Game Hunter Loathed By Animal Activists Fall to
His Death While Shooting Birds.
Ponzetto, a veterinarian who received media attention after
posing with a photograph of a lion he had killed, fell to his death during a
hunting trip in Italy.
On 13 December 2016, the tabloid The Sun published an article reporting the death
of Luciano Ponzetto, a 55-year-old veterinarian who drew the ire of
the Internet in November 2015 after posing for a photograph with a lion he had
killed:
A big
game hunter who sparked worldwide fury when he posed next to a lion he had
killed has died after falling 100ft down a ravine while shooting birds.
Vet
Luciano Ponzetto, 55, received death threats and hate mail after he posted the
snaps of him with the lion on social media last year.
He
insisted he had done nothing wrong but the controversy forced him to step down
as the medical director of a kennel business after being slammed for shooting Cecil the lion despite working with animals.
Officials
say he was out hunting with pals when he slipped on ice and fell down the
ravine at Colle delle Oche in hills above the Italian city of Turin.
While
several media outlets reported on Ponzetto's death, the circumstances of his
demise (a veterinarian infamous for big game hunting photographs, who died
during a hunting trip) were too surreal for some to immediately believe.
However,
the report is genuine. News about Ponzetto's death was first reported by
Italian outlets such as Corriere Della Sera and Torina Today on 10 December 2016. According to
those reports, Ponzetto was "chasing prey" when he slipped on ice and
fell more than a dozen meters into a deep ravine:
As he
often did, Ponzetto left early in the morning for a hunting trip with a friend
in the valley of the Rio Giassetto. The accident occurred at an altitude of
2,200 meters in the valley of the Colle delle Oche, above Pianprato. The vet,
who was well equipped, being a decent climber, lost his balance and fell
tumbling into a deep ravine a few dozen meters.
Police
and mountaineers found his body after about an hour and a half of searching,
and say that he appeared to have died instantly.
Social media sites immediately picked up on his
death and described it as “karma”.
One wrote: “I don’t quite see how this man could
have worked as a vet and then
happily gone out and killed animals.
“He should have had more respect.”
An Italian police spokesman said: “We were called by
the mountain rescue services
who had been alerted to the incident by someone
who was out with him.
“His body was recovered by helicopter and taken to a
local hospital.
“It looks like he slipped and fell when he was out
hunting.
“He died instantly and there was nothing that could
be done.”
The case drew comparisons with that of legendary
Cecil the Lion who was shot dead by an American game hunter in Zimbabwe last
year.
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