*Irony didn’t want big game hunter Pero Jelinic to shoot the lion he was aiming at. So it shot and killed him.
It would’ve been the Croatian man’s second kill and sources say this was going to be the “crown jewel” of his rich career. After all, friends say he had already “hunted everything that could be hunted in Europe.”
But on Saturday, while he had his eyes on that big cat at a remote lodge near Setiagole in the NW Province of South Africa, someone had their eyes on him.
The bullet that hit the game hunter was initially described as “stray,” but police have since changed the course of their investigation, and are now investigating it as a possible homicide.
Jelinic, 75, had retired from his career as a hotelier on the island of Pag. Several news outlets are speculating on who may have had it in for Jelinic, who, according to Total Croatia News, was to make this particular lion trophy the “crowning jewel” to his rich hunting career. TCN also reported the hunter was killed by “unknown assailants.”
South Africa’s News24 quoted police as saying it was not clear who fired the fatal shot but that a case of “culpable homicide” had been opened and they were investigating possible illegal firearms charges.
SG Gate reported that the lions, who had been farm-raised to be hunted in a legal yet controversial sport often called “canned hunting,” were captive-bred. But earlier this month, the Dallas Safari Club condemned the practice of canned hunting, stating that “there is no evidence or scientific research to suggest that captive bred lion hunting contributes to the conservation of wild lion.”
