Cocaine Bear is a new movie coming out next year in 2023. Cocaine Bear is based on a true story about a bear stumbling up on a lot of cocaine back in the 1980s and then consuming it. A Lexington Kentucky narcotics investigator, Andrew Thornton II, turned out to be a drug dealer. It was believed that in 1985, the drug was dumped from his plane and a black bear encountered it and was discovered dead three months later from overdosing. 

Thornton died that night when he jumped out of the airplane, and his parachute did not deploy. His body was discovered in a driveway of a family home in Knoxville, Tennessee. It was said that Thornton was wearing a bulletproof vest, and night vision goggles, and was carrying a duffle bag that was filled with 75 lbs of cocaine. But if that was the case, then how did a bear come across cocaine and overdose from it? Maybe he had another bag of cocaine that was dumped or maybe the duffle bag opened somehow and some fell out? On the other hand, some rumor that as a consequence of the plane being in distress, Thornton dumped his illegal cargo over Georgia. The cocaine was worth $15 million at the time.

Thornton’s death was listed quickly as an “accident.” He was part of a domestic drug trafficking operation that connected him to the largest drug traffickers in the western part of the United States, the Chagra brothers, Jamiel and Jimmy Chagra. A curious note about Thornton’s death was brought up in the investigation. He had two parachutes. One being his backup parachute and then the main parachute. He deployed his backup parachute instead of his main parachute. Both parachutes were examined and we can indicate from the examination that both were high quality and neither have any “flaws.”

The actual bear that died from the overdose is well-preserved in Georgia and it is also owned by a few other people, including Waylon Jennings. It now can also be found in Lexington at the popular shop, “Kentucky for Kentucky,” which has a line of cocaine bear merchandise like hats, shirts, and puzzles. We can also conclude that based on Kentucky’s approved movies list, it doesn’t appear any of it was shot in the state and Banks said most of the film is based in Georgia but was shot in Ireland. The movie will be released in theaters and is rated R.