Bigfoot hoaxer killed

Randy Lee Tenley, 44, of Kalispell, Montana was killed yesterday while reportedly attempting to stage a Bigfoot hoax. Tenley was walking on a highway wearing a hunter's ghillie suit, likely similar to the one seen here, when he was struck by two different vehicles driven by teenagers. From KAJ18.com:

Montana Highway Patrol Trooper Jim Schneider says friends of the victim said Tenley was wearing a military-style camouflage ghillie suit in hopes of creating a Bigfoot hoax…
"It's still a crash involving vehicles and a pedestrian. So we're still doing the same investigation, but once we started speaking to parties, then someone involved in it, trying to ascertain exactly what brought that gentleman out to Highway 93 … I would not guess that would motivate anybody to be out on Highway 93," Scheider said.

"Man dressed as Sasquatch hit and killed near Kalispell" (Thanks, Bob Pescovitz!)

"Man Pulling Off Bigfoot Hoax Killed" (Cryptomundo)

David Pescovitz is Boing Boing's co-editor/managing partner. He's also a research director at Institute for the Future. On Instagram, he's @pesco.

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Brainspore

Well the good news is that the camouflage worked…

Oh who am I kidding. Nothing really funny here, especially since the drunken idiot just irreparably scarred two girls for the rest of their lives.
- awjt
  
  It serves him right. That’s an ugly suit.
http://twitter.com/BonzoDog1 BonzoDog1

Highway 93 is notorious for being one of the most deadly roadways in Montana without any hijinks. At least only the fool died. The two young women could have easily died or been seriously injured, too.
I thought too of several young members of the Crow Tribe who died in the 1990s trying to count coup by slapping the fenders of passing 18-wheelers going 80 mph on I-90 through the rez.
skeptacally

Can we please give this guy a Darwin Award nomination?
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  At 44, chances are that he’s already passed on his DNA or isn’t going to.
- retepslluerb
  
  Comments in the original article indicate that he had a ten year old son.
  - Bill
    
    Oh, there will be a sequel…
    - SomeGuyNamedMark
      
      Keep an eye open for a mini-squatch
- http://twitter.com/matcatastrophe mat catastrophe
  
  Insert obligatory “you don’t know the first thing about evolutionary biology” here.
oldtaku

‘alcohol may have been involved’
- Tom Forest
  
  >’alcohol may have been involved’
  
  Forget the Darwin award, that has to be in the running for ‘Understatement of the Year’
- Bill
  
  that is true of life in general
copperwatt

Too be fair, witnesses on the scene reported that the victim was *extremely* blurry at the time of the accident.
jansob

The ghillie suit idea is top-notch….if not pulled off by a dumbass.
robuluz

That just makes this footage even more chilling…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4CfC6XuF-FM
ALEX1648

DID YOU KNOW THE POSTED LIMIT IN MONTANA IS: DRIVE AS FAST AS GOD ALLOWS! HONEST!!!
- http://twitter.com/MartianEmpress Rezeya Montecore
  
  WHAT ARE THEIR RULES ON SCREAMING IN ALL CAPS ON PUBLIC FORUMS? OR POSTING TO THE INTERNET ON AN APPLE II?
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_OAUXAA362EXWLYVMPJOKLFB5JQ Incipient Madness
    
    Connecting an apple II to the internet would be so full of win that I think we could forgive the all caps.
  - benher
    
    Ow. I think I just had a cap popped in my ass.
- Warren_Terra
  
  Allcaps aside, your information is out of date. Montana indeed did not have a speed limit for a time in the 90s, but for more than a decade now all public roads must have posted speed limits, and that speed limit must be 75 mph or lower.
  - silkox
    
    Once I got a speeding ticket in Montana: the fine was $5, payable directly to the officer, and the paid ticket was a license to speed for the rest of the day. Does it still work this way?
    - Warren_Terra
      
      Never been to Montana, dunno. Interesting system you encountered, and by “interesting” I mean “ludicrously dangerous”.
      
      As I understand it, the reason states all have speed limits is to qualify for federal highway funds. I could easily imagine Montana enacting speed limits with the toothless and meaningless penalties you describe.
      - ChicagoD
        
        There’s also a due process element to having numeric speed limits. “Reasonable and prudent” is not a predictable standard, whereas 75 m.p.h. is something people can predict and adjust to. The idea is that without predictability there is no limit on the police power.
    - E. Quintus Ringsak
      
      Sadly, no. The $5 ‘fee’ went out the door when the speed limit was changed to “Reasonable and Prudent” back in the 90s , and was not reinstated when Montana went back to numeric speed limits.
Mitchell Glaser

Do you think he’s learned his lesson? Not yeti.
- Jake0748
  
  Too soon… too soon.
  - Just_Ok
    
    Yah, a comment like that is totally abominable
http://www.facebook.com/nonameasname Josh Neal

the real bigfoot pushed him
http://www.facebook.com/mj.mathisen.1 MJ Mathisen

I guess this makes the joke on Randy?
Preston Sturges

“No. 42 How Not To Be Seen”

http://youtu.be/zekiZYSVdeQ
sam1148

My brother did that way back in the 70′s. He had on a silver ‘space suit’ jump suit. A Gorilla mask..and a WWII cloth flight helmet (Rocky the flying squirrel type).

We lived on a farm then..and he went on the road and limped across the road when a car passed and then vaulted over a fence, most cars slowed down, some turned around and came back and then burned rubber. We walked home and laughed..until…the fields where filled with cop cars..and search lights and knocked on the door, in true Spielberg ‘have you seen any strangers in the neighborhood’. Dad sussed it out and got brother to apologize to the cops, and the car load of drunk Alabama football fans that got really spooked about it. Great fun tho..Brother still ran into someone at his work that mentioned he saw ‘spaceman big foot’ on that road..fortunately he just stayed quite about the hoax.
Roger Strong

He can still pull off his hoax. Bury him in his ghillie suit and let him freak out some archaeologist 800 years from now.
http://www.facebook.com/jwin74 Jon Winchester

dressing up like a goat wasnt enough for him.
- http://www.facebook.com/jwin74 Jon Winchester
  
  I’m gonna be just a bit of a troll here, and take a moment to ponder the nature of respect for the dead here at boingboing (and perhaps in our culture).
  
  Making fun of this guy who died playing a dumb practical joke is apparently all good fun. Yet not so long ago my comment criticizing Andy Irons for undertaking international travel with a dangerous communicable disease (dengue) was deleted. Is it because he was famous? An athlete? Because surfing is a more respectable hobby than bigfoot hoaxing? Interesting.
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    I’m gonna be just a bit of a troll here
    
    Just a bit? I think that your arithmetic is off.
Targe

The first driver who “couldn’t get out of the way” was a 15-year-old.

Looks like in Montana you can start off driving at 14 and a half years… he was stupid to be walking on a highway in a camo suit, but I can’t help but think that an inexperienced driver may have made the situation worse :(
- glace neuf
  
  that fact, that the first person was a 15-year-old, struck me as odd too. pretty messed up all around
  - Dav_Daddy
    
    It sounds like the 15 yr old struck him as… Oh never mind.
- EvilSpirit
  
  It’s true that you can get a learner’s license at 14½, but that only allows you to drive under the supervision of an adult with your parent or guardian’s permission.
  
  Six months after holding *that* license (so, no younger than 15), you can get a restricted license that limits the passengers you can carry and the times and purposes for which you can drive.
  
  The reason for all of this, keep in mind, is that things are really far apart in Montana. If you’ve never been to the rural West, you really have no idea.
  - Jerril
    
    We’ve got similar problems in most of Canada; the driving age in Ontario is 16, but again it’s a graduated permit system. There’s all kinds of exemptions in the graduated permit rules for various rural highways because they’re the only way to get anywhere if you live up country.
ackpht

Too many factors left unspecified in these “reports” to place blame one way or the other. Presumably the police will perform a proper investigation.

Novel way to make your exit, though.
Scratcheee

Right. That’s what they want us to believe.
http://www.youtube.com/user/Freethinkersanon Christopher

I blame all those Jack Links commercials for this.
zartan

Ah, Kalispell.

This post is a great excuse for me to link to the Flathead Beacon police blotter, truly one of the most sublimely eccentric things I’ve ever read (which is saying a lot):

http://www.flatheadbeacon.com/policeblotter/

Now that I think of it, boingboing should post the police blotter as a separate item. It is truly, truly awesome. Sample:

9:43 a.m. A Somers man believes that his drunken neighbor vomited in his driveway and looted his wife’s vehicle.8:15 p.m. Dueling neighbor’s screamed at one another about dog beatings, kids, a stout woman’s reckless driving, and an disobedient teenager. 9:28 p.m. Someone saw a transient holding a rope on Highway 2 East.
- silkox
  
  Wow, you’re not kidding.
  
  10:37 a.m. Someone said that a grass fire started when a goose flew into a power line, caught fire, and fell to the ground.
  - Brainspore
    
    The goose. The goose. The goose is on fire.
    
    We don’t need no water, let that motherfucker burn.
  - blueelm
    
    I feel like I just watched an episode of Twin Peaks.
- Roger Strong
  
  From the August 2002 Alta, Utah, town newsletter (as featured in the Salt Lake Tribune):
  ”July 14: At 12 p.m., the deputy on duty responded to a report of a man chasing a moose in Albion Basin. It is suspected that this is related to a subsequent report of a moose chasing a man.”
Amorette

Highway 93 is two-lane and winds through forests and dips down near Flathead Lake. The scenery is beautiful but the road is deadly. Any drunk who thinks wearing a bigfoot suit and jumping out onto Highway 93 deserved to get whacked but I feel sorry for the young drivers. Yes, 15 is legal to drive because this is a rural state and most kids have been driving farm trucks and tractors and combines since they were 11. Also, the speed limit on most of 93 is 65 mph because it is narrow and runs through country where deer, elk and bears often cross the road.
- http://twitter.com/hbirdyman myung lee
  
  so, you dont feel sorry for the guy who died??
- GrumpySteen
  
  So, you’ve jumped directly from “police are waiting to get toxicology reports to see if Tenley had been drinking” to “Any drunk who thinks wearing a bigfoot suit and jumping out onto Highway 93 deserved to get whacked.” without the need for anything even remotely resembling proof?
  
  Perhaps you’d like to whack his child as well, since children often behave like their parents. Let the witch hunts begin and to hell with that stupid “innocent until proven guilty” crap!
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    He walked out onto a dangerous highway wearing camouflage. I don’t think that it’s victim blaming to point out cause and effect in this situation.
  - Mitchell Glaser
    
    It wasn’t a bigfoot suit, it was a suit that was made for the specific purpose of keeping people from seeing you, and it worked! Before you get up on your grumpy high horse you might consider that for a moment.
http://twitter.com/REIM3RS Reimers!

Anyone think of Harry and the Hendersons after reading this?!
- Lurking_Grue
  
  Glad I wasn’t the only one.
http://otherthings.com otherthings

“And I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren’t for those meddling kids…”

http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/YouMeddlingKids