The tragic TRUE story of Cocaine Bear: Hollywood sensationalizes excruciating death of 'Pablo EskoBear'

The story of the legendary bear was originally told by a local business Kentucky for Kentucky, which now owns the beast. According to the Daily Mirror, it begins in an era of the 1980s known as the "Bluegrass Conspiracy" days, courtesy of a book of the same name by author Sally Denton. In 1985, a former narcotics officer turned drug kingpin abandoned an airplane midflight across the US. Andrew Carter Thornton II, an ex-Army trooper, had been flying a drug route from Colombia when his Cessna malfunctioned. In a bid to reduce the payload, he dropped off at least 40 plastic containers full of cocaine in the Chattahoochee National Forest. Thornton eventually jumped off the aircraft, but unfortunately, his parachute never opened and he fell to his death in Knoxville Tennessee.

Police traced his route back through the forest, hoping to find a cache of drugs worth millions of dollars. Instead, they discovered 40 open containers and a deceased black bear nearby. It later emerged that 'Pablo Eskobear' was making his way through the forest when he stumbled upon the vast stash of drugs ejected from Thornton's plane. The aptly named 'Cocaine Bear' went on to consume brick by brick until eventually dying from an acute overdose.

Medical reports later revealed that the bear's stomach was filled with cocaine to the brim and it inevitably led to heart, respiratory and renal failure, as well as a brain hemorrhage, stroke, and hyperthermia. Forensic experts said the 175-pound beast had suffered possibly the worst overdose in recorded history. “Its stomach was literally packed to the brim with cocaine. There isn’t a mammal on the planet that could survive that,” the medical examiner who performed the bear’s necropsy told Kentucky for Kentucky, adding, “Cerebral hemorrhaging, respiratory failure, hyperthermia, renal failure, heart failure, stroke. You name it, that bear had it."

The bear's remains were reportedly found in Fannin County, Georgia, near the state's border with Tennessee. Georgia Bureau of Investigation officials told reporters at the time that the dead bear -- and potentially more animals -- had consumed "several million dollars" worth of cocaine from the bags, which were reportedly valued at more than $20 million in total. "The bear got to it before we could, and he tore the duffel bag open, got him some cocaine, and [overdosed]," a GBI spokesperson told the AP at the time.

Following an autopsy, the bear was taxidermied and passed along by various owners through the years, including the country and western singer Waylon Jennings. The founders of Kentucky for Kentucky -- set up by two friends hoping to promote the state -- eventually tracked down the bear through a string of various owners and purchased it. The pair subsequently put the stuffed animal on display at the Kentucky Fun Mall in north Lexington where tourists have been flocking to see it.