July 20, 2006
The San Jose Mercury News is reporting Wednesday that Tom Biscardi sued his old organization, the Great American Bigfoot Organiztion.
You probably remember GABRO. They were the ones that set up in Happy Camp, CA with streaming video cameras selling subscriptions to their exploits with promises of capturing Bigfoot within 90 days. The capture was to be shown on the live streaming video feed. The video was available at findingbigfoot.com. While the GABRO website is still, as of today, advertising live expedition feeds, the site is no longer available.
Shortly after the claim of a captured Bigfoot was revealed as a hoax, Biscardi packed up at Happy Camp and hit the road.
Apparently, this was the same time that he split from GABRO, because he started a new website and organization, Searching For Bigfoot, Inc.
Bigfoot deal gets hairy, legally
EXPERT SUES LOCALS OVER PAY, COLLECTION
By Dan Reed
Mercury News
This film frame and other material are part of every Bigfoot collection.Bigfoot — that bashful, large lug of a hairy monster — is causing trouble among his believers.
Not that he — or she, or whichever — ever did anything to anyone except pose for really fuzzy pictures, leave mammoth footprints in remote areas and never get caught.
But late last week, C. Thomas Biscardi, a Redwood City man who bills himself as a "World Renowned Bigfoot Researcher," sued the Great American Bigfoot Research Organization, its president and vice president. The group was established last year "to track, study and learn about the Bigfoot creatures that are believed to inhabit North America."
Biscardi, who’s been in the Bigfoot business for 33 years, says he was supposed to be paid $250,000 to "lend his experience, knowledge and reputation," to conduct "Bigfoot expeditions," and to provide the group with use of his library — which consists of things such as plaster footprint casts, films, photos and sound recordings.
The group, the lawsuit claims, paid him only $65,000 and won’t give back his stuff. Dennis Kazubowski, the San Jose lawyer representing Biscardi, said he’d been negotiating with the attorney for the defendants, North Bay residents Carole Rubin and Robert Shorey, for the return of Biscardi’s library, but then "the attorney quit because he wasn’t getting paid."
Neither defendant could be reached for comment.
"They return Tom’s property and the lawsuit is dismissed in a minute," Kazubowski said.
Last year, Biscardi led an expedition to find Bigfoot at Happy Camp, in the Klamath River Valley, in far Northern California. He had a pay-per-view Webcast. The seemingly sure-fire plan was to nail the big fellow with a stun gun, keep him in a zoo for 90 days so a medical team could study him, then release him back into the wild.
No luck.
I had thought that Biscardi was the Great American Bigfoot Organiztion. On the website, he is listed as one of 2 founders of the organization, along with Peggy Marx. The "top notch management" of the org is listed as Tim McMillen, Secretary; Robert Shorey, VP of Operations; Ruby Rubin, CFO; and Elbert Yee. You may remember Tim McMillen as the stand-in for the Clarence, NY Bigfoot here.
Tim McMillen is also listed as one of the 3 trackers for the org, the other 2 being Lee and Jimmy Hickman, grandsons of Ivan Marx. Mr. McMillen is also listed as being on the board of directors for the org, along with Dick Fletcher and Charles E. Pintard.
The official supporter of the org, and also it’s publicity agent, is Robert Barrows. He is also apparently the PR person for the new organization, as he was listed on the press release for "The Hand of Unknown Origin."
Mr. Barrows also had the following photo on his website at one time promoting Tom Biscardi. The website has been revamped and I can’t find mention of it now, but here is the photo. Here is a link to the cached page on google containing the text below the following photo.
An adult male Bigfoot is shown here eating the entrails of some kind of animal. This photo was taken in the Shasta area of northern California, from a distance of about a hundred feet with a 135 mm lens. Other photos from this encounter with a group of four Bigfoot, including a baby Bigfoot with white fur, are also available.
There are conflicting reports regarding the lawsuit coming out. The Houston Chronicle is reporting the following:
One of the leading searchers for the creature is suing the Great American Bigfoot Research Organization for breach of contract, claiming it never paid to use keepsakes he collected in his pursuits, including a plaster impression of what he describes as the hairy beast’s actual big foot.
"You can’t get this stuff anywhere," C. Thomas Biscardi said Wednesday by cell phone from Texas, where he says he has spotted a Bigfoot yet again. "It’s worth thousands of thousands of dollars."
Biscardi claims the suburban San Francisco company agreed to pay him $215,000 but only made one initial payment. His attorney, Dennis Kazubowski, said the company hasn’t replied to repeated requests to return the items.
The company didn’t immediately return a call on Wednesday seeking comment.
In the suit filed in Marin County Superior Court, Biscardi asked for $185,000 plus interest and the return of his rare Bigfoot stash including original film reels, magazine articles, books and pictures. He’s also asking the organization not to use his name or likeness on its Web site, which was still offering Biscardi-led expeditions Wednesday.
Kazubowski said the Bigfoot expert entered a licensing agreement with research organization executives Carole Rubin and Robert Shorey in 2005 to conduct Bigfoot expeditions and allow the organization to use his collection.
The lawsuit claims Biscardi "is publicly renowned for leading the research into whether the Bigfoot creature exists."
Fellow Cryptomundo blogger Loren Coleman offered this commentary on the articles:
If you read the article carefully you will see that the organization that paid him that amount (as per the legal papers filed) was *his* organization.
This is a typical inside job.
The fees, indeed, paid by the "pay-per-view" public, generated by TB’s high-powered publicity firm’s campaign and TB’s Coast to Coast AM appearances, were more than imagined. We don’t know how much came in when TB was promising to broadcast video
of a live captured Bigfoot, but I think we have a figure to play with now. The overhead was small since there were no Bigfoot being held and no Bigfoot footage, so the money had to end up somewhere. Any ideas into what individual’s pocket that would have been?
TB is well-known in Las Vegas as a figure sued for alleged broken promotional promises and other failed deals. This latest news should be no surprise to those who have followed his "career."
It is exactly the "shady characters" that get this kind of money, and the regular Bigfooters and cryptozoologists of the world who survive on less than $10,000 a year!
Loren’s website documents these dealings here.
The San Jose Mercury News also reported additional incredible news:
The Mercury News reached Biscardi by cell phone Monday. He was Bigfoot hunting just outside Paris, Texas. He didn’t much want to talk about his lawsuit, which he considers his "private business.”
But he was in a high state of excitement. The crew had a Bigfoot sighting Sunday night. Biscardi said they had found a spot that looks like "Jurassic Park,” and saw — guess who? — yep, Bigfoot. Biscardi said he’s had five "close encounters” with a Bigfoot in his career, but nothing like this.
"I gotta tell you something,” he said, "this is the largest thing I’ve ever seen in my life.”
Biscardi said television captured its image and he figures the find will hit the national news today or Thursday.
I will have additional information regarding the Bigfoot situation outside Paris, TX soon…stay tuned.
So far, the only news hitting yesterday and today was regarding the lawsuit…and minor mentions of his exploits outside Paris. Nothing more regarding the image captured by television. I guess that’s minor news compared to the lawsuit…
Co-founder of Cryptomundo in 2005.
I have appeared in or contributed to the following TV programs, documentaries and films:
OLN's Mysterious Encounters: "Caddo Critter", Southern Fried Bigfoot, Travel Channel's Weird Travels: "Bigfoot", History Channel's MonsterQuest: "Swamp Stalker", The Wild Man of the Navidad, Destination America's Monsters and Mysteries in America: Texas Terror - Lake Worth Monster, Animal Planet's Finding Bigfoot: Return to Boggy Creek and Beast of the Bayou.
Filed under Bigfoot, Bigfoot Report, Breaking News, Cryptozoology, Expedition Reports, Hoaxes, Public Forum, Sasquatch