A Pennsylvania woman cleaning out a bear cage on Sunday night was mauled and killed by the 350-pound captive black bear who was confined inside. To compound the tragedy, her children and a neighbor's children witnessed the horrific incident and called for help. A neighbor arrived and shot and killed the bear, reports MSNBC.
The woman, Kelly Ann Walz, 37, was pronounced dead at the scene, reports MSNBC. She had entered the cage, tossing dog food inside to distract the bear while she attempted to clean the 15x15 steel and concrete cage.
"Why this woman chose to go in the same area that the bear was in is beyond me," Tim Conway of the Pennsylania Game Commission, told MSNBC. "It's a fatal mistake. These things are not tame animals, they're wild animals."
Walz's husband, Michael Walz, has had a license to keep and sell exotic animals since 1994, but his license had expired in 2008, reports MSNBC. In 2007, he reported to authorities that "he kept a lion, cougar, jaguar, tiger, black bear, leopard and two servals on the property in Ross Township, a rural area in the Poconos Mountains, about 20 miles northeast of Allentown," states MSNBC.
Comments
Uh, why haven't the the big cats been removed from these irresponsible people. Keeping a 350 lb bear captive in a 15 x 15 cell is tremendously cruel.
As hard as it is for me to say it, I usually side with the animals in these cases.
A 15 x 15 cell? What was the bears crime? How long was this prison sentence for?
Any sentient being would go insane condemned to a life like this.
Sometimes death is not the worst thing to happen to an animal.
It is terrible that children witnessed this event. It's also terrible that they witnessed animals being treated this way day after day. I wonder what they will take away from this?
I can't believe how stupid people can be. Why would they keep this poor animal caged up? This is the perfect example of 'what comes around, goes around' Rest in Peace
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