Pet Chimp rips the face off of a woman and is shot dead

Here's the article.    And here's the Video of the 911 call.

Warning - the 911 is graphic, you can hear the chimp screaming and can only imagine the horror of what the poor lady was going through.

IMO, the owner is soley responsible.  She should not have a pet chimp in the first place AND she shouldn't give it wine and take it upon herself to give it xanex to mellow it out!

Did you guys here about this? What are your thoughts?

oh ugh, that is just horrific.

poor woman, and poor chimp.

when will people learn that wild animals are NOT PETS!

that's demented.

Original Post by jules817:

oh ugh, that is just horrific.

poor woman, and poor chimp.

when will people learn that wild animals are NOT PETS!

 

 

My heart goes out to the victim and her family, l hope she comes out of this alright. l wish the owners were the ones mauled...........wild animals belong in the wild people!

There is a reason why chimps are only used in commercials when they are young ... by the time they are 7 or 8 they are virtually uncontrollable.  I saw a documentary on chimps used in TV once, they are almost always physically abused to get them to do what their trainiers want. It's very sad, both for the chimp and for the victim.

i saw that (or a similar) doc, too, sybil.  it was awful.

i saw a doc not too long ago about people keeping small monkey's as pets and treating them like children.

they had all their teeth removed because they couldn't stop them from biting.

it was absolutely awful.

Yet another animal suffers.......... 

I'm sorry but at what point does it EVER seem like a good idea to keep a wild animal as pet? even if you keep it as a pet WHY would you let it have free run/be let near strangers at all????  I love tigers , they are my absolute favourite animal, would i own one? no. because i'm not an absolute psycho. Seriously.

Original Post by andie-joe:

Yet another animal suffers.......... 

It's not even fair. :(

This chimp is better behaved than my 16 year old, what are you guys talking about

At the time of the 2003 incident, police said the Herolds told them the chimpanzee was toilet trained, dressed himself, took his own bath, ate at the table and drank wine from a stemmed glass. He also brushed his teeth using a Water Pik, logged onto the computer to look at pictures, and watched television using the remote control, police said.

As a biologist who loves animals, this is something that frustrates me to no end. I love chimps, other monkeys and wolves as much as the next person. However, some people "love" them so much that they keep them as pets and it usually ends badly for the owner, the animal or both. WILD ANIMALS ARE NOT PETS!!!

/end rant

sounds like this was a show-business chimp and the family was trying to provide a good retirement.  i doubt very much that they had anything but the best of intentions.

God she had him for years and years and he never hurt anyone, people train wild animals and they never do anything wrong and then there is a handful that snap when something happens and everyone acts like it's the owners fault for having a wild animal as a pet. It was an accident. The chimp was a pet. It is no one's fault. It does not mean people can't own wild animals. Should they? I don't know. It depends on the situation, the animal, and the person. Me being someone that is looking to work with large exotic animals as a career, I would like to think something like an attack can be prevented. It can't. That is the risk you take. And I do not think taking that risk and owning an animal for 15 years before it acts out is wrong. I wish all wild animals were born and raised in their normal enviorment, but that is not the case, due to injuries, illness, hunting, their enviorments being destroyed, not being raised by their parents, alot of wild animals are not born into their natural world. They are born into our world. With people that have to raise them or they will not survive

Pets are considered "pets" and "safe" for a reason. They have been domesticated; selectively bred over generations to be involved in the lives of humans.

Wild animals are wild animals. They can snap at ANY moment. Instincts take over whether we like it or not. The same goes for pitbulls (and similar breeds) that have been selectively bred for years to be fighting dogs.

There is a difference between someone raising an animal for it's survival/rehabilitation and owning one as a pet. Owning a wild animal as a pet is nothing beyond selfish.

That's somewhat true, but what tends to happen in these cases is that the owner stops thinking of these animals as the potentially dangerous things they are.  A lot of times they don't even think of them as animals anymore.  In my opinion, there's nothing inherently wrong with people owning exotics.  The problems come in because, generally, people don't have the resources to support the animal, treat them like they're a normal pet or worse a child, and/or don't understand the responsiblity they're about to undertake.  That doesn't mean it's impossible for someone to responsibly own one, it's just really really hard. 

Personally, I dont' believe that animals 'snap'; I think they react like animals.  Something set him off; what it was, who knows, but I seriously doubt this happened for no reason whatsoever.  That's not to say that I think the victim's at fault here.  The blame should go squarely on the owner for allowing the potential for this to happen to exist.

To clarify, I did mean snap in the terms you suggested, vultar. Instincts take over, etc.

i don't think it's okay to steal baby chimps and other animals away from their mothers and force them into slavery for our entertainment.  however, once that's done, those animals need to be cared for.  it's too bad that woman got her face ripped off, but chimp attacks are awfully rare compared to--say--dog attacks.  i mean - come on.

Why didn't they tranq it? I don't understand why bullets had to be used... the monkey was already stabbed. :/ Yes, the cop felt threatened (I would too) but why not tranq it? >_< I felt so sorry for it when I read it ran back to it's resting area to die... how horrible. :( I also don't understand why it wasn't leashed. And is it okay to give a monkey xanex? Maybe side effects from the medication set him off (confusion etc). Yes, she had it for 15 years. But she still had a wild animal for 15 years.

I always feel so terrible when an animal dies because of human ignorance. :(

On a happier note: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zVNTdWbVBgc

I agree with you, pgeorgian, that once you take an animal away from it's mother, have it be trained by humans, that it needs to be taken care of. Wild animals being used for entertainment sucks, to be blunt and unintelligiant sounding.

The responsibility of this lies with the owner. As vultar said, the chimp shouldn't have been treated like a normal pet, let alone a child. Maybe the owner was uneducated and misinformed (or perhaps obviously), but in any case...when you take an animal into your care and allow it free range like this animal clearly was, you take responsibilty for it's actions.

I'm so emotional when it comes to animals. That video made me tear up, cptbunny!