crime

16-year-old boy arrested for cutting cage wire mesh at zoo, allowing 70 monkeys to escape

16 Comments

Police in Chiba City have arrested a 16-year-old high school boy on suspicion of vandalism after about 70 Japanese macaque monkeys escaped from their enclosure at a zoo in Futtsu City in June. The primates fled through a hole that was cut in the wire mesh fencing at Takagoyama Shizen Zoo, Sankei Shimbun reported.

On the morning of June 10, a zoo caretaker found a hole with a diameter of 30 centimeters in the caged enclosure. The wire mesh fence had been cut with a sharp tool.

Police said a car belonging to the boy’s friend was caught on surveillance camera footage, which led them to believe that he was driven to the zoo. Following his arrest on Wednesday, the boy said he picked up the tool while heading to the zoo. The boy’s friends are also being investigated for their involvement in the incident.

In September 2019, the city-run zoo’s metal fences were toppled by Typhoon Faxai. At that time, the primates managed to escape but were eventually recaptured.

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16 Comments
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While I'd probably guess its for giggles, this kid could've seriously hurt himself from those fleeing monkeys. I dare him to try cutting the wires of the big cat enclosures.

-4 ( +1 / -5 )

A happy monkey is a free monkey...

11 ( +12 / -1 )

This kid was only monkeying around but now we have 70 primates on the loose and going bananas around Chiba. The good thing is at least they should be easy to spot unless they had money or credit cards to buy clothes so as to disguise themselves. Keep your eyes peeled for some pretty short hairy guys who may possibly be sharply dressed but smell like they've been on a safari their whole lives.

6 ( +6 / -0 )

Amazing. Easily the best headline I've seen here in ages.

Too bad the monkeys didn't find their way into the hills.

When I lived in southern Akita years ago, a monkey came down from the hills in Yokote, ran into some little granny's yaoyasan vegetable market, and went bananas flipping all the tables over and tossing fruit all into the street. He grabbed an armful of mikans and hit the bricks. It made all the local papers.

3 ( +3 / -0 )

Japanese zoo’s are a disgrace. It is a naive but kind and brave action of a kid with a heart. Hopefully he gets released quickly or somebody will have to cut the wires around his cage.

He does not deserve arrest but A stern warning that the thought to help animals was right, the action maybe less so.

3 ( +5 / -2 )

When I lived in southern Akita years ago, a monkey came down from the hills in Yokote, ran into some little granny's yaoyasan vegetable market, and went bananas flipping all the tables over and tossing fruit all into the street. He grabbed an armful of mikans and hit the bricks. It made all the local papers.

Macaques are nasty little brutes and will do worse than that.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

Heroic.

Keep animals (and humans) out of cages.

4 ( +6 / -2 )

A happy monkey is a free monkey...

And a free monkey is a happy monkey.

3 ( +4 / -1 )

Watch 12 monkeys with Bruce Willis and Brad Pitt. Set them free, zoos are prisons for animals. Zoos were created for the amusement of people that want to see exotic animals but be protected from them. Zoos say they are doing animals a favor and saving them from extinction. Maybe we should round up a lot of ethnically different groups of humans and isolate them in in human zoos to protect us all from extinction. Maybe that is why we are going to colonize Mars??? LOL

3 ( +4 / -1 )

a zoo caretaker found a hole with a diameter of 30 centimeters in the caged enclosure. 

They're wiry little things under that fur, so 30cm would easily be enough. Two at once possibly.

Top marks to them for noticing the hole and getting out. There must be some kind of "Lads! Check this out!!" expression in monkey speak.

1 ( +1 / -0 )

Just saw some monkeys while driving. They were not in concrete and metal cages. I could enjoy their beauty.

2 ( +3 / -1 )

The rise of the Young Activist... :)

1 ( +2 / -1 )

Cheeky monkey!

0 ( +0 / -0 )

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