Zimbabwe: Cecil's killer had permits

Authorities in Zimbabwe have decided not to charge the American dentist who hunted and killed one of Africa's most beloved lions, saying that Walter Palmer went through the proper channels before he set out on the savanna with a bow and arrow.

Palmer sparked international outrage over the summer after he killed the 13-year-old black-maned beauty Cecil the lion. Some called Palmer a monster. Others called him a murderer. The uproar all but forced him underground.

But a cabinet minister said Monday in Zimbabwe that Palmer had obtained the legal authority to do it.

"We approached the police and then the prosecutor general, and it turned out that Palmer came to Zimbabwe because all the papers were in order," Environment Minister Oppah Muchinguri-Kashiri told reporters, according to Agence France-Presse.

"The documents were there," she added. "The problem now remains internal. ... We are now going to review how we issue hunting quotas." A spokesman for Palmer told the Minneapolis Star Tribune that Palmer had no comment.

Palmer, a big-game hunter from Bloomington, Minn., was identified as Cecil's killer in July. Authorities said he had paid roughly $50,000 for the African safari in which he lured the lion from his home in the Hwange National Park, hunted him, and killed him.

Zimbabwean authorities called for his extradition.

Palmer apologized, asserting that he thought the hunt was legal. He said he had relied on his hunting guide, Theo Bronkhorst, and a local property owner, Honest Ndlovu. Bronkhorst was charged with "failure to prevent an illegal hunt." Ndlovu was charged with allowing the men to hunt the lion on his land without getting authorization. The minister said this week that Ndlovu did not have a hunting quota but the district council over his land did, according to Agence France-Presse.

After he was identified as Cecil's killer, Palmer said his life was threatened. He temporarily shut down his dental practice, River Bluff Dental, where protesters put up memorials with stuffed lions to represent the one he took.

He came forward last month, telling the Associated Press and the Star Tribune in a joint interview that he did, in fact, kill Cecil, but echoing his previous statement that he did not know the lion was important to the country.

"It's been especially hard on my wife and daughter," Palmer told the news organizations. "They've been threatened. In the media, as well, and the social media. . . . I don't understand that level of humanity, to come after people not involved at all."

Palmer returned to work without further comment.

Muchinguri-Kashiri said Zimbabwe would be happy to have Palmer back - but "not for hunting."