#CecilTheLion: Walter Palmer Starts Work Again Tomorrow
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Walter Palmer, who has spent more than a month out of sight after becoming the target of protests and threats, intends to return to his suburban Minneapolis dental practice Tuesday. In an evening interview conducted jointly by The Associated Press and the Minneapolis Star Tribune that advisers said would be the only one granted, Palmer said again that he believes he acted legally and that he was stunned to find out his hunting party had killed one of Zimbabwe’s treasured animals. “If I had known this lion had a name and was important to the country or a study obviously I wouldn’t have taken it,” Palmer said. “Nobody in our hunting party knew before or after the name of this lion.” Some high-level Zimbabwean officials have called for Palmer’s extradition, but no formal steps toward getting the dentist to return to Zimbabwe have been publicly disclosed. Friedberg, a Minneapolis attorney who said he is acting as an unpaid consultant to Palmer, said he has heard nothing from authorities about domestic or international investigations since early August.
The American dentist who killed Cecil the lion was a "foreign poacher" who paid for an illegal hunt and he should be extradited to Zimbabwe to face justice, environment minister Oppah Muchinguri said on Friday. In Harare's first official comments since Cecil's killing grabbed world headlines this week, Muchinguri said the Prosecutor General had already started the process to have 55-year-old Walter Palmer extradited from the United States. Muchinguri, a 91-year-old veteran from President Robert Mugabe's ruling ZANU-PF party, described Cecil - a black-maned lion well-known to foreign tourists in the Hwange National Park - as an "iconic attraction". "The illegal killing was deliberate," she told a news conference. "We are appealing to the responsible authorities for his extradition to Zimbabwe so that he can be held accountable for his illegal actions."
If Palmer did indeed kill Cecil, that’s not a violation of the Endangered Species Act. Under that federal law, it is illegal to “take” (that is, wound or kill) an endangered animal. But the U.S. doesn’t consider the African lion to be endangered—just “threatened.” (U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has proposed revising the lion’s status to list it as endangered; a final decision is expected in October.) When an animal is merely threatened, federal law prohibits only the possession, transportation, or shipment of the animal (or part of its carcass, as a trophy) across state or international borders. And even if the lion were endangered, the Endangered Species Act probably doesn’t apply to acts committed outside the United States. In other words, on its own, the killing isn’t punishable in America.
Palmer didn’t just stumble upon the lion: According to Zimbabwean authorities quoted in the Independent, he allegedly bribed wildlife guides $55,000 for the honor. And a federal law called the Travel Act forbids foreign travel with the intent to engage in certain “unlawful activities” overseas. One of those activities is bribery. If Palmer traveled to Zimbabwe to hunt exotic species, and planned to bribe guides if necessary to access his prey, that offense would fall within the broad scope of the Travel Act. Palmer could be prosecuted in America for it.
Emmanuel Fundira, the president of the Safari Operators Association of Zimbabwe, confirmed at a news conference on Tuesday that Dr. Walter Palmer is wanted for the death of Cecil the lion but that his whereabouts were unknown. Police spokeswoman Charity Charamba said 'we are looking for Palmer' who allegedly paid $55,000 (£35,000) for a big game permit and traveled from his home town of Minneapolis to Africa to kill the lion. Dr. Palmer's hunting colleagues, Zimbabwean hunter Theo Bronkhorst and local landowner Honest Ndlovu are due to appear in court this week on poaching charges for allegedly killing Cecil. "We arrested two people and now we are looking for Palmer in connection with the same case," said Charamba. The much loved big cat was wounded by an arrow after he was allegedly lured out of the national park by the hunter's bait. After spending two days tracking the injured beast, Cecil was eventually found and shot dead. The corpse was then skinned and the head hacked off as a trophy.
Cecil the lion – the most famous creature in one of Zimbabwe's national parks – was killed by an American hunter who has boasted about shooting a menagerie of animals with his bow and arrow, The Telegraph can reveal. Walter Palmer (above left), a dentist from Minnesota, is believed to have paid £35,000 to shoot and kill the much-loved lion with a bow and arrow. The animal was shot on July 1 in Hwange National Park. Two independent sources have confirmed the hunter's identity to the paper, which has also seen a copy of the relevant hunting permit. Conservation groups in Zimbabwe reacted angrily to the news that the 13-year-old animal had been killed: partly because the lion was known to visitors and seemingly enjoyed human contact, and partly because of the way in which he was killed. He was lured out of the national park and shot.
dumb fat piece of ****. **** rich white people who think they can get away with **** like this. **** corrupt african governments that let this happen. ugh
If he had a permit, so what? It's not poaching if it was done legally. Hunting lions is legal in Zimbabwe. The hunting party claims they had a permit but the government claims the landowner wasn't allotted a lion this year.
Before hating on this guy, let's see if the charges are true. Don't go off half-cocked.
If he had a permit, so what? It's not poaching if it was done legally. Hunting lions is legal in Zimbabwe. The hunting party claims they had a permit but the government claims the landowner wasn't allotted a lion this year.
Before hating on this guy, let's see if the charges are true. Don't go off half-cocked.
I KNEW you were going to show up here. It was illegal - he lured the lion off the park property and the adjacent property owner is being tried - what other evidence do you need?
The fact that you're missing the larger point here doesn't surprise me. I'm amazed you can sleep at night.
If he had a permit, so what? It's not poaching if it was done legally. Hunting lions is legal in Zimbabwe. The hunting party claims they had a permit but the government claims the landowner wasn't allotted a lion this year.
Before hating on this guy, let's see if the charges are true. Don't go off half-cocked.
4th Post