The True Story Behind Viral Bear Destroying Car in Louisiana
When I first saw the post of a black bear destroying a car in Louisiana over the weekend, I was somewhat accepting of its real possibility.
Black bears are populating extremely well in a number of areas of the eastern parts of Louisiana, so the fact that one might have been somewhat destructive in the West Monroe area was entirely believable.
If you're a little late to the party and didn't actually get to see the post for yourself, it not only includes pictures of fairly large black bear, but the story says:
Officers were dispatched to a vehicle unlock this morning in West Monroe. Once they arrived they found the vehicle locked with a bear inside. Needless to say Bear -1 Vehicle -0 . This is a reminder to keep your vehicle doors locked even if you will be out of it for only a few minutes.
However, when I began to see the same article pop up on Facebook "Garage Sale" pages from scores of other areas here in northwest Louisiana, I figured there was a snake in the grass.
It didn't take a rocket scientist to determine this one was fake news for sure, but thanks to our good friends at 1079ishot.com, who had taken the time to do a lot more research, we were able to confirm our suspicions that this was a scam.
So the question is, why? 1079ishot.com pointed out that the article was just a gateway to a mass number of Facebook users for the purpose of pulling the scam.
The next step is usually a direct connection via messenger or some other type of communication and the scam is on.
In the words of wisdom of Sheriff Wilkins of North Carolina who was quoted in their article:
If you haven’t seen the information on a legit law enforcement or news outlet page and the name sharing the post on the yard sale site is from out of country or a new page that was just started with one friend, it’s a FAKE.