Update:
Baby-biting baboon shot dead
Posted Fri, 13 Jun 2003
A baboon which bit a three-month-old baby boy from the North West on the head, killing him, was shot dead by police and nature conservation officials on Thursday, police reported.
Superintendent Louis Jacobs said the baboon, which was an old male, died instantly.
"We are quite sure we got the right baboon because this same baboon attacked a goat and the teeth marks on the goat skin match that of the baboon," he said.
On June 3 Betty Tukane (34) was washing dishes around midday and left her infant, Neo, sleeping inside her house in the village of Madipelesa, near the border between the North West and the Northern Cape.
She heard the baby screaming and ran into the bedroom to see him being carried away by the baboon.
Tukane tried to rescue her son but the baboon evaded her. The mother called for help and neighbours came with dogs. The baboon became aggressive and bit the child on the head and dropped him before disappearing into thick bush that surrounds the village.
Jacobs said nature conservation officials had initially put out cages in an attempt to catch the baboon, known in the area by the Tswana name Rotwe (outcast), but this was unsuccessful.
On Tuesday three members of the Klerksdorp public order policing unit members and nature conservation officials were deployed in the Kgomotso area in an attempt to locate the baboon.
"We had quite a good description of him, he was old male and one of his incisors was missing. He was always moving with, but on the side of, a troop," Jacobs said.
The police and conservationists tried to establish the troop's pattern of movement and, from early on Thursday morning attempted to locate the troop, which was spotted around 4.30pm together with a young baboon.
Jacobs said the old male went into the bushes when it saw the humans, with the police and conservationists followed it for around a kilometre. It was then properly sited, and shot in the chest.
Sapa
http://iafrica.com/news/sa/244649.htm