So a Chilean man named Franco Luis Ferrara decided to commit suicide-by-lion. He stripped naked and somehow managed to enter the lions’ zoo enclosure. Not getting the desired response, Ferrara began “taunting” the big cats. Who did what big cats (and small cats would if they could) do: they got off their fat lazy you-know-whats and mauled him. Zookeepers rushed to the scene. And what did they do? They did what politically correct zookeepers do: they turned a water hose on the beasts. ‘Cause everyone knows cats hate water, right? Anyway, no joy (save maybe for the lions who probably appreciate a well-washed human limb or four). At that point, the keepers got out the big guns. As our firearms-averse friends at huffingtonpost.com report, that didn’t go so well, at least at first . . .
They then fired a tranquilizer dart, but it missed the lions and instead struck the man, identified by local media as 20-year-old Franco Luis Ferrada, in the neck.
As Ferrada was being mauled, a zookeeper shot the lions with live rounds. They died a short time later. Ferrada was rushed to a local health clinic, where he was in critical condition.
Santiago police said he left what’s believed to be a suicide note. “We are comparing it with other [writing samples],” said sub-commissioner Gerson Sepulveda.
Critics took to social media to complain about the handling of the incident, with many condemning the zoo for killing the lions.
But zoo director Alejandra Montalva defended her staff’s actions, saying they’d followed the “established protocol” to deal with such circumstances.
“When a person’s life is at risk, you have to sacrifice the animals,” she said. “The shooter decided to save the life of the person and unfortunately we had to sacrifice two members of our family.”
A vigil was held for the dead lions, which had been residents at the zoo for more than 20 years, near their enclosure on Saturday night.
As you can imagine, there are plenty of animal rights activists — as in all of them — who would have preferred it if the zookeepers had let the “innocent” lions feast on Mr. Ferrara. Which puts them in the same camp as devotees of snuff flicks, strangely enough. Just sayin’.