Animal expert and emeritus director of the Columbus Zoo and Aquarium Jack Hanna said over the weekend that Walter Palmer, the American dentist who killed Cecil the Lion in Zimbabwe recently should be prosecuted and sent to jail.
Speaking to ABC News, Hanna noted that the lion population has declined precipitously in recent decades:
“In 1947 when I was born, there were about 450,000 lions, the mid-70s when my kids were born, there were about 100,000. Today, there are less than 30,000.”
Hanna added that available evidence shows that Palmer broke the law by moving Cecil from one side of the wildlife sanctuary to another location so he could be “legally” killed:
“Number two, you drag a carcass over from the protected side of [Hwange National Park] over to the hunting side — and that was proven that they drug the carcass for the animal to be drug over to that area where he could be hunted by bow an arrow. Someone said the man might not have seen the collar on the lion. Well if that was a rifle, maybe that’s true — but I was there when they were collaring the lions, by the way — so therefore, you could see that collar if it was a bow and arrow.”
And Hanna was adamant that Dr. Palmer should either be extradicted to Zimbabwe for trial or face legal jeopardy here in the United States:
“Let’s put it this way: Several years ago–I don’t know the exact year, you can look it up–a gentleman was in Yellowstone and took an elk, took the animal, killed the animal, put him in the back of a pickup. He got very hefty fines as well as, my understanding is, four or so years in prison. And there have been other instances like that as well. So what should happen is–as far as extraditing him to Zimbabwe, if you know much about Zimbabwe, that’s probably not someplace [he should be extradited].”
Asked directly if Palmer should be imprisoned for killing Cecil, Hanna said:
“Yeah, I think every good hunter would agree that something has to happen here. The doctor must know himself that something has to happen here because that’s not what good hunters do by any means. He had to know some of these things I pointed out. You just can’t drag a carcass from one protected side to another and shoot him out there like a cow. Predator-prey relationships is what our good Lord put on the planet here. The predator relationship to prey is messed up in a lot of places so you have to work on that.”
Watch Jack Hanna On ABC News
