Walter Palmer, a 55-year-old year old American dentist paid $50,000 dollars to hunt down and kill a lion. He accomplished his mission but he is going to pay for his unconventional hobby, hunting wild game, for the rest of his life.

Already, he’s been forced into hiding because wildlife activists all around the world and especially those living in the US, are not happy with the pain he inflicted on Cecil, the beloved Zimbabwean lion he killed weeks ago, first hitting it with an arrow, then letting it suffer for all of 40 hours before shooting and beheading it. 

Palmer’s two homes have been vandalized, as has his medical practice and given all the negative publicity he has been getting lately, it won’t be long before he loses all his patients. I was thinking that even if I had a terrible toothache, I would not pay the ‘lion killer’ as Dr Palmer is now being referred to as, to treat me and I could be wrong but I don’t think going forward, many potential clients will be comfortable with him. 

I still can’t reconcile with the fact that a dentist would even have time to go poaching in a country thousands of miles away. I know doctors to be serious and focused individuals and to read that Dr Palmer is an avid hunter sort of doesn’t fit a typical medic’s profile. I wonder if he extracted some of his patients’ teeth just for fun along the years! That would be terrible. 

One of my friends who happens to be vegetarian thinks we’re all overreacting and shouldn’t be so hard on Dr Palmer, since we can only enjoy our meat, red or white after chicken, cows, goats and all are slaughtered, so to speak. I told her we don’t find joy in the kill or pose for pictures the way Palmer does. I’ve been thinking of an appropriate punishment for this doctor that would deter others from inflicting this kind of cruelty on animals. 

Some Zimbabweans are calling for his extradition so he can be tried in the country where he committed the crime but that may not happen, mainly because Zimbabwe issues hunting permits for wildlife, including lions, elephants and buffaloes and Palmer insists his hunt was legal. But even if he were fined for illegal hunting, all he would have to pay is $20,000. 

He’s a rich man and remember he already forked out $50,000 to kill just one lion so I have no doubt he would easily pay the fine and escape the 10 year mandatory sentence for illegal hunting. Some Zimbabwean officials themselves have already mentioned that they prefer the revenue which they say helps wildlife conservation efforts, something I doubt, given the high levels of corruption and greed, and which could in fact explain why Dr Palmer was allowed into the park in the first place. 

But that’s a debate for another day. As things stand, I don’t think Dr Palmer will serve any jail time. It would have been nice if Cecil had taught him a lesson though, in typical hunter becomes hunted style and maybe then, other humans would have learned never to mess with wildlife.

Rest In Peace Cecil.