Jul 29, 2015 4 min read

On his latest ESPN show, Keith Olbermann had a regular segment highlighting the “worst people in sports.” If you’re looking for the worst person in the world, at least for this week, Minnesota dentist Walter James Palmer might be a good choice.

If you haven’t heard of him yet, Palmer is the “hunter” who, with the help of local guides, lured a relatively docile lion from a national park in Zimbabwe, killed the animal with the help of a high-powered bow, then beheaded and skinned 13-year-old Cecil.

The lion, according to an article on The Telegraph website from London, was a favorite of visitors to Hwange National Park because he seemed to enjoy contact with humans. He was wearing a collar so he could be tracked as part of a study being conducted since 1999 by the Wildlife Conservation Research Unit at Oxford University.

According to reports, Palmer paid $35,000 for the right to kill a lion in the area of the wildlife park – but not inside the park.

So, Palmer and his local helpers, under cover of night, hung meat about a half mile outside the park boundary. When Cecil was lured by the bait, he was shot – but not killed. The “hunters” found the wounded lion the next day and finished him off. They then cut off his tracking collar and butchered him. But not, of course, before Palmer, grinning like a fool, posed for a photo with the corpse to commemorate his “accomplishment.”

Zimbabwe’s Parks and Wildlife Management Authority is investigating those involved, and the professional hunter who accompanied Palmer is reportedly facing criminal prosecution. Palmer, himself, could be brought up on poaching charges.

Contacted by the Colorado News, Palmer said, “I had no idea that the lion I took was a known, local favorite, was collared and part of a study until the end of the hunt.” Sure, it’s tough to see those collars when you’re lying in wait for an animal in the bushes, in the dark. And we feel sure Palmer will make every effort to ambush a less-famous lion the next time.

We have editorialized many times about our support for hunting when it involves people who are trying to put food on their tables. When an animal is killed so someone can put its head on his or her wall, or pose with a formerly living creature for a photo, it’s a much-less-defensible practice.

Palmer, who is being excoriated on social media and in memorials to Cecil set up at his dental practice, apparently spends much of his free time doing the latter. The Telegraph reported he killed a leopard in Zimbabwe in 2010, paid thousands to shoot an endangered sheep – the Nevada Bighorn – and shelled out $45,000 at an auction for the opportunity to kill an elk in 2009.

According to a 2009 New York Times story about Palmer, the dentist killed all but one of the animals listed in records kept by Pope and Young, a bow-hunting group. The list includes polar bears, bison, grizzly bears and cougars.

“Of course, it is a personal achievement to harvest any big-game animal with a bow and arrow,” Pope and Young records curator Glen Hisey told the Times. “It is a way of honoring that animal for all time.”

No word in the Times as to whether Palmer asked his victims in advance whether they were interested in receiving such an “honor.”

Often, the sale of licenses to kill these big, endangered animals is touted as a way to raise money for animal preservation.

If Palmer really wanted to be a humanitarian – or even just a decent human being – he could write checks to support these organizations’ efforts – and then not kill the animals.

But that wouldn’t afford him the chance to brag about what a “great white hunter” he is.