clear to the public, webmaster and readers. We should clearly state, the headline on one of the writer’s blogs states “Curry Deputy as this sighting to tell us about, ” and “Curry Deputy as followup on his sighting,” thus the inquiry to the u>Curry County Sheriff’s Department eems to be logical?…
NABS took on this investigation to find the reporting party who had impeccable credentials to be a witness, a law enforcement officer. u>If they were being harassed unlawfully by their department for making an observation of a biped then NABS would step in and assist with their legal defense. We believe that people who observe the biped should not be persecuted, threatened or harassed. People throughout the blog have claimed that this individual is in law enforcement, thus the inquiry to the agency that had jurisdiction for that area was made.
Update: March 12, 2010
NABS received another email from Undersheriff Bob Rector from Curry County. He stated that he had further reviewed CAD logs for 12/4/09 and 12/14/09 during the time frames outlined and there was nothing that remotely matched a shooting on the Chetco River area. He did explain that his agency also dispatches for the USFS and he stated that there was never a shooting in the area indicated by the USFS. He explained that he reviewed the entries last night made on the Oregon website by the individual claiming a shooting and stated that he was obviously fabricating the event. Sheriff Rector clealry stated that if there was a shooting in his county by ANY law enforcment officer, he would know about it. He also stated that in years past lumber companies had spoken to his office about certain personnel carrying firearms but at this point that was not a practice. heriff Rector stated that his office wanted to make it perfectly clear that there never was a shooting on the Chetco during this time frame from a law enforcment officer in Curry County and the entries on the Oregon website are pure fabrication. ne final note, the sheriff did state that while he was reading the writers entry on the website one major spelling error by the writer caught his eye. He stated that any law enforcement officer who had lived in Curry County knows the spelling of Carpenterville, not the spelling by the writer “Carpenderville”.