Woman Who Hunted Bigfoot Found Dead At 51

(VitalNews.org) – Claudia Ackley, the 51-year-old “Bigfoot” hunter, was found dead in her home in Tennessee on July 3rd. Her partner, Ed Brown, told reporters that he became concerned for her welfare while he was away on a business trip and had not heard from her in the time between Thursday and Sunday. He asked a friend to go and check on her. The friend discovered Ackley lying on her bed, not moving.

The cause of death is suspected to be a heart attack, and Brown has emphasized that there is no suspicion of foul play. He explained that Ackley suffered from hypertension and was taking medication for the problem.

Ackley became widely regarded as America’s most prominent Bigfoot hunter when she sued the Fish and Wildlife Department of California in order to force them to recognize the sasquatch as a real species, and not just an urban legend. Her 2018 lawsuit was ultimately unsuccessful, but it garnered plenty of publicity and debate. Ackley said that her aim was to get the state to recognize the creatures in order for people to learn more about them and to be wary of the potential threat she claimed they posed. This came after two alleged sasquatch encounters, which Ackley described as life-changing.

Ackley said that she first ran into the creature in 2014 while hiking with her then-husband. Coming face-to-face with the cryptid changed her perspective and prompted her to seek a divorce and lose 125 pounds, she later said. In 2017, she was hiking with her two daughters when one of them became frightened by something she saw among the trees. One of her daughters filmed what the family believed to be a large alpha male sasquatch semi-hidden in the forest.

Ackley submitted the footage to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, who gave her the verdict that what she and her daughters had witnessed was, in fact, a bear. She did not agree and wanted further research into the matter. This led her to take the department to court in 2018 in the case that fellow Bigfoot aficionado Daniel Perez described as “bad publicity” for their community. Claudia Ackley, however, said that she was determined to see the case through in the hope that gaining recognition of sasquatches would save people’s lives in the future.