Of course you didn’t. And witnesses will confirm that you were politely observing the animals at the San Francisco Zoo while thoughtfully considering their majesty— but more on that later. Finally, the parents of mauling victim Carlos Sousa received the phone call they pleaded for:
One of two young men who survived the Christmas Day tiger attack at the San Francisco Zoo that killed their 17-year-old friend told the teen’s mother that they had not taunted the big cat, the mother said today.
“He said, ‘We didn’t do nothing. We were just normal kids at the zoo,’ ” Marilza Sousa said after talking with her son’s friend Paul Dhaliwal, 19, of San Jose.
“That’s what happened, just dancing, talking, laughing like normal kids,” said Sousa, whose son Carlos Sousa Jr. was killed by the Siberian tiger. “I believe him.”
…The brothers have so far refused to speak publicly about the incident. Sousa said Paul Dhaliwal had told her he has remained silent because he is still tormented by the incident, not because his attorney has told him not to talk. [sfgate]
Both brothers attended Sousa’s funeral, which is what their friend’s grieving parents hoped for.
But there’s still more to this story and it contradicts the recounting of events provided by the Dhaliwal brothers. A witness came forward, to describe what the boys were doing that day at the zoo:
Jennifer Miller, who was at the zoo with her husband and two children that ill-fated Christmas afternoon, said she saw four young men at the big-cat grottos - and three of them were teasing the lions a short time before the tiger’s bloody rampage that killed 17-year-old Carlos Sousa Jr.
“The boys, especially the older one, were roaring at them. He was taunting them,” the San Francisco woman said. “They were trying to get that lion’s attention. … The lion was bristling, so I just said, ‘Come on, let’s get out of here’ because my kids were disturbed by it.”
…Her family was looking at the lions when the young men stopped beside them at the big-cat grottos - five outdoor exhibits attached to the Lion House. The young men started roaring at the lions and acting “boisterous” to get their attention, said Miller, who added that she watched the four for five minutes or so a little after 4 p.m. “It was why we left,” she said. “Their behavior was disturbing. They kept doing it.”
Sousa refrained from such tactics, Miller said. “He wasn’t roaring. He wasn’t taunting them,” she recalled. “He kept looking at me apologetically like, ‘I’m sorry, I know we are being stupid.’ “ [sfgate]
Experts on big cats continue to agree with what Jack Hanna said; I quoted Hanna in my last post as being skeptical about the boys’ innocence.
“First and foremost, people need to be educated. We need to respect them accordingly,” said Jonathan Kraft, who runs Keepers of the Wild in Arizona, which has more than 20 tigers. In the San Francisco escape, “I would bet my reputation that the animal was taunted.” [CBS5]
More sketchiness (and the reason why many continue to doubt the brothers Dhaliwal):
Sources told The Chronicle that paramedics taking the Dhaliwal brothers to the zoo by ambulance had overheard Kulbir Dhaliwal tell his brother, “Don’t tell them what we did.”
The sources also said Paul Dhaliwal was intoxicated at the time of the incident, having used marijuana and consumed enough liquor to have a blood-alcohol level above the 0.08 legal limit for driving. The older brother also had been drinking and using marijuana around the time the tiger escaped, the sources said.
Police say they spotted an empty vodka bottle inside the car the group took to the zoo that day, but investigators cannot legally search the vehicle without the Dhaliwals’ permission.
A person who picked up the phone today at the Dhaliwals’ home hung up without answering questions. [SFGate]
The Dhaliwals’ have retained the services of Mark Geragos, the man who represented luminaries like Michael Jackson and Winona Ryder, and murderers like Scott Peterson. Geragos is obviously fighting tooth-and-claw to get the car back, unsearched. As of yesterday, he’s losing:
In anticipation of a lawsuit over the fatal tiger attack at the San Francisco Zoo, the City Attorney’s Office obtained a temporary court order Tuesday to secure the cell phone records and car of the two brothers mauled in the attack.
While zoo officials have stopped short of accusing Paul and Kulbir Dhaliwal of taunting Tatiana the tiger, they have repeatedly said something must have provoked it to jump from its enclosure. Police have confirmed that an empty bottle of vodka could be seen on the front seat of the car, and city attorney investigators have expressed interest in images captured on the brothers’ cell phones. [Examiner]
I’d love to know what their cameraphones may have captured, wouldn’t you? Isn’t that the point of all this Jackass-inspired-stupidity? To document it recklessly and later upload it to Facebook?
The order comes on the day the brothers were scheduled to pick up their property from police, said City Attorney Dennis Herrera, who referred to the emergency hearing as a “race against the clock.” The brothers’ lawyer, Mark Geragos, refused to comment Monday on whether the brothers would give the permission needed to give police access to their property. He also rejected claims that the two have been uncooperative.
Referring to correspondence between Geragos and himself, Herrera accused Geragos of “just stalling until his clients could get to the Police Department to claim their cell phones and car. [Examiner]
As for the New York Post’s screeching headline about the “slingshot theory”:
In the ongoing chaos that is the aftermath of the fatal tiger mauling at the San Francisco Zoo, the plot has thickened, or thinned I guess, depending. ABC7’s intrepid rabblerouser Dan Noyes has seemingly debunked the mighty New York Post report, based on an unnamed source, that brothers Amritpal Dhaliwal and Kulbir Dhaliwal were taunting 350-pound Tatiana the Siberian tiger using slingshots prior to her escape and fatal mauling of their companion, 17-year-old Carlos Sousa Jr.
“Today, we received official word from the San Francisco Police Department. Sgt. Steve Manina told us he checked with inspectors working the case and “there were no slingshots on the kids, in the zoo or ambulances that night.” No slingshots.” [SFWeekly]
Developing…we’ll try and keep you posted.
