Group plans to file suit over Beartaria

A Reddit community of 38 members to date has recently been formed for the purpose of filing a class action lawsuit on claims of land fraud allegedly perpetrated by Owen Benjamin following his purchase of a 10-acre river-front haven on Earl Lane about four years he paid for by crowd-funding, accepting a $400 “donation” in exchange for unlimited access to Beartaria.

Benjamin allegedly offered donors, his “bears” a variety of descriptions of what they could do once there, from bucolic back-to-the-land gardening and gathering to full-on survival training with weapons for the end times or the crash of society, whichever came first.

Except for a couple of working weekends, when people came in from across the nation to build six dry cabins, those lining up to participate in the suit say none of the promises have been fulfilled, that requests for refunds have been met with intimidation and harassment, and that the former Hollywood comic pulled a “bait and switch,” all but abandoning the Boundary County development after backlash by area residents and adverse media attention prompted to shift to a new bear haven in the Missouri Ozarks, much to the chagrin of folks there.

The 44-year-old Benjamin had a modicum of success in Hollywood as a stand-up comic, writer and actor with work in films including “The House Bunny” and “Gaytown” in 2008 and “Jack and Jill” in 2011, but his increasingly racist and supremacist commentary cost him his audience and his career.

He launched a successful podcast, rambling for hours a day and at one point garnering around 172,000 followers on Twitter, attracting a global following of bears, but his rhetoric soon began to violate standards and he was kicked off blogging platforms one by one; Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube. He has since been reinstated on the former Twitter, Elon Musk’s X, where he now has around 242,000 followers.

Now, from his home in Bonner County, where he tried to start a Beartaria of about 200 acres before P&Z and worried neighbors led him to cast an eye north, he broadcasts on the fringe to a mere sliver of his old audience, and his emboldened bears are revolting despite Benjamin’s alleged propensity for intimidation by encouraging his faithful bears to harass those who complain or request refunds.

As a result, those who plan to file the suit are keeping details close to vest, to include the names of those included in the suit. No timeframe has been given as to when the lawsuit might be filed or in what court.

In addition to this suit, Benjamin is also defendant in a breach of contract suit filed March 7, 2024, in the Riverside County, California, Superior Court by videographer Adam Camacho seeking over $35,000 in damages.