Unless You've Been Locked in a Homebuilt Cage...

...you probably heard that there was an incident in Zanesville involving approx 50 exotic animals, mostly apex predators, being released into the non-wilds by an EDP owner, who proceeded to off himself before being gnawed on by a big cat.  I'm trying to collect articles as time (and quality of article) allows and will set up a tab of links or doc account.  A couple initial thoughts:

• If the Columbus Dispatch is correct, a fair number of pretty large animals were put down with 5.56mm rifles, which would not be my first choice in confronting a lion, tiger, or liger.  I'm leaning more and more to the .30 calibers for domestic LE use, for it's ability to handle longer ranges and penetrate harder cover.  We don't have to carry 300 rounds of ammo, and I'd rather carry fewer rounds that are more effective at differing ranges and targets.
• ODOT and the local EMA were on the ball with the signs on I70 basically telling people not to pick up hitch-hiking carnivores.  It would have been a great place for a DUI checkpoint, or drug-sniffing wolf.
• Exotics are everywhere.  There are a couple lions within maybe 5 air-miles of campus.
• Now the politicians will go into full knee-jerk reaction, and start banning sugar gliders and guinea pigs; they aren't native to North America.  I'll have to hurry up and get that pygmy hedgehog I've always wanted.  I don't care if a person has a laser-sighted Mini-gun mounted to the back of a rhino.  I also don't think that requiring minimum standards of training, experience, facilities and testing and inspection are excessive, when it comes to owning an intelligent, living chainsaw with a will of it's own.