When one of Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s cousins spoke to The New York Times about the discovery of a dead bear cub abandoned in Central Park in 2014, he said he had no idea he was behind the body.
Former Times reporter Tatiana Schlossberg is the daughter of RFK Jr.’s cousin, Caroline Kennedy. I wrote about the mysterious trial. When the bear was first found under a bicycle in the park 10 years ago, it appeared as if it had been run over and killed by the wheel.
Schlossberg said the world only found out over the weekend that his environmentalist cousin was the culprit, after the independent presidential candidate acknowledged him in a video posted to X on Sunday in an attempt to thwart The New Yorker’s exposé.
“Like law enforcement, when I wrote the story, we had no idea who was responsible for this,” says Schlossberg, who was an intern at the time. It said in a statement Released by her former employer.
RFK Jr., 70, acknowledged that he came clean about the ugly tale because he expected it to be included in a future article and that it would cause damage.
In the video, the Kennedy heir said he was out falcon hunting with friends in Goshen, New York, when a woman driving in front of him hit and killed a bear cub with her car.
“So I pulled over, picked up the bear and put it in the back of my van. I was going to skin the bear, it was in pretty good condition, and I was going to put the meat in the fridge,” he recalled.
The environmental lawyer said he wanted to tag the cubs that died on the road to make the plan legal, but that day never came.
He said he ended up rushing off to dinner in Manhattan and only had to carry the bear’s carcass out of his car.
He said he and his friends, who were drunk at the time, came up with the bizarre dumping plan as a prank as the cycling accident was getting a lot of media attention at the time.
Kennedy claims he was not drunk and said he thought it would be funny to make it look like the bear had been hit by a bicycle.
“Everyone thought that was a great idea, so we went ahead and did it and thought it would be funny for whoever found out,” Kennedy recalled.
“That’s because I have a bit of a country bumpkin in me,” he added.
Two women eventually found the cub and called authorities, sparking a media frenzy.
“I turned on the TV and there was like a mile of yellow tape and 20 police cars,” Kennedy said. “There was a helicopter overhead. I thought, ‘Oh my God, what have I done?'”
“I was worried. [finger]”The bike was covered in footprints. Luckily the story faded away after a while.”
The bear’s body was sent to Albany for a necropsy, which determined that the bear had likely been hit by a vehicle and was not a victim of animal cruelty.
