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Thread: Exotic Animals on the Loose in Ohio After Park Owner Found Dead

  1. #1
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Exotic Animals on the Loose in Ohio After Park Owner Found Dead

    Dozens of animals escaped from a wild-animal preserve that houses bears, big cats and other beasts, and the owner later was found dead there, said police, who shot several of the animals and urged nearby residents to stay indoors.

    The fences had been left unsecured Tuesday at the Muskingum County Animal Farm in Zanesville, in east-central Ohio, and the animals' cages were open, police said. They wouldn't say what animals escaped but said the preserve had lions, tigers, cheetahs, wolves, giraffes, camels and bears. They said bears and wolves were among 25 escaped animals that had been shot and killed and there were multiple sightings of exotic animals along a nearby highway.

    "These are wild animals that you would see on TV in Africa," Sheriff Matt Lutz warned at a press conference.

    Neighbor Danielle White, whose father's property abuts the animal preserve, said she didn't see loose animals this time but did in 2006, when a lion escaped.

    "It's always been a fear of mine knowing (the preserve's owner) had all those animals," she said. "I have kids. I've heard a male lion roar all night."

    Lutz called the escaped animals "mature, very big, aggressive" but said a caretaker told authorities the preserve's 48 animals had been fed on Monday. He said police were patrolling the 40-acre farm and the surrounding areas in cars, not on foot, and were concerned about big cats and bears hiding in the dark and in trees.

    "This is a bad situation," Lutz said. "It's been a situation for a long time."

    Lutz said his office started getting phone calls at about 5:30 p.m. that wild animals were loose just west of Zanesville on a road that runs under Interstate 70.

    He said four deputies with assault rifles in a pickup truck went to the animal farm, where they found the owner, Terry Thompson, dead and all the animal cage doors open. He wouldn't say how Thompson died but said several aggressive animals were near his body when deputies arrived and had to be shot.

    Thompson, who lived on the property, had orangutans and chimps in his home, but those were still in their cages, Lutz said.

    The deputies, who saw many other animals standing outside their cages and others that had escaped past the fencing surrounding the property, began shooting them on sight. They said there had been no reports of injuries among the public.

    Staffers from the Columbus Zoo went to the scene, hoping to tranquilize and capture the animals. The sheriff said caretakers might put food in the animals' open cages to try to lure them back.

    Lutz said people should stay indoors and he might ask for local schools to close Wednesday. At least four school districts in the area canceled classes.

    Lutz said his main concern was protecting the public in the rural area, where homes sit on large lots of sometimes 10 acres (four hectares).

    "Any kind of cat species or bear species is what we are concerned about," Lutz said. "We don't know how much of a head start these animals have on us."

    A spokeswoman for the Ohio Department of Natural Resources, which usually handles native wildlife, such as deer, said state Division of Wildlife officers were helping the sheriff's office cope with the exotic animals in Zanesville, a city of about 25,000 residents.

    "This is, I would say, unique," spokeswoman Laura Jones said.

    White, the preserve's neighbor, said Thompson had been in legal trouble, and police said he had gotten out of jail recently.

    At a nearby Moose Lodge, Bill Weiser remembered Thompson as an interesting character who flew planes, raced boats and owned a custom motorcycle shop that also sold guns.

    "He was pretty unique," Weiser said. "He had a different slant on things. I never knew him to hurt anybody, and he took good care of the animals."

    Ohio has some of the nation's weakest restrictions on exotic pets and among the highest number of injuries and deaths caused by them.

    In the summer of 2010, an animal caretaker was killed by a bear at a property in Cleveland. The caretaker had opened the bear's cage at exotic-animal keeper Sam Mazzola's property for a routine feeding.

    Though animal-welfare activists had wanted Mazzola charged with reckless homicide, the caretaker's death was ruled a workplace accident. The bear was later destroyed.

    This summer, Mazzola was found dead on a water bed, wearing a mask and with his arms and legs restrained, at his home in Columbia Township, about 15 miles southwest of Cleveland.

    It was unclear how many animals remained on the property when he died, but he had said in a bankruptcy filing in May 2010 that he owned four tigers, a lion, eight bears and 12 wolves. The U.S. Department of Agriculture had revoked his license to exhibit animals after animal-welfare activists campaigned for him to stop letting people wrestle with another one of his bears.

    Mazzola had permits for nine bears for 2010, the Ohio Department of Natural Resources said. The state requires permits for bears but doesn't regulate the ownership of nonnative animals, such as lions and tigers.

    Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2011/10/19...#ixzz1bE77CGhG

  2. #2
    Administrator Michael's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Heidi View Post
    "These are wild animals that you would see on TV in Africa," Sheriff Matt Lutz warned at a press conference.
    I´ve seen tis animals at Busch Gardens in Tampa.... :highly_amused:

    Sorry, I couldn´t resist. I hope no one (except the dangerous animals) will be hurt.

  3. #3
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Authorities are now saying they believe the caretaker set the animals free and then committed suicide. They have also closed schools in the area.

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    Administrator Michael's Avatar
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    On a serious note - Ohio should consider stricter laws for people keeping dangerous animals. Im happy that my neighbour can´t a bear or a lion. Unfortunately they´re allowed to house poisinou sanimals like spiders or snakes.

  5. #5
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    In my opinion wild animals shouldn't be kept in captivity, whether it be a zoo or the circus.

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    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    All escaped animals accounted for, Ohio sheriff says

    (CNN) -- An Ohio sheriff believes no more exotic animals are on the loose after his deputies killed 49 lions, tigers and other wild animals freed from a local farm by its suicidal owner.

    Of the 56 animals released Tuesday night, only a grizzly bear, two monkeys and three leopards were taken alive, Muskingum County Sheriff Matt Lutz said.

    One monkey remained unaccounted for Wednesday night, but conservationist Jack Hanna, who assisted in the effort, said the animal may have been eaten.

    "It looks like everything is taken care of," Hanna said. "There was one monkey left, and right now, we found a carcass of the monkey. We don't know if it was eaten."

    The farm's owner, Terry Thompson, pried open cages and opened the farm's fences before dying from a self-inflicted gunshot wound Tuesday afternoon, Lutz said

    None of the deputies are equipped with tranquilizer guns, Lutz told CNN's "Anderson Cooper 360."

    And with night falling Tuesday, he gave the order to kill the escaped animals.

    Ohio animal owner supplied cub for Heidi Klum

    "If this had been a 9 o'clock or 10 o'clock incident, in the middle of the day, odds are high that we may have been able to surround the area and keep everything contained," he said. "But our biggest problem that we had was nightfall. We had about an hour, hour and a half of light, and we just couldn't take the chance."

    As of Wednesday afternoon, authorities had killed 49 animals -- 18 tigers, 17 lions, six black bears, two grizzly bears, three mountain lions, two wolves and a baboon. Those captured alive were taken to the Columbus Zoo.

    Hanna, the zoo's director emeritus, said he was upset by loss of "precious" animals, but defended the decision to use deadly force.

    "To have no one hurt or killed here with 40-something animals getting loose is unbelievable," he told CNN's "The Situation Room."

    Hanna led a team of experts who arrived with four tranquilizer guns late Tuesday in an effort to corral the animals. He said the drugs take several minutes to subdue an animal even with a good shot, and one tiger had to be killed Wednesday afternoon when it turned on a veterinarian after being hit with a tranquilizer dart.

    Overnight, sheriff's deputies searched the eastern Ohio woods around the city of Zanesville with night-vision gear and patrolled in pickups, armed with shotguns. Flashing signs on the highways in eastern Ohio warned motorists Wednesday: "Caution. Exotic animals." Schools were closed, and some frightened residents said they were keeping to their homes as sheriff's deputies hunted lions, tigers, leopards and grizzly bears.

    "Yeah, there's a lion on Mount Perry Road. ... I just drove by and it walked out in front of me and was standing there under the street light," one caller to 911 told deputies.

    Zanesville Mayor Howard Zwelling said he received calls from people who were concerned that the animals had been killed. He said authorities were trying to use tranquilizers whenever possible.

    But Lutz told reporters, "We are not talking about your normal everyday house cat or dog.

    Opinion: Wild animals should be left in the wild

    "These are 300-pound Bengal tigers that we have had to put down," he said.

    Thompson's property is about 2 miles outside Zanesville. The 62-year-old had been released from a federal prison September 30 after pleading guilty earlier this year to possessing illegal firearms, including five fully automatic firearms. A civil case seeking forfeiture of firearms was pending, according to the U.S. attorney's office in Ohio's Southern District.

    He also had been convicted of animal cruelty and was arrested several times for traffic violations.

    Authorities were waiting on the results of an autopsy to determine the exact cause of his death, but Lutz said Thompson shot himself just after releasing the animals.

    Sam Kopchak, Thompson's neighbor, said he saw lions and bears running free Tuesday evening, with one tiger chasing horses. Kopchak managed to get himself and his horse into his barn and telephoned his mother.

    "It was like a war zone," Kopchak said when authorities descended on the property, set off the road named after Kopchak's family.

    Kopchak described Thompson as aloof. He loved animals. Kopchak saw him driving one time with a baby black bear on his chest

    http://edition.cnn.com/2011/10/20/us...ose/?hpt=us_c2

  7. #7
    Administrator Heidi's Avatar
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    Report: Man upset before releasing animals

    The final investigation report on the release of 56 exotic animals at an Ohio farm in October reveals that the farm owner was distraught about an impending confinement as part of his parole, overwhelmed with the condition of the farm and animals and upset about his wife being gone.

    Two witnesses provided statements to the Muskingum County Sheriff’s Office that provide insight into farm owner Terry Thompson’s state of mind in the days leading up to the Oct. 18 incident.

    Sheriff Matt Lutz said the investigation is complete, yet no one knows why he released the animals before committing suicide.

    Thompson’s actions set off a firestorm of activity in Muskingum County, as deputies tracked down and killed 48 of the animals.

    ‘He had a plan’

    John Moore, a caretaker on Thompson’s property, told investigators he saw Thompson the night before the animals were released when he went to help feed the animals.

    He told deputies that as he prepared to leave that evening, Thompson said he had received a letter from his wife, Marian, that disturbed him and that he “had a plan” and Moore would know it “when it happens.”

    Moore told deputies Marian Thompson had left the farm in April or May on business. He said she would come to the farm two or three times each week to check on things and sent money so food and materials for the farm.

    Moore said he bought at least 2,000 pounds of chicken weekly to feed the big cats.

    Marian Thompson has been out of town on business, said her attorney, Dean Wilson. She has not made any statements about her husband’s death or the confiscation of six surviving animals.

    The final report doesn’t include any statements or interviews with Marian Thompson. Lutz said she wasn’t at the scene Oct. 18, so there was no reason to interview her.

    At-home confinement

    Five days before he released the animals, Terry Thompson received a visit from Joe Moore, a federal parole officer. Moore was at the farm on Kopchak Road to make arrangements for a home confinement system to be installed for one year.

    Thompson, who was sentenced to one year and one day for two counts of possessing illegal firearms, had been released from federal prison Sept. 30.

    The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives seized 133 weapons and a small amount of ammunition during a search of Thompson’s home in 2008. They included five fully automatic firearms and three short-barreled firearms without serial numbers.

    Moore said in a report that Thompson was distraught about being confined to the property and being hooked up to a monitoring system. He said the farm situation also was discussed, with Thompson saying he was overwhelmed with the condition of the farm and animals. Thompson also was disturbed that his wife was not at the home, Moore reported. Thompson told him he “took the gun case” that sent him to prison for “both him and Marian.”

    No one is sure, according to the report, where Thompson obtained the gun he used to kill himself.

    The gun, a .357-caliber Ruger revolver, at one time belonged to a Muskingum County deputy who once was a gun dealer but who had not had possession of the gun for years and could not remember selling it to Thompson.

    That night

    On the night of the animal release, deputies arrived at the Thompson farm after receiving calls that a lion and a bear had been spotted roaming loose.

    Deputies found several big cats roaming near Thompson’s body, which made it difficult for them to reach him, reports show.

    Deputy K.C. Jones wrote in his report that when he arrived, he could hear sporadic gunfire coming from the area of the barn and house as deputies were trying to contain animals, but instead they had to kill the animals to reach Thompson’s body.

    Thompson’s body was located in a field behind a row of cages. It appeared he had been dragged about 20 feet toward the cages, Jones stated.

    Deputies found the gun, a pair of bolt cutters and a bloody ball cap that Thompson had been wearing at the spot where authorities think Thompson killed himself.

    Deputies went to the back of the barn for safety because a white tiger was lying near Thompson, Jones stated. The Special Response Team was making a move into an area behind the barn where Jones knew, from previous visits, a large enclosure with cats was located.

    “They suddenly cut loose with gunfire,” Jones stated. A large male lion then came running from the north end of the barn and crossed in front of Jones, who fired a shot. The lion ran about 150 yards into a field toward a pond and laid down.

    Jones said the lion, was killed by one of the SRT team members.

    Once deputies felt they could move Thompson’s body, a squad arrived and Thompson was taken to the Licking County Coroner’s Office, where an autopsy was done.

    Detective Todd Kanavel said the cages had been cut and cage doors were open, which prevented deputies from being able to contain the animals . All the while, Kanavel said, lions and tigers were escaping and some were charging at the deputies.

    One black leopard was found inside its cage, Kanavel said, and that cage was undamaged.

    Six of the animals, including the leopard, survived. They are at the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium under quarantine.

    Autopsy and ballistic reports convinced Lutz that Thompson killed himself.

    Autopsy reports also show Thompson had bite marks on his head and several other wounds on his body that indicate he might have been bitten by a large cat.

    http://tucsoncitizen.com/usa-today-n...asing-animals/

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