Berkeley mourns a mountain lion shot by police

[Liberal_in_LA]

Berkeley mourns a mountain lion


Henry K. Lee


They're an occasional sight along streets in tough neighborhoods -- makeshift memorials of flowers, notes and well-wishes for victims of gunfire. But a shrine for a mountain lion killed by police? Only in Berkeley.

Police shot the cougar early Aug. 31 as it roamed a neighborhood near the city's famed Gourmet Ghetto. Police said it posed a public-safety threat for night-shift workers coming and going and for sleeping homeless people.

But a number of people have voiced their disapproval at a memorial put up at the corner of Shattuck Avenue and Cedar Street, not far from where the cat was first spotted. Included was a montage of facts about the animals and a front-page Chronicle story about the killing.

"In honor, respect and remembrance of the innocent and helpless mountain lion that was slain in Berkeley," someone wrote alongside a picture of a cougar that was alive and well.

"May we protect our wildlife," another person printed out on a piece of paper. "If we save them, we save ourselves. 'Thou shalt not kill?' Remember?"

But one person defended the actions of the officers.

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"If it's just looking for new territory, then relocating probably would have been a better idea, because usually they're pretty shy animals," said Jacob Sockness, 27, of San Francisco.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/blogs/crime/detail?entry_id=71815&tsp=1#ixzz0yzg3ekIT

[Better Today]

1. Around here we've had two attacks by mountain lions in the last

few years. The idea that they are in anyway safe is ridiculous. We had on lady literally attacked while biking, knocked off her bike as the cougar lunged at her and chomped down on her, another was a near miss attack at a grade school.

Like the article says, "only at Berkeley"

[ThomasQED]

6. Then the animal should be tranquilized

and relocated.

[Mz Pip]

7. I would have liked that too

but the critter was running through yards and there wasn't a game warden handy to do the tranquilizing. I guess whatever is necessary to tranquilize a mountain lion isn't kept handy in downtown Berkeley.

[smalll]

2. I sense a little Berkelyesque latte liberal classism here. More than a little.

"...it posed a public-safety threat for night-shift workers coming and going and for sleeping homeless people."

Night-shift workers and sleeping homeless? Not Quite Our Sort, Dear.

[xchrom]

3. God I love Berkeley. Yeah I'm one of those. Nt

[EFerrari]

4. Shattuck and Cedar?! I'm surprised it wasn't hit by a car first. nt

[Cleita]

5. I hate it every time they kill one of these animals.

We have encroached on their hunting grounds. It would be better to study the individuals to find out what they are hunting. Our cougars prowl the wetlands around the beach because they are hunting water fowl like geese and ducks. Of course that's where humans want to camp and go to the beach so the poor beast loses out and gets killed, not even a chance of getting trapped and relocated. We really need wild life corridors where people don't go unless they understand that they are in wild life territory.