Palmer is not to be found.
By Raif Karerat
WASHINGTON, DC: As a Minnesota dentist who killed a beloved African lion named Cecil continues to weather the scornful wrath of social media and celebrities around the globe, police in Zimbabwe have said they urgently wish to speak with him.
Emmanuel Fundira, the president of the Safari Operators Association of Zimbabwe, confirmed at a news conference on Tuesday that Dr. Walter Palmer is wanted for the death of Cecil the lion but that his whereabouts were unknown, reported the Daily Mail on June 29.
Police spokeswoman Charity Charamba said “we are looking for Palmer” who allegedly paid $55,000 for a big game permit and traveled from his home town of Minneapolis to Africa in order to murder a lion.
Meanwhile, Stateside, U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum, a Minnesota Democrat, has called for an investigation by the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to see whether any U.S. laws were violated, USA Today revealed Wednesday.
Cecil was allegedly lured with bait out of the national park, where he is protected by law, to private property where Palmer then shot him with his compound bow and arrow. However, Cecil was only wounded, and after two days of being tracked, he was found and shot with a gun.
According to the Zimbabwe Conservation Task Force (ZCTF), the hunt began on July 6.
“They went hunting at night with a spotlight and they spotted Cecil,’ said the ZCTF’s Johnny Rodrigues. “They tied a dead animal to their vehicle to lure Cecil out of the park and they scented an area about half a kilometer from the park.”
The corpse was later found skinned and with the head hacked off as a trophy.
Speaking to the Star Tribune on Tuesday morning, Palmer said he was unaware of Cecil’s fame and expressed regret but denied any illegality, laying the blame firmly on his guides, two of whom are slated for prosecution.
Professional Zimbabwean hunter Theo Bronkhorst and local landowner Honest Ndlovu are due to appear in court this week on poaching charges for allegedly aiding in Cecil’s killing.
Meanwhile, Palmer has shuttered his dental practice and a makeshift memorial of stuffed animals has amassed in front of the Bloomington, Minn. Office. Two separate protests are also scheduled to take place in front of the closed dentist office on Wednesday afternoon, reported local news station KARE.
The beloved big cat was a local favorite and well known to tourists and researchers as well.
“Cecil was the most confident lion you ever met,” Brent Stapelkamp, a researcher with Oxford University’s lion project in the Hwange National Park for nine years, told The Telegraph. “He knew he was the biggest on the block”.
After Cecil was first identified in 2008 or 2009, the lion with the distinctive black-tinged mane soon became a familiar sight to visitors to Hwange park, where an estimated 500 lions live.
“He was not really playful – more regal,” Stapelkamp recalled.