Honestly, if you saw a dead bear in the middle of Manhattan, you’d probably assume you were dreaming. Or maybe that a zoo enclosure had a very security-flawed night. But back in 2014, when a 6-month-old black bear cub turned up under a bush in Central Park, nobody knew what to think. It wasn’t a dream. It was just one of the weirdest unsolved mysteries in New York City history. For a decade, the "Central Park Bear" was a ghost story for locals.
Then 2024 rolled around.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., better known to the internet as RFK Jr., posted a video on X (formerly Twitter) that basically broke the political corner of the web. Sitting at a kitchen table with Roseanne Barr, he casually admitted that he was the one who put the bear there.
The Goshen Incident: How it All Started
It started in upstate New York. RFK Jr. was on his way to a falconry excursion—which is a very "Kennedy" way to spend a Saturday—near Goshen. Driving down the road, he saw the car in front of him hit and kill a young bear.
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Most people would call 911 or just keep driving, feeling a bit sad.
Not Bobby.
He pulled over, picked up the 44-pound carcass, and chucked it into the back of his van. His plan? He wanted to skin it and eat the meat. In New York, you can actually get a "roadkill tag" for a bear, so he wasn't technically doing anything illegal at that exact moment. He figured the meat was in good condition and it’d be a waste to let it rot on the shoulder of a highway.
But life happened. The falconry went long. Then he had to get to New York City for a dinner at the legendary Peter Luger Steakhouse in Brooklyn.
A Scheduling Nightmare and a "Redneck" Idea
By the time dinner was over, he had a problem. He had to go to the airport, and he had a dead, un-skinned bear sitting in a hot van. He couldn't take it home to Westchester. He couldn't leave it in the car at the airport—that would’ve been a smell no air freshener could fix.
He had an old bicycle in the back of the van, too. Someone had asked him to get rid of it.
That’s when the "redneck" side of him (his words, not mine) kicked in. There had been a lot of news coverage about bicycle accidents in New York because the city was aggressively installing new bike lanes. People were frustrated. It was a whole thing.
So, around 2:00 AM, he and his friends—who he admits had been drinking, though he says he was sober—drove to Central Park. They found a spot near 79th Street, laid the bear down, and draped the bike over it. They wanted it to look like a cyclist had taken out a bear.
"We thought it would be amusing for whoever found it," he told Roseanne in the video.
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The Media Circus He Didn't Expect
The prank worked. Maybe too well. The next morning, a woman walking her dog found the "crime scene."
By noon, it was everywhere.
- Helicopters circling the park.
- Yellow tape for miles.
- Investigators in Tyvek suits.
- Reports on every major news station.
RFK Jr. was suddenly terrified. He realized his fingerprints were all over that old bike. He hunkered down and waited for the heat to pass. In a strange twist of fate, his own niece, Tatiana Schlossberg, was actually one of the reporters who covered the story for The New York Times at the time. She had no idea her uncle was the culprit.
Why Did He Come Clean Now?
You might wonder why someone would wait ten years to tell a story like this, especially while running for President of the United States.
It wasn't exactly a spontaneous confession.
The New Yorker was working on a massive profile of him by staff writer Clare Malone. Their fact-checkers had caught wind of the story and called him to verify it. Knowing the story was coming out anyway, Kennedy decided to "get ahead of it" by releasing his own version of the events on social media.
It was a classic PR move: if you can't stop the fire, at least be the one holding the matches.
The Fallout and the "Brain Worm" Connection
This story didn't happen in a vacuum. It hit the news right around the time people were already talking about his "brain worm"—a parasitic infection he’d mentioned in a deposition years prior. When the New Yorker writer asked him about the bear, he joked, "Maybe that's where I got my brain worm."
Whether you think it’s a funny prank or just plain gross, the Robert Kennedy Jr bear story is now a permanent part of his political legacy. The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation eventually looked into it, but the statute of limitations had long since expired. He walked away without a fine, though he definitely didn't walk away from the memes.
What You Should Know About Handling Roadkill
While RFK Jr.’s story is wild, it actually touches on real laws regarding roadkill. If you find yourself in a similar situation (minus the Central Park prank), here is how to handle it legally:
- Check Local Laws: In New York, you must report a deer, bear, or moose hit by a car to a law enforcement officer to get a legal salvage tag.
- Health Risks: Roadkill can carry parasites or bacteria, especially if it's been sitting in the sun. Always wear gloves and use caution.
- No Dumping: Disposing of a carcass in a public park is generally considered illegal dumping or littering, regardless of whether there's a bicycle involved.
If you’re interested in the intersection of wildlife law and public stunts, you can check out the official NYSDEC guidelines on reporting wildlife.
The reality is that this story survived for a decade because it was so perfectly weird. It’s a reminder that sometimes the truth behind an urban legend is even stranger than the theories people come up with at the time.
To stay updated on how these types of bizarre stories impact public figures, you can follow the latest from reputable investigative outlets like The New Yorker or The New York Times, both of which played a role in unearthing this specific Manhattan mystery.