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I think we're all rambling on this one, Boomer. This is just an awful thing to have happen and to have the animal pts for this would just be compounding an already sad situation. I'm so relieved that the decision was made to let it rest.

Very good points, silknlace.

SilknLace,

You have expressed most of what I have been thinking...

My condolences go to the family!

This was a wild animal, I am glad that this was taken into consideration, they are wild, they do whatever they do for their reasons, is the risk when dealing with them.

Again, condolences to the family! *Hugs*

Peg & Bruce....

Thank You for your logical yet emotional insite of this tragedy.
I have dealt with reptile rescue for years and that too
can be a very misunderstood interaction with a large animal
.... most large reptile handlers will tell you that when
something goes wrong and one gets hurt by these giants,
it is nearly always the humans "fault" so to speak...
When Stephan took this job and his cousin asked him to
work with these massive furballs, they both knew that
every second around them was a risk... even with the
oldest, most trusted, well trained animal there can be
an oops.... good lord, an animal that large could simply
slip and fall and crush a human in a fatal spot... I
would be stunned to find that "Rocky" had one spec of
anger in his actions on Tuesday. It appears that Randy Miller
and his family have been doing right by these critters for
years (face it, we all love to see the wild animals up
close, on screen)... they have been checked out thouroughly
it seems, even in the last couple days.... now it's time to
let them all (including the animals)have time to heal.
In my opinion PETA needs to hush and let them do what they
have been doing right for years. These animals have been
raised to interact with humans, be fed and cared for... they
can never be released to "act naturally" because for them
all they know is being fed and cared for...let them be and
let them do what Stephen Miller gave his life doing.

I had an incident a few years back that came back to the
forfront in my mind through all this.... a large rescue
burmese python that I had cared for for a few years (still
see him frequently) was lazing in his enclosure... he has
always been one of my favorites as he can be so patient
at outreach events, kids will too often slap at him, pick
at his scales and we have to say "uh uh! thats not nice!"
...yet he never jerks or pulls away.... they want to "feel"
his tongue when he flicks so he accomadates when they put
their hand out.....
we are always very specific in telling people that they must
be sure they don't smell like the pet rabbit from home if
they want to interact with any large snake or lizard as this
can be confusing to the critter and lead to a "mistake" in
identity... our rescue organization does lots of outreach
events and has never had an "accident".... but same as
Randy Millers place, we are always much too aware that it
can happen.
Well with this same python, I had a private firts, last and only mistake... he is only around 70 lbs (all muscle) and
about 13'... I had finished up some major clean up work
and was calling it a day, getting ready to head home as
I walked by his enclosure...he was looking his usual adorable
self so I band down and unlocked his enclosure to give a him
a loving pat (what an idiot I was)...well that was really dumb
since I had just spent the last half hour over at the rodent
compound cleaning up.... he was apparently asleep as I gave
him a pat on his side as I said "how's our big boy!"...
mind you these guys have no eyelids so you can't tell if they
are asleep and they don't hear airborne sound but we talk to
them anyway.....
well he popped up his head, took a sniff and snapped to
attention...right that second it flashed into my head that
I had just made a terrible mistake... I tried to quickly
remove my hand as I reaked of rodent plus I'm warm like
a rodent...so to his simpleminded calculations, I'm now FOOD!
....the second I went to jerk back, he overcame his
momentary confusion (one thing didn't "fit", rodents never
"pat" him).... he snapped forward wrapping his 180 teeth
around my wrist and attempted to pull and coil his 13' body
around his meal (my arm).... this began maybe a 7 to 8 minute
tug-o-war with me in tear, begging him to let go... my hubby
was there in a split second hollering for another volunteer
to get the two plastic putty knives... he gently slid the
blades in bewteen his teeth and my wrist, one for the upper
and then one for the lower.... I'm bleeding like an open
fire hydrant all the while begging "please let go son"....
I felt horrible! because this big beautiful python had no
clue why his "meal" was being forcefully removed...
it ended up taking a while to heal, a few weeks later an
x-ray confirmed that the remaining numbness to my pinky is
due to a crushed nerve....
I still feel bad for the big guy whenever I see him because
it was completely my fault that he was placed in the confusing
situation where he made this mistake... he had never bit a
human before and has never since... because he would never,
ever knowingly bite a human being... we just don't "smell"
like anything he would want to eat. He didn't ask to be born
into captivity but he was... he can live to be 25 or even
35 years old and it's up to us to take care of those critters
that we allow to be born into our human prisons.
We love them and try to bring education about these reptilains
and show people why we love them but also why they should NOT
be bred to be pets!....
they live long, grow huge and need to eat things that most
households can't stomach knowing!

Good Lord! I'm sorry about the diahrea of the fingers!
if you did, thanks for reading!