By MARY SELL, Alabama Daily News
Harvey Updyke, the rabid Alabama fan who admitted poisoning Auburn University’s famed oak trees in 2010, died Thursday, multiple news outlets reported overnight.
Updyke, a retired Texas state trooper who most recently lived in Louisiana, pleaded guilty to poisoning the trees in 2013.
Updyke’s son Bear Updyke told AL.com that his father died of natural causes in Louisiana. He was 71.
The elder Updyke made national news in early 2011 when he told the Paul Finebaum Show that he poisoned Auburn’s Toomer’s Corner trees following the Tigers’ 2010 Iron Bowl victory over Alabama.
“They’re not dead yet, but they definitely will die,” he said.
Asked why he did it, Updyke famously said he just had “too much ‘Bama in me.”
Updyke did spend a short time in jail and was ordered to pay $800,000 in penalties and restitution. As of late last year, he’d only paid about $6,900.
Auburn removed the more than 150 year old trees and new ones.