Sierra Kills: Justin Smeja Interview
Posted by: Craig Woolheater on May 10th, 2012
Recently, Jeffery Pritchett, radio show host for The Church Of Mabus, interviewed Justin Smeja, the Sierra Kills shooter.
Below is an excerpt of that interview.
1. What exactly happened and where did this happen regarding the actual shooting of two bigfoot creatures?
Justin Smeja: Wow. Well thats kind of a loaded question. In October of 2010 I was bear hunting near Gold Lake CA. Me and my buddy drove into a clearing shielded by trees, so it was much like a blind corner for any game that would be feeding in the meadow, and we saw a strange looking creature. I shot it and 2 others juveniles came out of the thicket. They all ran off and we went after them on foot and eventually I shot another one. We hid the small one and i couldn’t find the other. We left immediately after. We felt like we just wanted to wake up.
2. Did you feel threatened by them at any time and is it true you shot them in the back?
Justin Smeja: NO I did NOT shoot any animal in the back. Quite honestly I dont think it matters if I was poaching (I wasn’t) or if I shot them in the face, the back, the neck or the ass. The story may seem interesting to some, most others read or listen with the soul intention of hopefully tearing it apart and somehow finding a hole in the story. I pierced both lungs on the adult, the young one I shot square on. It’s hard to put my emotions into a paragraph unless you have been there. We felt all kinds of things. At times threatened yes. (un-warranted in all honesty)
3. Also what made you decide to carve a piece of flesh aka steak off of them instead of bringing the carcasses back?
Justin Smeja: I dont know where in the &^%$ stuff like this comes from. I mean I have been asked this several times I don’t have a computer so I dont spend time online correcting what whoever is saying about me. I’m 100 percent convinced bigfooters read about half of everything and jump to their own conclusions and start injecting their opinion. If this was bigfootevidence by this point in, these people would already be commenting.
I did NOT carve any piece of meat or any part off of any animal ever. After we left we did not return for several weeks. Hard to say why it left me with a weird fear feeling almost like ptsd. Mean while I was so sure it was just like any other animal and would be there when we went back to get it, at least some hair and skull I figured. Some people had said to me ”well after several weeks scavengers would have ate every last bit of meat.” Thats simply not true anyone who has said anything like that hasnt killed enough animals or any to make that statement. Go shoot a cow a deer or elk and leave it lay. Come back in a few weeks. There will be a &**& load of hair hide depending on elevation and time of year fat and yes even a bit of meat on the bones ect. Me and my buddy returned several weeks later with a blood hound, we were greeted by a few feet of snow that came in shortly after the shooting. All we could find was a small scrap of hide. We sent some to Dr. Melba Ketchum.
4. You do realize alot of people are outraged by this story and theres a huge no kill pro kill debate in the bigfoot community and many people are upset about this. How does that make you feel?
Justin Smeja: I was put in a situation where I reacted in a moments notice and made really poor decisions. I wish I could take it back. I’m not a pro kill guy at heart. At the time I didnt know any of this was real. It was just a monster to me. Had I had previous knowledge of the creature I would of reacted different.
5. Also what do you wanna say to all the people that think this is a giant hoax or money making scam and comparing it to the Georgia bigfoot in the ice box hoax?
Justin Smeja: I havent made a dime but I’ve spent many a dollars on fuel, cameras, camping trips, and time off work to try to make peace with what happened. I’ve spent over 3 thousand dollars on fuel alone if this is a hoax I sure is hell wasnt let in on it and its not even a good one, a hoax would be much more believable in my opinion. NOBODY has made any money on this but many people have spent money sense this has happened looking for answers. People act like I’m going around posting everywhere online jumping up and down HEY I SHOT 2 BIGFOOTS. Thats NOT whats been happening. A story was leaked that had a lot of misinformation for awhile I spent many a hours correcting it and answering endless questions. After a while I realized it didnt help so I quit visiting bigfoot sites. That and I no longer have a computer so it makes it hard to keep up with whatever somebodys saying.
Read the entire interview here: ‘To Kill Or Not To Kill’ Interview with Bigfoot killer Justin Smeja, for more interesting things such as a book that is being written about the incident and more.
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.
Nope, don’t believe him.
If this guy is lying, he should get the Academy Award. The rationalizations, the excuses, then indignation. If it didn’t happen, this is exactly how someone from his background would react. If this is made up, somebody call Stanislavski–we got a natural here.
Let’s see, a book is being written about this fairy tale, but according to Mr. Smeja “I haven’t made a dime off of this.”
Well, I guess he means so far. Common sense would dictate if a book is being written he will be the one getting paid for his yarn. What a crock of bull.
I am pretty skeptical about Bigfoot in general, but there is something about this guy – his rationalisations and excuses, as mandors said – that I find kind of convincing. Let’s face it, he doesn’t exactly come out of this story sounding like a nice guy, and I can’t help feeling like, if he’d made it up, he would have made himself sound better. He also does come off like he was genuinely upset and disturbed by what happened.
Then I got to the part where he’s going to be making money off a book, and his credibility sunk a notch in my eyes. Also the part where he’s apparently got much more meat in his freezer and it’s just sitting there. It’s all very well saying he’s going to send it out to labs – why hasn’t he done it yet, especially if he’s so keen to prove the truth? So maybe he is just a good storyteller. For the sake of any creatures that might have been involved, I hope so.
I remain very skeptical of Mr. Smeja’s story as well. However, in all fairness to him if you click on the link in the story and read the entire interview he claims all the proceeds from his upcoming book are going to public education to prevent such things as this ever happening again.
It may all be Bullsh*t, I understand, but people shouldn’t jump to the conclusion that he’s pocketing all the profits without reading the whole article cited.
So, now, the 6″x 4″x 3″ piece of meat, described as a “Bigfoot steak” which appeared to have been “sliced off by a knife” (in previous stories), was only a “scrap of hide”? Incredible!
Smeja strikes me as someone who got caught in a lie and now he’s mad at everyone for not buying into an ever-changing story.
I don’t know what Melba Ketchum has been examining, but if she received a chunk of meat and Smeja sent her a scrap of hide, something is wrong with this story. Even if Ketchum ever does release her findings, I am not going to believe they were based on a Bigfoot sample. Hell, she’s been examining a chunk of meat! So, where did that come from if Smeja sent her a scrap of hide he found in the snow?
I hope Ketchum’s peer reviewed results are published soon, and I am proven to be totally wrong, but this story just keeps getting more and more vague. I give up on it, and am not going to waste any more time trying to keep up with all the changing versions.
Here’s my version: Smeja sees a Bigfoot. He says to his buddy, “Dang, I should have shot it and we would be famous.” His buddy says, “Well, write a book and claim you did shoot it. I’ll back your story, for a share of the royalties.” They find a scrap of coyote hide and drip a little of their own blood onto it. They send it to Melba Ketchum and she gets a false DNA reading.
So, he didn’t shoot them in the back, but they chased after a young one and killed it. I seriously doubt it was running toward him.
Discrepency #2: He shot one through both lungs, but later couldn’t find it–and just how did he know he pierced both lungs?
Discrepency #3: Being supposedly so traumatized, he still managed to chase after the small ones and shoot one anyway.
This is such a poor even attempt at a hoax. I’m guessing someone who’s read more of this guy’s “accounts” of this can probably find even more inconsistencies.
As for the decomposition–MonsterQuest proved that if you take a deer carcass and leave it out, it can disappear in a matter of days–they had a camera on a carcass, and though they suspected it would take weeks, it took a lot less than that.
Nope, this guy is still lying…or maybe just plain crazy if he actually believes this stuff he’s shoveling, in my opinion…
Sorry to say, but this is nothing more than a “Long Con”.
Any “hunter” that shoots at something he doesn’t intend to harvest… is either a complete liar or a worthless human being. I can’t possibly imagine my first reaction (to seeing a Bigfoot) being to lift my rifle and fire a shot. And then to shoot at another one after realizing my mistake? Nope. Not buy’n it. He didn’t even say he felt threatened. If there are valid samples, why is it taking so long to publish the findings? It’s been two years. Sorry, this is all a bunch of bunk in my opinion.