Sweet jesu..that poor woman who was attacked by that champanzee lost both eyes, her nose, and

[Skidmore]

part of her jaw. Just reported on MSNBC now. Chimpanzees belong in the wild, just like snakes, alligators, and other such "exotic" creatures.

[bdamomma]

1. omg that poor woman

wild animals belong in their own habitant.

[Ilsa]

2. I remember MSM saying she was critical. I had no idea the chimp had

torn her face apart like that. How horrible. It was really trying to kill her.

[LisaL]

33. Police didn't even recognize she was a woman when they arrived

on the scene. They thought she was a man, and said he had no face. So I knew it had to be really bad.

[boobooday]

3. That is horrific

What a freakin' tragedy.

[liberalmuse]

4. That is absolutely horrific!

Why do people keep wild animals, and are surprised when they do what wild animals do? And then the animal ends up getting shot, and some poor innocent person ends up maimed for life, or dead.

[a kennedy]

6. da.......THEY ARE WILD!!!

:eyes:

[NJmaverick]

5. OMG! What a horrible fate

[TwilightGardener]

7. What's really unsettling is that the chimp went for the most "human" parts--

the face, the hands. It wasn't like a polar bear or mountain lion trying to eat you because it's hungry--this was some kind of weird primate-to-primate thing that I don't understand.

[KittyWampus]

10. my observation as well. Someone posted another story about grown chimps who attacked

a man and also ate his face and hands off.

[dustbunnie]

12. Predators do go after the most vulnerable parts.

Head and neck mostly. Hand injuries are usually the result of defensive wounds. But they all do it. A mountain lion will go for the head, a grizzly bear likes to decapitate, can remove a moose's kepi with one good swat. The chimp wasn't a predator, but something set him off and he reacted in the aggressive way they all seem to.

[TwilightGardener]

15. I had to laugh about mountain lions going after the head--all cats do that, even

my little kittehs--that's how you snap the spinal cord and get your prey to stop moving. This chimp wasn't hungry, he just wanted to inflict pain and damage--it's very hard to understand why, so I chalk it up to an almost-human form of pointless violence.

[dustbunnie]

17. I giggled a little at your post.

My kittehs did that too, playfully though. (In retrospect, I hope so!!)

Am home sick with the flu so am reading everything left and right. The chimp was being treated for Lyme disease, so they're surmising the attack may have been instigated by his illness and/or medication. Plus the foolish woman apparently gave him Xanax just before the attack. Also, as they were saying, at this point he was a fully grown, 200-lb, sexually mature male, being handled like a baby human by a 70-year-old woman. He had nowhere to release his energy.

[Marrah_G]

25. Chimps are indeed predators

They actively hunt monkeys and have hunted humans in the past.

They specifically eat the hands and feet and face of their prey first.

They are not cute and cuddly.

[dysfunctional press]

27. i saw a documentary on chimps in thailand once- it showed a pack hunting a monkey...

and it was BRUTAL. when they caught it, they basically just ripped it apart and started eating it without bothering to kill it first.

[RollWithIt]

13. Chimps commonly attack the hands, nose, eyes, genitals, and rest of face....

If you're ever in a zoo with a large group of chimps if you look closely at their hands you should see at least one or two of them missing a few digits.

[backscatter712]

39. This is because chimps are very close to human.

They're very intelligent, they've done cool things like learning sign language and using tools. Travis, the chimp from this weeks story could use the toilet, watch TV and change channels with the remote control, could use a computer to look at pictures and so on.

They're almost as smart as humans, and that gives chimps and the other great apes a dark side.

Just like humans, they have emotions - love, which helps make them cute and cuddly, but they also feel jealousy and rage. And they're sexual - a male chimp will be very possessive of human women around him, and if a man walks into the room, the chimp does get jealous.

That's part of why chimps attack - they do the same thing human beings do - they very much have our dark side. And that's why they don't just attack, but they're incredibly vicious when they attack. They're just like us.

[Whoa_Nelly]

8. Are you sure you're not confusing two stories that MSNBC is using

in regard to the latest chimp attack? I can't find anything anywhere that states what you posted.

From the MSNBC website, an aside in the article about the latest on the Connecticut woman:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29255129/

<snip>
Previous incidents
Such attacks are rare, but they have happened before. In 2005, St. James and LaDonna Davis of West Covina, Calif., were visiting Moe, a 39-year-old chimp they had raised as a human, at a wildlife refuge the chimpanzee had been sent to by a court after he showed aggressive behavior in 1999. While they were feeding Moe birthday cake through a hole in his fenced enclosure, two adolescent chimpanzees somehow escaped from their own enclosure at the refuge and attacked the Davises.

In attempting to defend his wife, St. James Davis was savagely mauled, losing an eye and several fingers as well as sustaining other injuries. A ranger at the refuge shot and killed both chimps. Moe was not involved in the attack.

After Rossen’s report, the Davises and their attorney, Gloria Allred, spoke from California with TODAY’s Natalie Morales. Today St. James Davis wears a prosthetic nose and his face is scarred from the attack and the scores of surgeries he has undergone. His wife lost a thumb.

[dysfunctional press]

28. i've heard the same news stories about the woman in connecticut-

the chimp tore her face off. it's what they do.

[liberalmuse]

9. Oh, and I must add...

What kind of human being would think this sad, horrible story would be fodder for a comic? I don't even want to know, really. Knowing more details of what happened makes me all the more angry at that NY Post atrocity. The editor should be fired, along with the creator of that cartoon.

[TheCowsCameHome]

11. That is just terrible.

Words cannot describe my feelings if the report is true.

[gratuitous]

14. I'll go with the Rude Pundit's rule on pets

Don't have anything for a pet that you can't kill with your bare hands.

[metis]

16. chimp

OMG!! That poor woman. I hope the owner has a large bank account or good insurance. Why keep a wild animal as a pet?

[dysfunctional press]

18. it basically tore her face off.

they shouldn't be allowed to be kept as pets.

awhile back, when i was working at 'santa's village' a now-closed amusement park west of chicago- we had a temporary show that used chimps- and they were MEAN little suckers, and everyone had to give them a WIDE berth backstage when they were going between their dressing room and their performances.

[TwilightGardener]

19. I used to watch Jeff Corwin on Animal Planet, and he would handle

poisonous snakes and encounter all sorts of dangerous critters, but he really seemed to fear monkeys and chimps above all--very uneasy around them. That was very telling.

[Blue Diadem]

20. 14 surgeons worked on her. Poor woman.

I was glad to see she has a brother. I was wondering about her family and if there would be anyone there to give her comfort and support.

[Hugabear]

21. Chimpanzees are extremely dangerous animals - should NEVER be kept as pets!

I've watched enough nature shows about chimps to know that they are highly aggressive, very dangerous animals. You wouldn't keep a grizzly bear, mountain lion, or tiger for a pet, why keep a chimpanzee? They belong in the wild.

[geek tragedy]

24. I'd rather keep a mountain lion than a chimpanzee, to be

quite honest. A mountain lion, properly fed, might give one swat or bite because like all cats their wires get crossed sometimes.

Chimpanzees are almost human in their capacity for brutality and even murder.

[Retrograde]

42. I'll stick with house cats

A mountain lion is still a cat, and has a cat's instinct to chase and attack moving objects. People do occasionally get killed by mountain lions in California (wild ones), usually when they're out running by themselves. I wouldn't want to be around a 150-lb cat when it got spooked or annoyed - the damage a 10-lb housecat can do is quite enough for me.

[JSK]

31. Have you watched "Escape to Chimp Eden"

on the Animal Planet? Great show. Associated with Jane Goodall in Africa. They rescue and attempt to rehabilitate abused and neglected chimps. The stories are heartbreaking -- chimps who have been literally chained in cages for decades. One who didn't even know how to climb a tree. Anyway, that guy has a VERY healthy respect for these animals and reminds us often they they can kill you in an instant, despite their friendly demeanor. The scenes were he has to go into the cages are freakin' scary. The show hasn't been on for ages; I was wondering what happened to it. Just googled -- second season starts in April.

[LisaL]

34. Yea, I watched it. The guy does get into enclosure with them.

I hope he doesn't end up like the chimp attack victims.

[ecstatic]

22. This is such a tragic mess! I hope the chimp owner has insurance?

She needs to pay for this mess!

[Marrah_G]

23. Chimps eat the hands, feet and face of those they want to kill first

It has to do with rendering their opponent unable to fight back.

[Hassin Bin Sober]

26. Yikes. I figured as much because this incident sounds like a similar case...

......that happened a few years ago.

[Are_grits_groceries]

29. The people who helped her were offered counseling.

Some of the medical people and police had already gotten counseling before it was offered. It had to be awful.

[MANative]

30. It's local news for me here in Fairfield Cty, CT, and our

local paper reported that the poor woman's face was so badly mauled that the responding officers couldn't tell whether the victim was a man or woman. Just horrible.

[LostinVA]

32. And both her hands -- I honestly hope she dies

Her poor daughter...

[Marrah_G]

35. I can't imagine how she will live with those injuries.

[LisaL]

36. Oh people can survive with all kind of horrific injuries.

Whether one wants to live or not with those injuries is another story.

[Marrah_G]

37. That's what I meant really- especially at her age

[LostinVA]

38. I would want to die, and would kill myself as soon as I could

Her face has been literally ripped apart and thrown away. MUCH worse than St. James Davis the NASCAR guy. He still has no nose -- or testicles -- but, except for the nose being gone, his face is pretty normal looking.

[MilesColtrane]

40. Ugh...

I remember hearing of another chimp attack awhile back in which the guy had his face eaten, and his junk and a foot ripped off.

[truebrit71]

41. Why was this animal allowed to be kept as a pet in the first place?

...what a horrible thing to happen..