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BY PAT SUMMERS
NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM
exotic: 1. From another part of the world; foreign.
Nine male lions, 8 lionesses, 6 black bears, 3 mountain lions, 2 grizzlies, 2 wolves, 1 baboon . . . and 18 Bengal tigers, an endangered species – these were the 49 “exotic animals” shot and killed by law enforcement officials in Zanesville, Ohio this week.
The exotic animals who survived the shoot-out were either captured and moved to the Cleveland Zoo and Aquarium or, in the case of one missing monkey, assumed to have been eaten by another freed animal.
The key words there are “exotic animals,” as in, they should never have been in Ohio to begin with. That’s not where lions, tigers, bears, wolves and primates belong. But historically, Ohio has been one of a handful of states without laws regulating ownership of “exotics,” according to the New York Times.The five Ws and H of the classic news story are simple to recount. Terry W. Thompson, 62, of Zanesville, Ohio, freed 56 of the exotic animals he owned from their cages and then committed suicide. This happened on Tuesday, October 18.
Once area law enforcement officials heard these animals were “at large” near Thompson’s wildlife preserve, with darkness falling, they set out to protect the public safety, hunting down and shooting most of them. A spokesperson later explained they don’t usually carry tranquillizer darts.
A recap earlier today said law enforcement officers “cornered and shot” the animals, most of whom “had wandered no more than 500 yards from their cages.”
ALSO
Lions, tigers, and bears: Ohio! — UPDATE
The last W, for “why?” remains unanswered. Was Thompson bitter at just having finished a year in federal prison on weapons charges, as the LA Times reported? Were he and his estranged wife too deeply in debt to dig out? Was he for any number of possible reasons at the end of his rope?
And yet, a family friend claimed the Thompsons had bottle-fed most of the big cats and bears (who were also declawed) since they were babies, as MSNBC had it.
This woman wondered why Thompson did what he did, knowing “how much he cared for them, and he would know that they would be killed.”
“It’s always the animals that suffer,” said the director of a 160-acre refuge in California in the LA Times. As one acquainted with Thompson, she wished he had contacted her for help instead of going ahead with his plan, or impulse.
