Different take on the “Bluegrass Conspiracy”
The movie plots of good folks gone bad are plentiful and popular. What happens, though, when it’s not a movie, but instead is a conviction against a family member? Back in 1985, one of Kentucky’s most prominent families experienced such a nightmare, and Erin Chandler, niece of one of the accused, is attempting to set the record straight in Bluegrass Sons: A True Crime Memoir.
Many Kentuckians (and beyond) may remember when news of the so-called Bluegrass Conspiracy scandal broke. It involved two blueblood socialites, Andrew Thornton and Bradley Bryant, military academy grads who went on to become, respectively, a police officer and a Marine, and allegedly had become entrenched in an international drug smuggling operation involving millions of dollars in marijuana and cocaine. Bryant was arrested and imprisoned when a cache of weapons and stolen goods were traced to him. Thornton parachuted to his death with weapons, drugs and money strapped to himself.
Now, almost 40 years later, Chandler has reopened the discussion. Interviewing the key players involved and hearing firsthand her Uncle Brad’s side of the story after decades of silence, Chandler writes that Bryant was actually doing contract work for the CIA in an attempt to infiltrate the heart of a drug cartel. When things didn’t go quite as planned, he was disavowed by the agency to which he was so loyal, according to his niece. He was repeatedly questioned, without success, for CIA information while incarcerated, moved over 130 times across the country to different prisons and passed over for parole after three years, according to the book. Chandler writes that Bryant’s attorney presented proof of his association with the CIA, but the agency still claimed never to have heard of him.
Chandler and her brother grew up with an almost ringside seat to her uncle’s world. Divorced parents led to summers being spent with their dad, Dan Chandler, in Las Vegas with Caesar’s Palace, where Dan Chandler worked, as their playground. Here, their father massaged the egos of the Chagra brothers, who were allegedly the targets of Bryant’s mission.
Despite all this, Erin Chandler loves her uncle unquestionably.
“Brad Bryant dove into a den of vipers and remained true to his pledge and the missions given him … ,” she writes, “… but a line of fence just standing out alone doesn’t keep anything in or anything out.”
The movie Cocaine Bear stemmed from events that led to Andrew Thornton’s demise. When Thornton tossed bags of cocaine out of the plane from which he parachuted to his death, they landed in the Chattahoochee National Forest, where they were consumed by a black bear.
“Cocaine Bear” was preserved through taxidermy and, after an adventurous circuit of various owners, now resides at the Kentucky for Kentucky Fun Mall in Lexington.
Bluegrass Sons, (Rabbit House Press, $17.95) can be purchased online at www.rabbithousepress.com.
