[FEL-L] CA - Tiger mauls caretaker at actress' animal sanctuary

[BigCatSimba at aol.com]

CA - Tiger mauls caretaker at actress' animal sanctuary
 
By Richard Winton, Los Angeles Times Staff Writer 
December 4, 2007 
 
A tiger living at actress Tippi Hedren's wildlife sanctuary mauled a 
caretaker Monday afternoon, leaving the man in critical condition with multiple bites, 
a Los Angeles County Fire Department spokesman said.

The incident occurred about 3 p.m. at Hedren's Shambala Preserve in Acton, 
which houses about 70 African lions, Siberian and Bengal tigers, leopards, 
servals, mountain lions and bobcats. 


In an interview, Hedren said the 40-year-old caretaker was jumped by a tiger 
as the man was cleaning the animal's enclosure. Fire officials airlifted the 
man, identified as Chris Orr, to a hospital. He was listed in critical but 
stable condition, said county Fire Department spokesman Brendon Peart.

"It's a terrible, terrible thing that has happened," Hedren said, adding that 
many of the tigers in her sanctuary come from abused backgrounds. "Who knows 
what happened to this tiger? People have kept them in closets, basements. Two 
of them were kept in air-conditioning systems."

The tiger in Monday's incident is a 4-year-old male. Hedren said state Fish 
and Game officers visited the sanctuary to investigate the attack. 

"It came walking over to them," she said of the tiger. "What makes these 
animals so dangerous is for no reason at all this kind of accident can happen. It 
isn't the tiger's fault. It is the fault of the people breeding these animals 
in the first place that leads them to be here."

She described the tiger in Monday's incident as a "mutt" that was probably 
bred in the United States as an exotic pet. The tiger is one of the youngest at 
the shelter and doesn't have a history of violence, she said.

Hedren said the preserve's cats live out their lives in enclosures and are 
not trained.

Hedren, best known for her starring role in the Alfred Hitchcock film "The 
Birds," has been pushing legislation for years that would crack down on people 
who keep tigers as pets and that would also prohibit commercial breeding of the 
animals. At a congressional hearing in 2000, Hedren; her daughter, actress 
Melanie Griffith; and actress Bo Derek spoke out on the issue. All three have 
been attacked by big cats. At age 19, Griffith required 50 stitches in her face 
when a lion jumped her. And Derek was bitten on the shoulder in 1981 during 
the filming of "Tarzan, the Ape Man."

Monday's mauling marks the latest of several incidents in recent years 
involving local animal sanctuaries.

In 2005, the owners of a Moorpark animal sanctuary were arrested for 
allegedly allowing a 352-pound Siberian tiger to escape and prowl suburban 
neighborhoods for four weeks while denying that the cat was theirs. They pleaded guilty 
earlier this year.

Also in 2005, a chimp at a Kern County sanctuary attacked its former owner, 
who had driven from West Covina to celebrate the animal's 39th birthday. St. 
James Davis suffered critical injuries. 

Hedren's sanctuary is about 40 miles north of Los Angeles. The organization's 
website has photos and biographies of many of the big cats, who have names 
such as Daisy and Boo.
 
_http://www.latimes.com/news/local/los_angeles_metro/la-me-tiger4dec04,1,47063
00.story?track=rss_ 
(http://www.latimes.com/news/local/los_angeles_metro/la-me-tiger4dec04,1,4706300.story?track=rss) 





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