Revealing the Lost Harambe Tapes

Welcome to Pablo Tore Finds out. I am Pablo Tore and today we're going to find out What this sound is I'm accusing myself of this conversation because I think it's bull Pablo that you are trying to capitalize off a dead gorilla. We would never do that rightight after the ad waiting so long to do this episode with you guys And I love as always that you don't have any idea what I hate it as always. I'm terrified. I hate it as always Yeah folders in front of you? I see them? I have what has been alleged to be a eating grin on my face. That is how much I'm enjoying having.. Are we gonna like it as much as you like it? I can't Totally, be sure. Great I do know that Dz is nice, Katie Nolan, you are both my friends. For now. For now. And also animal people What's going on? yeah, Uhuh And we do like dogs. You you have have you have dogs. Yeah. Is something that happened a couple of months ago in Prospectay Park 'cause the dog came at me saying like It's about something that we got at our tip line. If your pubatory finds out fans, whistleblowers, they will dial Five, one, three, eight, five Pablo It was that in area code with Ludicrs? Oh, good. That's how I reference everything. tr five one three two. I don't know if Ludicrous has hose in Cincinnati, Ohio. No, I think Fan doesn't mention it Yeah. Naty. But this is the area code we were randomly assigned by Google Cosmically recurs. Interesting because this was earlier this year We got a tip Hi, My name is Jeff McCurry I'd like to see if you would like to show the world the secret videos that the Zoo has tried to keep quiet for ten years The videos are very graphic They absolutely are real. Everybody that's seen them is just speechless. Anyway, I look forward to hearing from you. We have u several months of a attendant anniversary And I'd probably reach out to you and see if you're interested in breaking this story Thank you Was Harambay Cincinnati Oh wow Jn Main twenty eighth. Oh my God. twenty sixteen. Oh my God. Exactly ten years ago. The Cincinnati Zoo outrage over an incident at the Cincinnati Zoo, when a three year old boy fell into the guerriilla enclosure Saturday. For ten agonizing minutes onlookers watched, including the boy's mother who cried out to him. M. At one point, the four hundred twenty pound male silverback named Hambe grabbed the boy's ankle and dragged him through the water . Unfortunately, we only have just a little bit of a window of what happened, right? What I really want to see is how the heck this child ended up at the top of the barrier through the brush and into the moat. We don't have that yet. The bottom line is that once that little boy was in the hands of that gorilla, unfortunately that's a death sentence for the gorilla. Did the Zoo make the right call The gorilla's behavior was textbook protective behavior for a gorilla. They run around with their kids like that in the wild. The kids know to jump on the back. Any gorilla expert should know that gorilla was not acting violently towards that child. And after all that attention, all that news coverage Tame The memes. This is an interesting sign. What does this mean I'm sure you all heard about Hirambe, the gorriilla He was murdered in the Cincinati Zoo. and I'm just saying like for Hirame, that's a rallying cry So you pull it out for Haram? I mean, if Haram was here, it'd be out right now. You know you could see it the people that are running up right now.am. Okay, thank you Stop for Ra, you know what the f is. Hey Haram. The death of this gorilla has given me a lot of joy. I hate to say it. Oh Treendous not a bad way. Yeah. Like RIP, Haram is for real but it's been really funny You could have give me thousand tries. This is I did not think this was going to be disgusting. No chance. Wh us? Rest in peace, Huby Well, one reason why is that Jesus personersonally, I did not shoot him to tweak quite a bit about Harambe according to our record. I bet you twenty sixty? Oh yeah Well only wish was whoever was alive to see his go to state with. he was a big fan. Yeah ye yeah. H that going on in twenty sixteen or maybe not that much going on in twenty sixteen? And when we tell the young people of America what twenty sixteen was like, it's really important to Educate them Bar stool madeade an empire out of Harambeay stuff I remember seeing on Pardon My takeake, which was I think like one of the main like centers of harambe content They were like fantasy drafting and Joe Burrow drafted Harambe as a defensive end for the Bengals You gotta take heramebe, right I mean the strength to weight ratio is just way higher than humans. I mean, that's easy seven sacks a game, I'm sure We are all of the sports interternet And Harambe was our gorilla Jesus There are some headlines here that I'd like you to help us remember. Okay Thousands of Americans vote for a dead gorilla. Basically. Yeah which brings us to the next headline Would Donald Trump have killed the guerriilla Harembe's death was the beginning of the fall of society. I'd hear that out. I wouldd hear that out. I don't w to be numb to the idea that would Donald Trump have killed the guerilla was a headline. In what sense are they asking like you? I you know the president authorized the shot. The president be Yeah. This was this was a Yeah, backack then it was like back then it wouldd be like, oh my go God, we' really know Donald Trump. We like would he possibly We knew Donald Trump? Now we like you him. He pull out a pen knife, dig his eyes out and gleefully say I was the biggest guerria ever they would have voted for me. But we didn't know that back then, we were young city bumpkins. We knew nothing about primates Donald Trump, according to CN, said that a Cincinnati Zoo probably had no choice but to kill a guerilla. It was a very tough call. It was amazing because there were moments with the gorilla, the way he held that child. It was almost like a mother Holding a baby Looks so beautiful and calm What Did Donald Trump said that? Yeah Yeah He appeared beautiful and calm Yeah. I don't like the way that feels. He's also really big with the gorillas. The gorriillas would have voted for him ten times This all of this The new cycle that was Haram. I really don't want to dwell on this too much, which usually means he does There is also this headline Elon Musk drops rap song eulogizing Harambei, the gorilla you remember this? No, I don't, and please don't remind me of it. S onom. Wow. they weren't kidding. Drake has showed no growth on ice mam. What is this You said let's not dwell, so let's not dwell H For the last four months, we have been, unfortunately dwelling. We've been trying to figure out In fairness, like is Jeff the whistleblower? Is he foolish Because what he has told us of this scoop of these videos that he's promising is quote This may ruin Harambee's reputation But it may change the world's feelings about zoos and quote, So is this this is going to demonize Harambe? What are they going to show that he reached across and brought the child into the What could the tapes possibly show to show Hm' final words. With or without gang violence. All right unless it's a video of Hami just looking in the camera and being like kid grab in theid. The kid was awise, I don't know what he could possibly do to change my Wow. h did that look Luckily, great This is a show where we do find out.'s go. I can already hear that get your little theme song, play I love the acapello. You gotta hire her like Rockab Billy from Carva San Diego? b b. That was good. This is a story about two characters that I have come to really appreciate This is a story about two parallel timelines, two primate species, two arguably parallel dimensions. And our first character is a sixty four year old man named Jeff McCurry AK A. Jeff the whistleblower. I know it sounds you know, like I'm full of myself or whatever, but I'm just being honest, Crazy. she finds me, Congratulations to you, Pablo. I consider you in that list now. It's like I met Pablo in the Salva wins a Pulitzer Prize I was literally sitting in my chair thinking, manan, tenth anniversary is coming up. I need to reach out to somebody. and I found and chose you. You got back with me and mininutes, I was like, holy shit, this was the right person to contact It was a maginate in heaven So describe the visuals on Jeff. As soon as you see behind Jeff, there are three by three square shaped, just portraits of Harambe. differentiffere poses. But some of them look a lot alike. L I would not have hung up the one on the top left next to the one in the middle top because it looks too similar from far away Those should be in separate parts of your wall collage. The top middle one that is like the The one you've all seen that's been memed to high heavens. Yeah. more importantly though, what we're not noticing and I just realize it right now. What's that? The Harumbe Lapel. Yeah, when you say we're noticing, I had seen it It is like a What is Jeff wearing? Now, it's almost like on an adidas tee that would have where it would have the stripes down the top of the shoulder. our drag race on. Oh, it's his whole, Ohh my go. sorry, it's a Harambee jersey. He plays for the Harambe. It's a Mitchanes throwback from nineteen eighty six where Harmbe page for the Pittsburgh pirates actually say on the front He says Fred Natz, this is the Fredericksburg Nationals. A single A affiliate of the Washington Nationals. Okay. And they had a harambeay night. Great Oh And it got delayed because of COVID. But they still did it. Well they have to do it. You gott to go through with it. Limited edition merch. What am I gonna do with all these harambeay jerseys? It was the five year anniversary back then and the proceeds were gonna go to the Dutch Guerriilla Foundation. This was gonna be this whole game worn auction thing And It all got derailed because of a global pandemic. A global pandemic That'll happen I think we should let Jeff explain what his sort of motive was when it comes to his front This is my way of honoring Hambe. wearing and displaying him as much as I can. So When your podcast gets out there and anybody that sees it, they'll, you know They'll have to look at Hirambe also too, not just me It's odd to say, but I was friends with a gorilla Worst Tpe song ever I was friends with gorilla he eats Speaking of someone who knows how to auto tune. sleeping, he grabbing that can friends with the gorilla Then On Christmas Eve nineteen eighty five, when Jeff was twenty four years old He was hit by a drunk driver He broke every bone in his body He was in a coma for almost two weeks. sort of like silver lining is he got a disability payout, meananing he essentially retired at twenty four And in his late thirties, he sees an ad in the school paper. photographer position. phhoto editor says, you got a camera? I'm like, Yeahah, you hands me two rollles of film He said, you're a new sports photographer And what he says is that he got invited into These worlds dugouts courtside It's how he learned how to build trust with his subjects My point is that this is actually something of a sports story Being a photographer in general, people invite you into the world. Being a sports photographer, you get invited into worlds Wh Nobody else is allowed While all this is happening, Jeff is still in extreme pain Right? He's taking one hundred and twenty pain pills a month. It's this combo of oxy and Tylenol. They don't even allow this stuff anymore. en Jeff McCurry Ky Nan, you willll now I think, realize why you are also here for this episode. You know him Christ? One time I walked in the doctor and she looked at him and she goes, Wait a minute, Jeff, you're a zombie. And then it dawned on me ten years after. it's like Wait minute, you idiot, you're having trouble sleeping. You never smoked weed because it helped you it made you tired. Try that And so I tried it and it just changed my life. tremendously and I had a doctor that I saw regularly and I went in sewing one day and He's like, Jeff What happened? You you're so much better And you know, this was before legalization was very common and everything And I'm like, you know, it's illegal. I don't know if we should talk about it. well, whatever it is, keep doing it because it definitely made you better. I'm like, okay N the guy in Cincinnati with the white ponytail and the minor leeague jersey finding the benefits of weed. Who could have seen that com in? My god. No Jeff discovered the beauty of the natural world in this way And so I started growing for myself and got really good at it I had a friend selling a house out in the country out in Rabbit House, Kentucky, if you've ever heard of it. They used to have a their mare was a dog for many years. Got lots and ne. hold on, hold on. I'm sorry. This is I know This is the town where the mayor was a dog Absolutely. Yeah, he got ree elected three or four times Yeah, if you don't smoke weed and you're watching this, this is what it's like to smoke weed. You have a guy who was best friends with a gorilla talking about a small town that had a dog as a mayor. That's called Indica There's a lot going on right now. You listen to this podcast, you are not passing any drug test for the next three days. Whistleblower, Jeff buys a house in rabbit hasash to start growing weed And I just need to establish people who are doubting us. The dogmare thing was real. Yeah. We report today from Rabbit Hash, Kentucky, where at least ten dogs a cat and a donkey are running for mayor Alas, Goofy became the nation's first elected official to be euthanized But satisfied voters elected another dog Junior, who himself recently went to that big bone buffet in the sky. CBS News Chief Washington correspondent Bob Schieefer is keeping a close eye on the election. Well, Bill, it seems pretty obvious to me that this dog vote may be split ten ways. and of course, that could greatly benefit the candidacy of Travis the Cat. The split does not seem to be helping Higgins, however. who may want to consider defining himself as a donkey rather than a jackass, but I do have to say I admire his honesty. Dude this is a different dog mirror than I was even thinking of. This is sick. I was obsessed with this. I was on CBS.. I wanna watch only stuff like that. Barry Weist is never reaching this level. No.. The dog's splitting it ten ways helping out the cat. There's graphics involved, There's deep divees. Maybe don't go by jackass, go by donkey. Also we can euthanize mirrors ' I mean, Eric Adam does b it It is truly. I can't believe that next dog got into the job knowing how the last one left off. I'll do a better job. Yeah. This is where Jeff moves. He moves to ye. Rabbits, hash. raab Rabbit Rbbit hash has Rabbit hash. Rabbit hash, whichich is funny because my mom's always complaining that the rabbits are eating her weed. She's to put like specific cage around her weed plant so that the Rabbbits don't e it. And rabbit hash sounds like just the worst weed you've ever smoked. Yeah.ust like driry. What is this Steamy nine? These are all the issues that I think Jeff was probablyably personally familiar with. Yeah. And the mayor was working on So I bought a house from a friend down there and filled it up with marijuana plants and was growing and thinking, okay, I'm going to, you know do this and make some money off of it, but before I made money off it, regretfullably a friend of mines brother in law who we had let go to the place because I had a creek in on the property and he would fish there. And he got pissed off it My friend's wife on Thanksgiving, and so he called crime stoppers twice and told him, you know, exactly where I was. That's how I got, you arrested The federal government alleges in its two thousand five indictment here that we obtained that quote You did knowingly and intentionally manufacture and possess with intent to distribute approximately three hundred and fifty plants of marijuana F hundred and fifty, actually, wouldn't it L check the stats. Check the stats my Check the stats problem that. Scoreboard Fact checking wise, Jeff is, it turns out cororrect. They found apparently a hundred extra plants at the address next door This all coming by the way from this count that was dismissed as part of his plea deal All you got to know for right now is that Jeff goes off to federal prison And we are going to turn our attention Brownsville, Texas We have the winner of our contest. It's the name of the baby with the Glasporter Zoo and it's the baby gorilla Fells about. Well, every morning, I like to get up and run on my treadmill and I listen to music. And I was listening to a particular reggae song And the performer kept singing this word harambe, harambe. And halfway through the song, she explained what it was, and it means to pull together, to help each other, sharing and caring and come together. Wow. So hence the name. And we've got the baby girla right there, Dan. That's the child you just name. There' Aam. Arambe is her name. Once again, what does it mean again It means pulling together, coming together, sharing and caring about one another. And what is it that like Swahili? It's a Swahili word. Oh, wow. this is so, so fantastic. Congratulations to you They put so much spice on the name the first seent. This is Aambe. They rolled that Aam. that are. This seems like a different strokes reboot that should never have aired. like Aambe. A very special episode of Pablo Tore finds out. Describe described's described. He It looks like a cutie pie. He's just he looks a little confused. He's just a baby, a tiny little baby He looks cute the way all of you were lying and saying punch looked. Remember that little monkey? Punchch was cute. Well was E excuse me.un I don't think we need to That's what's in the foul Punch was a federal. is so cute. Those he' disppeared. We haven'tard from Punch of Mons. Well Punch made a human friend, and then I think everything was There was also a lot of misinformation Punch that got really weird really quick. He got into it, he found a girlfriend, he went all right. Oh shoot. Oh, shoot. I think we can all agree that Punch the Monkey was no Harambe Lots of imitators No duplicators. There you go. And by the way, the name meaning ing together coming together, sharing characs. How can it mean all those things? Well, This is an ape that was named after a song by B Mary' widow Where's the restpons it means working together. L again,ink again. cararing and sharing, reaching out, touhing your brothers, sisters. I'd like to apologize because she does say it means all those things. notes. I need to hear it from the primary source. No for.'s the dueilig that want that guy to be getting it right. I trust her I should say that Hambe for those not familiar with his personal species. Western lowland silverback gorilla It shares about ninety eight point three percent of its DNA with us humans. That's a lot of DNA. It's a lot same species if you've ever seen coocoa and another famous gorilla who learn sign language That's also a Western lowland silverback gorilla. and Yeah, I love to eat fruit. You know, one expert we talk to. like in western L and gorillas in the wild, basically vegetarians living in a salad bowl And so Harambe born may twenty seventh, nineteen ninety nine to Mother Kayla with a younger brother, Mookco This is an uplifting story You know, It worries me. This is the story of Rambe whose, I think, name, image and likeness. fromr the very beginning. was very intentional. of value to the local news in Brownsville, Texas Less uplifting. Is this article, Katie in your folder from the Houston Chronicle in early two thousand two Okay, this headline says chlorine gas kills gorillas at Valley Zoo Subhead firefighters found three guerillas unconscious. and several others suffering from chlorine inhalation Three Western lowland gorillas died and a fourth was in serious condition Sunday after a chlorine gas leak at the Gladysporter Zoo in Brownsville The gerillas were all groggy and unresponsive. The zoo identified the gerillas killed as ten year old Kayla. Her eleven month old son Mooko and a two year old female named Uzuri This was Ram's family Oh, wow Hh It was a toxic gas leak, a space heater melted near a chlorine tank at the zoo His mom Kayla, his little brother Mooko, anothering gorilla story. Yeah, H was like two and a half and This AP story, Katie the next one from the Memorial Service Whats? Again, just like a more vivid sense of what Harambe was like growing up Three guorillas remembered during service at Brownsville Zoo This is a quote. To see the gorillas so sad just sitting there, you can tell that there is a sorrow. There is something that they are missing Mayor Blanca S. Vela said Grief counselors have visited with zookeepers and those close to the animals. Oh my God. Notably no guorilla therapists. The grief counselor is a human grief counselor for the zookeeers for the zoo keepepers and those close to the animals. Okay. But again, the question of like, okay, so what what do we do with Their grief What do we do with them? What is in the mind of a gorilla? Was Harumbi just there staring at the caskets, just like crying Also twenty thirteen. or Ham's father dies of heart disease. twowo years later. twenty fifteen Teenage Hirambee is on the move. This according to a press release thesis, in your photeroter. Y turn from the Cincinnati Zoo M, New rookie silverback and Gorilla worldor for spring training Sport story This is sports. He's traded Texas. Cincinnati, Ohio as The Cinni Zoos curator of Primates who declined our interview request. Uh desescribed in this introductory video sixteen years old as Harambe is now, it was time for him to kind of go out and find his way elsewhere, just like a young silverback might do in the wild For many years, young silverbacks roam around by themselves until they can get enough size and enough experience to impress females to come and join him. So Haram coming here is kind of like a rookie silverback in training. We got a couple of good females for him to be with And it's going to be a fun summer of introductions for Harambee Chui and Mara. Okay All right NBA drafty A fun females. for him to just to see. Spring trading Before mating season is what brings Harambe to Cincinnati. And the press release, by the way, Desus further clarifies the process Hurami Large for his age at four hundred and nineteen pounds will be placed in a social group with two nineteen year old females A typical gorilla group includes one silverback male and several females. Oh okay. So the three will be together for social interaction and companionship That's one way to put it Okay the Polycule Cll Corlla Polyyule. J monkeys with the party full You comeing do today? Livving in a compound. Rrambe was not quite at breeding maturity just yet. He was sixteen, but he's a star prospect. He is. Measurables really strong. Bring twenty fifteen. It's April and said prospect encounters A certain sports photographer. Oh, that's right. Turned weed horticulturalist Yes, who had recently gotten out of federal prison after growing what he told us was four hundred and fifty marijuana plants Although Jeff did want to make something very clear that experience Yeah, I uh Ped guilty and went to a federal prison camp in West Virginia and spent ten and a half months there I literally had my own golf cart. I could drive down the road So the point is all of us in the camp. We're always on our best behavior. It was like, hey guys We got this place in there was no guards. There was no nothing. We were just there. And it's just Stay out of trouble guys and we'll leave you alone And you know It was the best possible prison experience. anybody could have And it's still horn. when Jeff got out He wanted to go where all people do with do foundound freedom Suburban Cincinnati And he found freedom in his camera And so one day, during the spring training of twenty fifteen Jheeff goes to the Cincinati Zoo. And he begins to take photos Gerilla world. And somebody from the zoo came over to me and they said, Oh, did you get a picture of that Uh yeah, maybe and justust like how he became a sports photographer back at the school paper He gets enlisted. The photos were so good, and the zoo had staff photographers who were getting paid that they said to Jeff, who was working while living off of his insurance payout. He's now fifty three years old whether he would work for free And Jeff becomes a sports photographer, turned weed horticulturalist, turned volunteer guerorilla photographer And it's important to note for legal reasons, Katie in your folder that we reviewed Jeff's contract with the Zoo By providing or allowing use of photographic files by the Cincinati Zoo in Botanical Garden, no one ever talks about the Botanical Garden. No about the gardens. You represent, acknowledge and warrant that said files are your original work and that you are the sole owner of all rights title and interests. Oh, I see what's happening here Okay So basically signed in this contract, they said, these things belong to you You signing here means they belong to you. which means if somebody were to get access to them. It would be him who would need to give you the authorization to air it somewhere Jeff keeps receipts Again, name image and likeness. Yeah And on april fifteenth, twenty fifteen, Jeff's camera discovers a glorious prospect ho A shut out This is out Hambe. This is the photo But the one that yes, we've been seeing that has been viral all over the world, many times over It was Harambe in Mating season This is the same harambee photo from Jeff's minor League baseball jersey on an NFL player's custom cleats on all those memes, on all the RIP harambeay t shirts And he took it When Hbe was sixteen years old On the first day they met. Wow. on opening day.. Okay And so When you see that photo and you think of Harambee's backstory You know, I think it's fair to assume like, you know, this is psychology of a damaged brok guerilla who is orphaned because a gastly killed his family and plunged his life into total chaos, forcing him across the country to be used as like this reproduction vehicle. This is like the worst version of the blindside I've ever seen. And so What becomes clear is that Harambe in Jeff's view wasn't Personally so much searching for a mate for all this stuff that would attend the life of a glorious prospect. Huram wanted a friend And I was like, Dam and Ram, I'll hang out with you. I'll be your friend. And so that's kind of how it started. And so Rambe and I started hanging out Whenever I would go, I'd stop by and remembering my prison experience. I remembered how great it was to get a visitor if I could Cheer you up for a few minutes in your day, makeake it better. You know I'd go and hang out with him and he seemed to bond with me,, you know, come up to me as close as he could and you know pose for me. do uh all kinds of things for He said, remember my president experi? I thought he was gonna bring like a cup of soup and a deodorant to me, like o looking out my OG. I do want to acknowledge the proud tradition in American culture and Hollywood, entertainment of Gerilla psychological analysis So King Kong Girls in the mist Congo, My Joe Young. We have often sort of like thought and talked about like what are these guerorillas up to And what Jeff says is that Hirambee was really smart. but it also made his life, I think, more hard. Knowing You know the situation he was stuck in He was quiet, He didn't like to be yelled at for sure Anbody would jill out of me walk away, you know, he'd go and hide, you know, go into his caves like, you know, I don't have to put up with this. Ram, by the way, as a subject in Jeff's sort of photographic line of sight. the same camera that he'd used to photograph athletes A make compose. Yeah Yeah, sure, oh my go Oh Yeah lookook at the art. I don't know what I'm allowed to say, but I thought you say he was a silver back gorilla, notot a bad bit D damn. Damn dam. right? The camera is on. Yeah, this angle. Theers shoulders. The shoulders and the arms that make me feel safe. Yeah Um Yeah It's just me. Yeah, Tyra sending him to the next round. Yes, sturdy. Sturdy. A sturdy remarkable gorilla Oh, hurambee thatigh. That's what Myrtle does. She she wants you to scratch the inside of her thigh. That's her favorite. She'll just pop it out like that And look I should say Jeff admits that it is again, it is odd that He became friends with a gorilla. He acknowledges that. G, Oh good thing that helps explain it that I didn't know, of course until we went so deep in the in youness. When Harambe was orphaned, he actually wound up being taken in by humans H caretakers at the zoo in Texas, the ones that C cut his umbical cord, bottle fed him, changed his diaper Humans like this is this is who dealt with him for his whole life. And so We've been asking ourselves the question, like how do you fact check this friendship with a gorilla and In Jeff's view, his scouting report, teenage Hambe was quote, a natural born ham He ignored his two girlfriends. They would be on different sides of the exhibit. He didn't seem interested in them at all He reminded me of my uncle Jim in so many ways where, you know, he's my favorite uncle and growing up, He was always the uncle that gave us kids, you know, always teasing us and, you know, the fun uncle, you know, the one and Harambe seemed like that where, you know He would do things to try and get me excited or to make, you know, expressions that, you know, just to get a reaction out of me. And I say we talked all the time, you know, and he just grin like there was no tomorrow. This is really sweet. I keep forgetting herame definitely dies, so this isn't gonna to stay happy the whole time What happens to get to the point Katie is making is that Jeff and Hambee are clearly friends and they Accord to Jeff, they loved each other. And so one day, exactly ten years ago, This is Saturday, may twenty eighth, twenty sixteen This is the day after Harambee's seventeenth birthday. Oh my go Jeff pulled up as he often did Two Gerilla worldlds And as I'm taking pictures, all of a sudden, this boy grabs my shirt and pulls me And I look over And he's standing on the fence. on top of the fence And he almost fell in All look Jis said Get down You know, screamed at the kid and then Dad is standing right behind him. he looks at me giving me this, you know, dagger eyes like how dare you yell at my kid It happens so often. I had this standard speech said Sure You don't understand. We're not worried about the guerilla killing your kid. Your kid is going to be dead when he falls fifteen feet onto the cement down there So that was day Harambeay died. That was not even the kidm That was earlier in the morning And Jeff McCurry was there and intervened and stopped it But then That afternoon, Jeff McCurry, volunteer sports photographer Left. He had to go to a basketball game. His Fr's teenage daughter it turned out would be future WNBA player for the Toronto tempo Lexi Held. Shut out. And Jeff had to go Take his camera elsewhere. And so Jeff Heard the news prettyty much li everybody else So I went home and I'm downloading the pictures and going through them and I have the TV on in the background, the news on, and all of a sudden it came on that They killed Rambe. I'm like, Oh What? You know, it's like Everybody ask, how did you learn? I wass like, I learned just like everybody else. They on the news Very emotional time at Cincinnati Zoo. It's unprecedented. We have never had to Kill a dangerous animal in the middle of an emergency situation. Cincinnati nine hundred eleven. H My s' out in the zoo. have a gorilla. There' a male gorilla standing over him. I need someone to contact you.. When it was determined that the child was being injured, not potentially injured, but was being injured, both down in the moat and then up on the ground that we had to make a decision to shoot him and we did. What was your reaction when you first saw that Heartbroken. I mean just like you feel whenever a friend of yours died, you're just like, no, I can't believe I'm not going to be able to spend time with them ever again And it was, you know, then to find out Not only is he gone, but you know, you literally shot him in the forehead. I'm like, o man, that's that's just awful At least it's quick, but I learned that from the car wreck. I don't have a fear of dying because I don't remember any of it Hm You wake up later going, what the hell happened So I'm comfortable that Hambe, his last thought was I've got this little boy and I'm protecting him. and Then he was, you know, the lights were turned off You may remember the debate about this. You know, it' like this Who do you blame? Right Now I should say that amid all the literal and figurative litigation, like no charges are filed against the mom No charges filed against the zoo, prosecutors concluded that their use of lethal force was necessary and the aforementioned mom posted on Facebook a couple days later, thanking bystanders. As a society, we are quick to judge how a parent could take their eyes off of their child, and if anyone knows me, I keep a tight watch on my kids. Accidents happened, but I am thankful that the right people were in the right place today. Thank you to everyone that helped me and my son. She deleted that post later, as of course one does The memes set in the whirlwind sets in and we did request an interview with The mother. father, the boy in question, and a family spokeserson said, que, They're not interested in doing any interviews at this point actuallyctually Never is fair. the boy though I'm happy to report, If you say graduated college, I'm leaving. she can't that big already. Have you watched this show? He's not It can't be that simple. He's about to drop something that's gonna blow ourrain.. Do You know who the b grew to be? We You'd be like, all right, that makes sense. That makes sense. All right, Pabo I am merely here to say he is now a sophomore in high school He's an athlete. He does play basketball. He also plays football and he runs track. ten athlete Most relevantly, perhaps to this program, he even wrrote a sports story for the school's news website. a sports journalist who's Privacy, we will respect quest As for the Cincinati Zoo They did not respond to our interview requests And as for Jeff He says that Even though Of course he lost his friend and feels insane reggret at not being able to say goodbye He does not blame the mom of the kid in question. He says the exhibit should have been more safeguarded And it was Zu's fault because we knew that that the kids were running wild. so that exhibit had to be bulletproof. And it wasn't And so that I've always thought, in my opinion, that made it all the zoo's fault and none of The mother's fault. She had three other kids, She loed every the other kids. And this little boy he through a barrier that should have been bigger and stronger and You know, it's It happens so often And so for the sake of being fair and balanced, we reached out to independent guerriilla experts. Of course there are lots of theories, like why couldn't you have tranquilized him? Yeah. What if you like tried to offer a trade like you know, here's some food, maybe he would have given up the kid and sort of relinquished you know, his hold on him, whether a trade of fruit for boy would have worked. I've done it it for boy. They used to be a partarky on the lower East side. B, New York was a real city Meanwhile, Ron McGill. My name's Ron McGill. until just about a week ago, I was a communications director, Goodwill Ambassador at Zoo Miami. I retired after forty six years friendriend of the show, friend of the Dan Lebatard show, friend of Metadal Ark Media. He says that Yeah, that would not have worked. Oh, let's try to negotiate. Let's see if we can bargain. Let's see if we can give some bananas and'll give us the boy. This is just stupidity. You can't do that and Unfortunately. Shooting him in the head was the only way. What's even sadder is Harembe was just protecting that little boy the wish he wish someone protected him when he was a little boy. No, arere you doing that on purpose? It's very sad to me. sad. And so what Deb McCurry is left to do. as Rambei's friend and Again, the guy who has this contract and these photographs is prrotect his friend's name, image and likeness He was surprised, of course, by the virality of it, he wasn't trying to cash in In fact, his whole thing as the de facto representative of Harambe's estate is to make sure that honored him and did not use his NIL against what Harambe would have wanted And so this photo, which got shared and estimated five Billion times This is the thing he trademarked. He also trademarked Rambe's name Jeff McCurry is the guy who possesses all of this NIL. And in fact, When he saw that part of my take was making all this money off of this t shirt JeffcCurry Sent A legal notice We agreed to a confidential settlement and they stopped selling them because they did not have permission We're both very happy with the settlement is what I can say which led us to, of course, seek necessarily a response from PFT commenter, Big Cat and their producer and Lockwood 's a little fill in on what happened in the summer twenty sixteen when Hank made those t shirts. This podcast probably wouldn't exist to this day if that gorilla hadn't gotten shot but then Hank Being the savy marketer that he is jumped on the opportunity. Yeah, I just wanted to make a t shirt a funny t shirt to wear to a music festival. Our te shirt guy sent it to me three weeks too late so I didn't even get to do that. but I took a picture and I didn't know what I created. I'm accusing myself of this conversation because I think it's bullsh Pablo that you are trying to capitalize off a dead gorilla So yeah, I'm not going comment anymore. You're trying to get your views and your clicks off a gorilla. We would never do that. I'm doing clicks and likes, the internet game. But I think Hank you came to terms with the photographer. We had a mutual agreement and everybody's happy. cororrect? Yeah. gorilla Yeah gorilla. Listen the guy that took D Rombie picture. I'm not gonna say anything on the record because I don't know the answer to that. I'm I'm going say on the record. it's been ten years. so facts are fuzzy And I' to say you know ten years ago today, it was a very sad day in our lives, but we move forward and we find new animals to capitalize off and exploore. Yeah. So follow my dog on Instagram, please. watchFT. I gotta say like On some level, they are fundamentally, of course correct, right? Like the speed with which I responded to the voicemail we got is true I smelled the phone. I smelled the clicks and the likes The internet, the intention economy, social media, of course recognize that People couldn't get enough Haramebe and now there was the promise of wait a minute, I could get. exclusive, bespoke seecret Harami Especially because these are the videos that according to Jeff McCurry, the Cincinnati Zoo tried to keep quiet for the last decade And look I promise you guys that we would deliver on the lost Harambe tapes. And so for the last four months, we have been vetting, yes Weird whistleblower in sports podcasts history And so I present to you now Do I have the I got my DVD player out as I plug in a physical DVD player. It's gonna to be a video of Harambe smoke a cigar or just like if you're watching this, I'm dead. Do you know how to use this? Why do you look so new here? That's because when is the last time you used? But veryery recently actually, I made a friend of mine watch The first season of Halt and catch Fire, which I have on DVD. hold on. Oh wow. And so We present to you the video of the world's most famous gorilla that was killed on the world's most viral Zoo video without any comment but filmed with Great care by Harambee's personal photographer and parent best friend Oh my god Oh my go, into his own hand he is a Oh my go, he just pulled a poop out of his butt. Yeah. a very nice co size poop. Green. Do not eat it.. Yeah, he's protein maxing. G There you go My God. See, a lot of people don't realize you create your own fiber. You don't have to go buy it from a store. of. There we go go in his while he does other stuff He's a breakfast bar. Thereere we go. We used to be real eaters. Like a Nutriure grain on his way the house for work. He had it hanging out of his mouth Okay, It's important to always get a granola bar in before you work out Harambei ate his whole life to only fit and it went out like this. Notama in the forbidden spinach wrap. It is so like the shape of it is like it's like a froyo. It's like a poop berry. It's like a u The way he eats a little and then kind of like rolls it around in the front of his mouth like it's a piece of gum. like a good mouth feel No, and the thing is like he's g eating it Like he's at a Michelin star restaurant. He's like he's like,, do you have any, you know, like little little sauce on the side? Oh don know, whatn't h A borderise sauce, perhaps Harembe got his own little portable empanatamam. Taste buds work the same as ours I mean, ninety eight, over ninety eight percent of the same genetic code. Yeah.. And I see the resemblance a bit. That's fresh silverbag. There's parts that I see. This is from seven months before Harambe's demise, his death all the way up until two months before That could have been the final shit he ate And I think it's important as we are again, trying to figure out Why and what Was Harambeay thinking? to hear from Jeff So Harambee had this behavior that he would do regularly and he would only do it when we were alone because other people would scream at him and he didn't like screaming and I wouldn't scream at him out loud I'd screaming at him. And you know, mentally, telepathically, God damnit Romy, stop. I don't want to see this. So anyway, one day I'm there and the lighting is just perfect I'm there all alone. Hambees comes right up to me And he does this behavior. And so I was like, all right, you off I Votap it. So I videotaped him doing this and lookingking at it and I'most like, Oh, man, this is amazing And I can't believe. And so I pack up my stuff and I'm leaving and I ran into a VP. I was said, Hey, hey, come here, come here. I need to show you this video. I just took a Rambe You're not going to believe this. I don't know when It will happen but this is going to make Harambee the most famous girl in the world when people see this video And I showed it to him And he just kind of went white I cannot stress enough how much the Zoo really did not want this. I can imagine If you could read the email, please from a communications executive at the Cincinnati Zoo three months after Herambe's death Hi, Jeff. A while ago, we talked about the possibility of you selling your harambe videos and donating the proceeds that is very generous and before everything spiraled out of control seemed like a good idea. Now with all the memes and global interest in harambe, we would really not like the videos to be made public They would only make media attention unbearable prolong this ordeal for all of us. So we would appreciate it if you did not move forward with plans to make the videos available. Thanks for all that you do for us. We really appreciate your time and talent. I've even stopped taking photos around here because I know yours will be better. Wow. Thanks And now listen, Do kinda see Coming from on that everyone wants to know already about Arami And what they find out is that he's eaten it straight from the tab. I just think that it would have become even somehow even bigger phenomenon The scientific term for the practice of eating your own sh is nasty. It's called nasty Let's guess the root word. It's got to be Epathy is the end of it in aopathy C propigy. Okay Prophey C O P R O P H H G Y and scientific papers, research, independent guerriilla experts say this is Rre in the wild But girls in captivity, will more frequently eat their own shit out of stress. That's even more do not like I do not like that. He was only eating his own sh because we locked him up When we show the poop tapes to independent experts, aforementioned, a panel of guorilla scientists such as Dr. Ian Redmond My name's Ian Redmond. I'm a naturist by birth biologists by training And a conservation is by necessity. He said, look, either Hurambee could have used more food and was just hungry O Arambe just wanted to get a reaction Amid all the stress and anxiety Karambee wanted to capture the attention of humans posossibly the reaction of the Humans do that. reinforce that when I do this, humans all make funny noises and You know, so the human That's gross Response Yeah Aam might be a curious feedback mechanism When I do this, they do that. So I'll do it again and watch them do it again do that again A ham. He did say that he's a ham and what is the that is the if humans fully committed to the bit The hammiest thing that guy at a wedding could do is poop in his hand in in the middle of the dance floor and then start eating it. That's the next level crowd workork right there, right? It is Is this Gorilla psychologically broken and or Is this gorilla expressing something that we too can recognize It's important to see that Jeff in his point of view had a personal perserspective The zoo is always talking about how they want to do all this enrich for the animals and this and that and the other. like Yeah, that's great. You're trying, but They're in prison. There's just nothing you can do to change that that's not healthy for them. that's not ood for him. It's mentally damaging to anybody that has a brain, any creature that has a brain It's a look. I I am not trying to turn this into a big like annti Zoo thing. I'm actually like conflicted about like what What do we do What do we do with this? right? Like Here is this video that we got And I could not be more enthusiastic about immediately seizing upon it. And I'm trying to be journalistically fair and again, climb into the mind of a gorilla and figure out like Do we show this? How do we contextualize it? How do we scientifically sort of validate this? And I was thinking about like, okay, so this gorilla that was stressed and anxious and cooped up and was misread by all sorts of people What he was trying to do, if nothing else everyverybody agrees on and all sides of the story is that he was trying to get the attention of humans And I was like I know what that feels like The whole idea of like this is a story about an animal that shares over ninety eight percent of its DNA with humans and What this video says is not you should think of Harambee differently necessarily, it's that you should maybe see him like We kind of see ourselves Pablo about to eat his own. Its not even that. It's not even that. You know what Like I usually don ownt beef I get this invite from P. I know. I was a friend. D I was gonna h in here a good time. S some chuck', maybe., Katie's gonna be there. Great time. Really great My soul has been crushed. I know. I have no idea what I'm going to see when I look in the mirror now. I'm just gonna be in a blank stare on the train. I don't know if I should cry. Be outraged. Am I a prison abolitionist? Are guerillaas not getting enough? I don't know what's going on right now. Do I have to do something for inner city gorriillas? Do I gotta find a kid that fell in this? Why would you put this mental anguish on me? Why is this coming across my desck Also, you had to read more. I know. So it was like he can't he can't handle this information So now now we' like, don't even trust me, now I'm gonna go home emo Now I'm sad about a ten years ago tragedy again God forbid anybody goes like, what's wrong with you? You having a tough day? and I have to go Haram. Please, don't ask ' would you believe it's Harambee? And they would go, geez, she's one of those get over it. You know what I mean? But it's you brought this all freshly back up. What if he's just a goof? He was just goofing. He was just trying to be a silly goof to get you to laugh All Harambe wanted was for you to laugh and for that little kid to please get out of He wass like, I'm gonna get you out of here. I gott to drag you, but get out of here You don't want to be stuck in here, You'll start eating your own buttts Get out. He was probably trying to take the kid out So the kid would not have to eat his own poop for his own enjoyment. And what did that get him? A bullet between the eyes. And the thing I am left realizing As Jeff offers one more thought is that Apparently There is something that he did want to tell Haramebe I always, you know, wish I could tell Hambe. It's like Pan, you became, you know, everybody loved you so much. broke the internet Harambee was a complex animal with a really tragic backstory. that just wanted to make people Laugh We didn't know him and learning about him Do we not learn more about ourselves? W. And we have to ask ourselves this question What do you thinkinking real Pimment. Oh. I mean, he was e good too He was eating good too. so you know it was like a neutr loa. It probably has good chunks in therever. I'm sure not too much sodia, you know. Oh yeah, a good balance. Good balance, mayaybe some chutney. don't know how to end this episode. I think that was it right then This has been Pablo Torere findinds out, a Madal Lark media production And I'll talk to you next time