Of course you didn’t. And witnesses will confirm that you were politely observing the animals at the San Francisco Zoo while thoughtfully considering their majesty– but more on that later. Finally, the parents of mauling victim Carlos Sousa received the phone call they pleaded for:
One of two young men who survived the Christmas Day tiger attack at the San Francisco Zoo that killed their 17-year-old friend told the teen’s mother that they had not taunted the big cat, the mother said today.
“He said, ‘We didn’t do nothing. We were just normal kids at the zoo,’ ” Marilza Sousa said after talking with her son’s friend Paul Dhaliwal, 19, of San Jose.
“That’s what happened, just dancing, talking, laughing like normal kids,” said Sousa, whose son Carlos Sousa Jr. was killed by the Siberian tiger. “I believe him.”
…The brothers have so far refused to speak publicly about the incident. Sousa said Paul Dhaliwal had told her he has remained silent because he is still tormented by the incident, not because his attorney has told him not to talk. [sfgate]
Both brothers attended Sousa’s funeral, which is what their friend’s grieving parents hoped for.
But there’s still more to this story and it contradicts the recounting of events provided by the Dhaliwal brothers. A witness came forward, to describe what the boys were doing that day at the zoo:
Jennifer Miller, who was at the zoo with her husband and two children that ill-fated Christmas afternoon, said she saw four young men at the big-cat grottos – and three of them were teasing the lions a short time before the tiger’s bloody rampage that killed 17-year-old Carlos Sousa Jr.
“The boys, especially the older one, were roaring at them. He was taunting them,” the San Francisco woman said. “They were trying to get that lion’s attention. … The lion was bristling, so I just said, ‘Come on, let’s get out of here’ because my kids were disturbed by it.”
…Her family was looking at the lions when the young men stopped beside them at the big-cat grottos – five outdoor exhibits attached to the Lion House. The young men started roaring at the lions and acting “boisterous” to get their attention, said Miller, who added that she watched the four for five minutes or so a little after 4 p.m. “It was why we left,” she said. “Their behavior was disturbing. They kept doing it.”
Sousa refrained from such tactics, Miller said. “He wasn’t roaring. He wasn’t taunting them,” she recalled. “He kept looking at me apologetically like, ‘I’m sorry, I know we are being stupid.’ “ [sfgate]
Experts on big cats continue to agree with what Jack Hanna said; I quoted Hanna in my last post as being skeptical about the boys’ innocence.
“First and foremost, people need to be educated. We need to respect them accordingly,” said Jonathan Kraft, who runs Keepers of the Wild in Arizona, which has more than 20 tigers. In the San Francisco escape, “I would bet my reputation that the animal was taunted.” [CBS5]
More sketchiness (and the reason why many continue to doubt the brothers Dhaliwal):
Sources told The Chronicle that paramedics taking the Dhaliwal brothers to the zoo by ambulance had overheard Kulbir Dhaliwal tell his brother, “Don’t tell them what we did.”
The sources also said Paul Dhaliwal was intoxicated at the time of the incident, having used marijuana and consumed enough liquor to have a blood-alcohol level above the 0.08 legal limit for driving. The older brother also had been drinking and using marijuana around the time the tiger escaped, the sources said.
Police say they spotted an empty vodka bottle inside the car the group took to the zoo that day, but investigators cannot legally search the vehicle without the Dhaliwals’ permission.
A person who picked up the phone today at the Dhaliwals’ home hung up without answering questions. [SFGate]
The Dhaliwals’ have retained the services of Mark Geragos, the man who represented luminaries like Michael Jackson and Winona Ryder, and murderers like Scott Peterson. Geragos is obviously fighting tooth-and-claw to get the car back, unsearched. As of yesterday, he’s losing:
In anticipation of a lawsuit over the fatal tiger attack at the San Francisco Zoo, the City Attorney’s Office obtained a temporary court order Tuesday to secure the cell phone records and car of the two brothers mauled in the attack.
While zoo officials have stopped short of accusing Paul and Kulbir Dhaliwal of taunting Tatiana the tiger, they have repeatedly said something must have provoked it to jump from its enclosure. Police have confirmed that an empty bottle of vodka could be seen on the front seat of the car, and city attorney investigators have expressed interest in images captured on the brothers’ cell phones. [Examiner]
I’d love to know what their cameraphones may have captured, wouldn’t you? Isn’t that the point of all this Jackass-inspired-stupidity? To document it recklessly and later upload it to Facebook?
The order comes on the day the brothers were scheduled to pick up their property from police, said City Attorney Dennis Herrera, who referred to the emergency hearing as a “race against the clock.†The brothers’ lawyer, Mark Geragos, refused to comment Monday on whether the brothers would give the permission needed to give police access to their property. He also rejected claims that the two have been uncooperative.
Referring to correspondence between Geragos and himself, Herrera accused Geragos of “just stalling until his clients could get to the Police Department to claim their cell phones and car. [Examiner]
As for the New York Post’s screeching headline about the “slingshot theory”:
In the ongoing chaos that is the aftermath of the fatal tiger mauling at the San Francisco Zoo, the plot has thickened, or thinned I guess, depending. ABC7’s intrepid rabblerouser Dan Noyes has seemingly debunked the mighty New York Post report, based on an unnamed source, that brothers Amritpal Dhaliwal and Kulbir Dhaliwal were taunting 350-pound Tatiana the Siberian tiger using slingshots prior to her escape and fatal mauling of their companion, 17-year-old Carlos Sousa Jr.
“Today, we received official word from the San Francisco Police Department. Sgt. Steve Manina told us he checked with inspectors working the case and “there were no slingshots on the kids, in the zoo or ambulances that night.†No slingshots.” [SFWeekly]
Developing…we’ll try and keep you posted.
Post 150:
I don’t buy this. Let’s leave drunken humans out of this. Suppose there is an earthquake. In a well-designed zoo, the animals be not be able to come out. What if there is a fire? What if there is a flood? Zoo designers do have to think about these things.
i think earthquakes and fires in a state prone to them would be considered possible eventualities or disasters that would be reasonable to expect, not stupidities. i’m sure the zoo even considers stupid human behaviour, which is why this zoo may be culpable. however, millions of people manage to go to zoos around the world each day without antagonizing the inhabitants. i have a friend who works with gorillas and orangutans at a zoo. she has enough to deal with, taking care of their needs and their environment and doing research on how best to save them in the wild, without having to worry about how to plan to deal with some of the allegedly badly behaved members of the species on the other side of the enclosure.
I apologise, Mary, I misread your comment…I thought you were criticizing him for the 911 call, but you weren’t. My bad.
Amitabh, no worries. Actually I kind of enjoyed your reaction, because that’s pretty much what I was doing at my monitor last night when I was reading some of the comments on the SF Chronicle article. Glad to know I’m not alone 🙂
Is it unreasonable for the employee within to have freaked out, been scared for their safety and not opened the door? I want to know whether the cafe employee knew that there was a killer tiger out, or if he/she thought this was just someone playing a prank/a violent crazed individual? If they knew the tiger was loose, then not helping these men was heartless.
Your point is well taken. I have to admit I was kind of pissed off when I wrote my previous comment – really kind of stunned at the “punks got what they deserved, too bad Tatiana didn’t finish the job, how dare he ask for paramedics” reactions I’ve seen elsewhere, and I let myself get a little strident here. So, I apologize for that.
One of the things that struck me about the 911 transcript is that Dhaliwal is repeatedly heard saying “Why won’t they give me towels? I’ve asked for towels” (presumably for bleeding). I don’t bring this up as a definitive statement on anything regarding Dhaliwal or the cafe employees, but it does make me honestly curious how Dhaliwal presented himself, what his requests were, what the employees knew. It’s too early to indict those particular cafe employees, so you’re right to call me on that.
But I wonder, if the zoo had taken the first reports of a loose tiger seriously, could they have communicated it to employees in the area? Hell, forget the Dhaliwals for a minute – the cafe employees themselves might have been in danger and had no idea of it.
Someone else raised this in a forum elsewhere, but unfortunately, zoos get prank calls like this often. The kids who have cried “wolf” over the years thinking it was funny have no idea that their pranks had a part in killing a tiger and a teen.
I agree. OTOH, 911 itself is probably the most prank-called number in the country (except maybe 867-5309), but they are still obligated to follow up on every single one. Likewise I think even if 99 out of 100 “the tiger is loose” phone calls are pranks, the zoo is still obligated to follow up on every single one.
On an individual, humane level, I can understand where it’s Christmas Day, and maybe some of the people working that day don’t want to be there, and the BS tolerance goes way down as a result. But zooming back and taking a macro view, I come to a similar disheartened view that you do, that so many people had to mess up in so many ways for this tragic event to occur. I guess that’s part of the reason I hate the blame being placed so squarely on the brothers, to the point that maybe I’m failing to acknowledge where they DID fuck up, and I don’t mean to do that.
I guess what I’m trying to get at is, I fully and totally agree that the way we treat animals reflects our humanity (or lack thereof), but I also think it makes a similarly disturbing statement that I’ve read so many “Dhaliwals got what they deserved” comments, that people quite gleefully and self-righteously condemn these brothers to death for animal taunting. I want to be really, super clear that I am NOT attributing that point of view to you, Anna, and I hope it doesn’t come out sounding that way in my post, but rather that I’m also kinda PO’d by some of the general reaction I’ve seen other places on the Internets.
54 · rob said
Sorry, you’ve got it wrong on the dogs biting, well, depending on where you live. Many cities have leash laws, which means that anything that happens to/with a dog that is not on a leash or confined in the owner’s backyard is the owner’s fault for not securing the dog. You are responsible first time, every time. The flip side to that is that if you’re driving down the street, you can hit a dog if there is a leash law, and it is the owner’s fault, not the driver’s, that the dog got hit. In cities without a leash law, you all have to expect that at any point in time, a dog may come out of nowhere and you have to be ready.
Mary,
You write at 154 above:
Well, its strange that you would say that since on 12/29 on the original thread, a mary said this at 105: “Stupid asses got exactly what they deserved.“
Now, I’m really hoping your not the same mary. But if you are, you got some good bullshit and scruples the size of an ant. Especially, if you were trying to use it to advocate an argument against the Dhaliwals when you say this:
and
Changing tactics from outright condemnation to an innuendo that the Dhaliwals did something to “deserve” the attack? Someone please tell me I’m reading way too much into this and this is benign.
SM Intern, any help?
156 · Jangali Janwar said
It’s not the same Mary.
This is an excellent, conspicuous example of why mutineers should be a bit more creative wrt their handles. We have multiples of:
Mary Jai Priya Sonia badmash Saurav Karthik Someone random lurker relurker delurker desi
and of course,
brown.
If you’re using one of those, consider what Jangali Janwar just pointed out in his comment; you might seem wildly inconsistent, hypocritical or worse, because you’re sharing a handle with someone or someones.
Camille, HMF, Portmanteau, Whose God is it Anyway?, Nala, Murali Mannered, Coffee Face, Chachaji and a lot of others don’t have that problem. Just something to ponder.
Thanks Intern. This bud’s for you.
To Mary on this thread, my apologies. I hope you understand the confusion. May I suggest you change your name to Mary, Mary, Not Contrary. And to the other mary of 12/29, this is for you, stop bugging out.
If all the allegations regarding the Dhaliwal brothers being intoxicated and taunting Tatiana are true, I’m confused, being a stupid moron and gettting yourself or your friend killed sounds like negligent behavior. Are any of you familiar with the phrase, “under normal circumstances?” It reminds me of the phrase, “instant idiot, just add alcohol.” Aren’t there enough uneducated jerks walking around? I don’t think the zoo was completely without fault but at what point do we hold people responsible for their own behavior? Why do we always have to protect the dumbest of the dumb and intoxicated individuals from themselves? How come an individual can’t say to the authorities or in court, “sorry for the accident, but I was drunk/high so it’s not my fault” and then have their case dismissed? According to some who’ve posted here those folks should get a pass, “What, you were stoned? Okay I guess it’s not your fault, you’re free to go and commit more unsafe acts and potentially harm others.” When people are harmed by their own thoughtless, stupid reasoning and actions, at what point do we turn around and say, “here’s some money for you, you deserve it?” To me that is encouragement to continue to do thoughtless stupid things. “Hey we got x amount of money last time, how much to you think we will get this time?” Even the show “Jackass” had a disclaimer about doing any of the things on the show/movie yourself. Sounds harsh but sometimes you need to step up to the plate and admit your own brain-dead behavior caused your own misfortune. This entire situation could be summed up as: if freedom means anything it means the right to act like a jackass, doesn’t necessarily mean you should profit from it. I guess that means pay to bury Sousa, cover the medical bills and the surviving guys should go home and lick their wounds.
Bob T, you’re forgetting one thing…in a well-designed zoo, there is no way for you to interact with the tiger beyond a certain point, and there is no way for the tiger to get out.
These Dhaliwal guys were no saints….there is a description online of how they behaved with police when arrested for public drunkenness in the past…makes for very sad reading…”Paul” even claimed that HIS name was Kulbir to the cops…not to mention cursing, kicking, and hitting…and no doubt they provoked that tiger…but that tiger could have potentially escaped on ANY day and attacked ANYONE.
160 · Amitabh said
Amitabh,
While I generally agree with your sentiment in responding to Bob T, I think it’s fair to clarify that there’s no evidence that these teens provoked the tiger other than to make faces and roar at the animal. Their behavior was stupid. However, I’m leery of the use of the word “provocation” when blame is being assigned, as in this context it has an ominous tone. Hence, my clarification.
Jangali Janwar, I agree with you.
It amazed me that in the whole 911 transcript, the word ‘tiger’ didn’t show up even once.
To Mary on this thread, my apologies. I hope you understand the confusion.
I just wish I were smart enough to figure out what the heck you thought I was trying to do… if I were trolling, I hope I’d at least have the basic sense to switch handles.
Anyway, I hope it’s clear from the overall context of my post that I am AGAINST the way the Dhaliwals have been crucified in some quarters – actually that’s originally why I came to Sepia Mutiny to discuss it, because this had seemed like one of the few blogs I read regularly where there’s a semi-reasonable discussion of this case going on.
In fact you quoted me as saying: “I hate the blame being placed so squarely on the brothers”, and frankly I have no idea how you interpreted that sentence as an innuendo suggesting the brothers “deserved” the attack. Particularly given the context of all my previous posts on this thread, in which I’ve pretty thoroughly excoriated the zoo.
Suggesting the Dhaliwals may have “fucked up” in allegedly taunting the animals is not the same thing as “they got what was coming.” Moreover, when I say I was “wondering” and “honestly curious” how Kulbir Dhaliwal appeared to the cafe employees, I meant exactly that, no more and no less. In fact I phrased it that way because I was trying to be as neutral as possible, and to avoid casting unwarranted aspersions on both Dhaliwal AND the cafe employees. Guess that didn’t really work out.
Anyway… not changing my handle on this thread because I understand that’s forbidden here, but if I post again I’ll bear SM Intern’s warning in mind.
Mary, the other…Mary held the opposite views you did, but on the original/first Tatiana thread. That’s what Jangali was referring to, not your comments here. I do hope you keep commenting, under whatever name you choose, because you’re thoughtful and articulate and the discussion was better with your participation.
And while we usually frown on “handle-switching” on the same thread, it’s because people do it to have other fake comments to point to and say, “See! xyzlld agrees with me!”…to which I feel like replying, “well, of course they agree with you. They ARE you.” If you’d like to change your handle, I don’t think anyone would want to fault you, especially since it would prevent confusion.
Thanks Anna for saying what I wanted to say but only so much better.
I understand… and I appreciate being baptized with a new name from Jangali Jaanwar. 🙂 This is a great blog, if I sounded grumpy it was equally due to frustration with myself for not expressing my thoughts as clearly as I would have liked. So, I apologize for that, and hopefully no hard feelings – there certainly are none on my part.
Mary Mary Not Contrary, no hard feelings at all on my part. My best relationships have started with an argument and a misunderstanding. 😉 BTW, it wasn’t your inability to make your comments understood, rather, I warped the meaning of your comments in light of the previous comments made by the other M person.
Just following up, to keep the thread updated: CNN is now reporting that SF police have suspended their investigation of the Dhaliwal brothers. Geragos is saying the cops were pressured by the city to find dirt on the young men as part of a smear campaign. Cops are declining comment. The link is attached.
http://www.insidebayarea.com/argus/localnews/ci_11265345?source=rss Tiger-attack survivor gets five years’ probation in shoplifting …. just had to eff up one way or another
Stupid kids, for all the people protecting the Dhaliwal’s, you can just shut the hell up…I know them and they are dumbasses at the least. You know the kind of kids that think they are cool drinking, drugs, illegal activities, being bullies. I’m not saying it’s not the zoo’s fault, cause of course it’s there fault for not making the walls higher. I just feel bad for the kid that died cause he’s a good dude hanging out with wannabe thugs. And you shouldn’t be taunting the tiger(or anything living) anyways, cause I mean I have enough common sense to realize that when I taunt something it’s gonna get mad and if i’m ok with that, then what kind of person would I be?. So again for all of you who don’t know these guys, you should just shut the hell up, cause I bet you wouldn’t be defending them if they lived in your neighborhood and jacked your car stereo and plotting to jack your house. It just sucks that the wrong kid died, it would of been good if the brothers got there arms bitten off then maybe they wouldn’t steal so much. I don’t think they deserve to die, but something should happen to them. Dumb kids got it good too, wealthy parents, nice house, cool clothes, nice cars but they feel that they need to be cool, and everyone knows that you can’t be cool unless your a thug. I don’t know the tiger personally or anything and I can give a rat’s ass about it, but i know the bro’s and I know how they are. They were drunk and high and got owned by Tiger style hahahahha
Best comment ever on SM.
“We didnt do nothing” I’m a FOB and these guys are paindoo. Dont flame me (I’m being honest) but MOST of the American born/Indian behave like this, try to be “G”‘s (whatever that means, I got it from a Snoop Dogg song I heard on TV) and people ask me why I dont have American indian friends (or just indians), can you blame me?
172 · ROMEO 86 said
I think you need to expand your social circle. I recognize the subculture but they are outliers among ABDs. Most teenage ABDs try to mimic the lifestyle of orthopedic surgeons and I-bankers and this does have its problems too (e.g. fetishization of bone saws,Series 7 anciety and lack of receptiveness to V. Prashad), but the violent paindoo gangsta is no more than 5% of us
Heh! Good one! Guilty as charged! 😉
173 · louiecypher said
I totally agree, thats why I said most and not all. I just havent seen the other groups (college was full of “G’s”,, you can have your Sean John, I’ll take my Gaultier and YSL),, I’ll just stay away from the BMW group though, HATE BMWs and I dont know who V Prashad is (sorry).. I do however try to make friends (embarrass) american borns by talking to them loudly with a very peculiar indian accent 🙂