‘Exotic pet’ tragedy in PA

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Over the weekend in my home state, a woman who probably had very good intentions died under the claws of her “pet” black bear. A neighbor shot the bear to end the attack. As CNN reports it today:

A 37-year-old Pennsylvania woman died Sunday after being mauled by her pet black bear, authorities said. [The woman] was attacked when she entered the bear’s cage to feed the 350-pound animal and clean its cage, according to Pennsylvania State Police.  The bear lived in a 15-by-15-foot steel and concrete enclosure on [the woman's] property in Ross Township. The bear wasn’t the only unusual animal living on the property, an official with the State Game Commission told CNN affiliate WFMZ-TV. The homeowner had a permit to keep a Bengal tiger and an African lion, and the property routinely passed inspection and had no violations, he said.

“No violations,” eh? Clearly, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania is in extreme violation of common sense if a 15-by-15-foot cell is a viable “home” for an animal meant to rove, wander, and assert itself the way a black bear is instinctively programmed to do so. Such a home is equivalent to imprisonment — nine year’s incarceration, to be exact, this being the number of years this bear lived on this property. Think you could live in a space that size for nearly a decade without going mad?

This woman was a mother, and unfortunately her children witnessed the attack, another psychological horror heaped upon this tragedy. The location itself is not some sort of circus-animal rescue operation. According to an NBC.com report out of Philadelphia, the woman’s husband owns an exotic pets operation, and his license to possess such creatures expired in 2008. This pet-business operator also listed a leopard, jaguar, cougar, and two African wild cats in his recent possession.

To whom does one sell this type of pet? Philly underworld types? Pittsburgh Steeler defensive linemen who like to have a pet they can wrestle with?

I’ve never been seized by the desire to own a jaguar, wolf, or other big wild mammal. But clearly some people are. That’s a really bad idea, because anybody who thinks they can provide a decent home for seven feet of snarling lethality is nuts. Selling large predators to such batty people is also a bad idea. A state or commonwealth licensing the deal is also an extremely stupid idea, and one that is apparently legit here in the Keystone State.

Please — just buy a Rottweiler and a gun and be happy. Don’t go dragging cage-mad wild animals into fantasies of Tarzanian escapades in your backyard or penthouse.

via Pet bear kills Pennsylvania woman – CNN.com.