A hunter allegedly shot one of Africa's best-known lions with a bow and arrow, then tracked it for two days while it was bleeding to death before finishing it off with a gun.
Now the hunter, who paid park guides £35,000 ($54,300) for the chance to kill the lion, has become the hunted. The lion was Cecil, a 13-year-old male who was widely known because he was wearing a GPS collar for part of a study by Oxford University, which was researching his movements within his home at Hwange national park in Zimbabwe.
It is alleged the information from that collar shows Cecil may have been lured outside the park's boundaries, where it was legal to kill him. There are reports of tourists saying Cecil was not afraid to approach humans and appeared to enjoy "posing" for photographs.
Authorities are still chasing the hunter, who was originally identified as Spanish but then identified in reports as North American.
The hunter who guided him has been quoted anonymously saying that he did not know the lion was famous and that he was "devastated" by the mistake.
Authorities say Cecil was bleeding and on the run for 40 hours before he was eventually killed with a rifle. He was skinned and beheaded.
The whereabouts of Cecil's head are still unknown.
The Zimbabwe Professional Hunters and Guides Association acknowledged that its members were involved and that the case was being investigated.
Worse news came from the Zimbabwe Conservation Task Force, which said Cecil's six cubs were unlikely to survive the death of their father.
"Cecil's death is a tragedy, not only because he was a symbol of Zimbabwe but because now we have to give up for dead his six cubs, as a new male won't allow them to live so as to encourage Cecil's three females to mate," the head of the nonprofit charity said in a statement.
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