What Happened To The Exotic Animals In Ohio

ZANESVILLE, Ohio — For Steve Blake it's a commencement-grade school photograph of his son from decades agone.

It was always one of Blake'southward favorites, that is, until Oct. 18, 2011. That was the day Blake helped with the killing of 48 exotic animals at the Terry Thompson subcontract in Zanesville, Ohio — nigh 55 miles east of Columbus, Ohio — driving a truck full of police officers who were shooting the animals.

"He had on a yellow shirt with a tiger on information technology," said Blake, who at the fourth dimension served as a sergeant with the Muskingum County (Ohio) Sheriff'southward Part only has since retired. "I yet get almost one-half teared upwardly over that. It just reminds me of that. He'll exist 39 years old this year."

The Zanesville animate being escape, where Thompson freed his animals before taking his own life, unfolded in an evening. But for those who were at that place, its marking will terminal a lifetime. Few seemed anxious to talk nigh it, only many of those who were there volition talk, and talk, about that night once asked. And they've been asked to talk about it — a lot.

Friend of exotic-beast owner writes book about killings

"We go to different trainings and things of that nature, and we terminate upward having to introduce ourselves and someone says 'hey that'southward where those animals were!,' " said Ryan Williams, a sheriff's deputy who served on the special response team that patrolled the property killing the animals.

For neighbour Sam Kopchak, the memory of that gloomy evening is as precipitous five years later equally if information technology happened yesterday.

"I picture the horses running in a circle, I picture the lion," said Kopchak, who came face-to-face with an African lion continuing but outside his pasture.

For Jack Hanna, director emeritus of the Columbus Zoo & Aquarium, information technology was the warning signs as he rushed to the scene from an result in Pennsylvania.

"The starting time time it hit me in the face was when I saw the signs on the interstate that said 'animals loose call 911,' " Hanna said. "When I saw the sign, my stomach dropped, and I knew the next 15 miles were going to be hard for me."

It'southward non clear when exactly Thompson freed his animals that twenty-four hours. But the start person to know something was amiss was Kopchak, a retired instructor tending to a horse he bought ix days earlier.

"I saw a black figure up there and I said 'What the heck is that,' " Kopchak said. And and then Kopchak saw the lion along his fence line. "He was huge."

Ohio exotic beast owner speaks out 1st fourth dimension since ordeal

Kopchak used his cellphone, which didn't get a great bespeak, to call his elderly mother in the nearby house they shared, instructing her to call 911.

The "what ifs" linger for Kopchak.

Kopchak went out at 4:40 p.m. What would have happened if he went out 5 minutes later? Would he have seen annihilation had he gone exterior five minutes earlier?

If he went out earlier, information technology could have been a long time before anyone else saw the animals and called government, and more of Thompson's lions, tigers, bears, wolves and other animals probably would accept escaped from the area, said Muskingum Sheriff Matt Lutz. Equally it turned out, not a single officer or member of the public was injured by the animals, which largely stayed on Thompson'southward fenced property or remained in the immediate area.

"We got very lucky," Lutz said.

Lutz has never had whatever regrets about giving the lodge for the loose animals to be killed, he said.

"There wasn't annihilation else that could take been washed," Lutz said. "Nosotros couldn't let the animals escape off that farm and injure someone."

The animals were dangerous, he said.

Special response team members had spotted a lion sitting in a muzzle that had been cut open, Williams said. Deputies attempted to use the plastic fasteners carried as hand cuffs to secure a piece of fencing over the opening so the animal would not have to be harmed, he said. Instead, the panthera leo of a sudden avant-garde toward the opening and had to be shot, Williams said.

"To meet the head and shoulders coming out of that hole with u.s.a. being within ii to three feet is an image I'thou not going to forget," he said.

Hundreds of exotic animals registered in Ohio

What Lutz carries now is pride the situation was independent without a death or injury, and a few lessons he conveys the 4 to five times a year he's asked to speak to other police force enforcement agencies about the incident. One is to brand every attempt to accost a potential issue, such as Thompson's private zoo, before something gets out of hand, he said.

"Any fourth dimension you know about something in your canton that is a thorn in your side, you should practise what you lot can to pull it out," Lutz said.

Indeed, the sheriff's office responded to more than than 30 calls related to Thompson in the five years earlier the incident, ranging from horses and cattle repeatedly being loose, to a sighting of a lion running loose, to an creature cruelty investigation that raised concerns well-nigh Thompson keeping such animals. In hindsight, Lutz said he wishes land officials would take instituted effective exotic animal regulations sooner. A law was put in identify in Ohio after the Zanesville incident, putting meaning restrictions on the keeping of such animals.

"It was kind of a volcano just waiting to erupt," he said.

Hanna, who gives as many every bit l talks a year on animals, said he is still regularly asked nigh the brute escape — and the shooting of the animals. He has not wavered in his belief that information technology was the correct affair to exercise.

"All I can tell them is it had to be done," he said.

Information technology was a phenomenon no 1 was hurt, he said.

"It was a terrible affair, but you have to say the good Lord was with everybody," Hanna said. "If they hadn't gotten to those animals immediately, there would have been a loss of human life, it would accept happened."

Year afterwards, effects of exotic-animal tragedy still felt

Kopchak said he is glad wild animals no longer alive next door.

The Thompson firm has been put up for auction by Terry Thompson's widow, Marian, who could not be reached for this story despite calls to relatives and a note left at the home. The real manor list makes no mention of the animals one time kept on the grounds and throughout the 3,728-square-foot habitation, which features an in-basis pool, game room and bucolic views.

Kopchak said he doesn't get many calls about the incident anymore. But his friends still often greet him the style they have for the by five years, he said.

"Seen whatever lions or bears lately?"

Kopchak said he's happy to report the respond is "no."

Follow Adrian Burns on Twitter: @BurnsAdrian

Scary safari in Ohio ends with carnage, questions

Source: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation-now/2016/10/14/ohio-exotic-animal-release-witnesses/92058120/

Posted by: striplinprivent.blogspot.com

Share this post