A tiger that is believed to have been owned by Germany’s controversial “Tiger Queen” has been shot dead by police after escaping its enclosure and attacking one of its keepers.
Police said that a 72-year-old worker was attacked by the big cat on Sunday inside its enclosure in a privately-owned facility outside Leipzig, in the eastern German state of Saxony.
Local media reported that the tiger was among several owned by Carmen Zander, a tiger tamer and performer who has been nicknamed the “Tiger Queen” in reference to the popular Netflix show involving “Tiger King” Joe Exotic.
Zander had trained the animals and performed in shows across Europe before placing them in an industrial estate in Schkeuditz, west of Leipzig.
Police said the tiger was shot in a garden around 300m away from the enclosure, around half an hour after it escaped at 1pm on Sunday.
Several shots were used to kill the fully grown adult male animal, they told the BBC, adding that there is “no longer any danger to the public”.
Police said the worker is in a stable condition in hospital. It remains unclear how the tiger escaped from the enclosure.
Ms Zander featured in a 2015 documentary called Wild Women: Gentle Beasts which documented the work of female animal tamers from Germany, Russia, France and Egypt.
Since 2022, she has been banned from exhibiting her animals commercially, after spending years showing them off in circuses across Europe.
Police will now search the area with a drone, to rule out the possibility that any other animals were killed or injured by the tiger.
Authorities are said to be demanding that Ms Zander provide more generous living conditions for the tigers in her complex.
The Federal Ministry of Agriculture issued guidelines that an outdoor enclosure for mammals should provide at least 200 square meters for one animal or a mating pair, according to Deutsche Welle.
Rayk Bergner, the mayor of Schkeuditz, said after the incident: “The tigers have to go. With three exclamation marks. A solution is urgently needed now; the authorities must clarify this.”
Biologist Dr Yvonne Würz of PETA said Ms Zander’s actions aren’t “animal love, it’s exploitation”. The animal rights charity has called on stricter rules to be put in place to protect privately-owned animals.
Residents who live nearby told German news agency DPA that the episode was “terrible and worrying”, and were critical of the conditions the tigers were allegedly being kept in.
The Independent has attempted to contact Ms Zander for comment.