Latest ‘Tiger King’ twist finds ‘Doc’ Antle facing possible prison sentence for animal trafficking

Five years after the documentary True Crime “Tiger King” has captured a country closed by COVID-19, the final legal problems of one of its main characters will be resolved Tuesday in a courtroom in South Carolina.

Bhagavan “Doc” Antle risks up to 10 years in prison for trafficking in exotic animals and money laundering after pleading guilty in November 2023.

What a sanction that the prosecutors ask for and all the arguments of leniency of the lawyers of Antle were kept from the public before the hearing on Tuesday morning before the Federal Court of Charleston.

Three other people who pleaded guilty in his investigation were sentenced to probation or a four -month prison sentence.

Antle’s sentence is the last chapter of the true life of the saga of King Tiger. The Netflix series made its debut in March 2020 near the Summit of Restrictions COVID-19.

The program was centered on Big Cats dealerships and environmentalists, focusing on disputes between Joe Exotic, a collector and a private zoo goalkeeper from Oklahoma, and Carole Baskin, who directs Big Cat Rescue in Florida.

Exotic, whose real name is Joseph Maldonado-Passage, purges a 21-year-old federal prison sentence for trying to hire two different men to kill Baskin.

Antle, who has a private zoo called Myrtle Beach Safari, appeared in the first season of the documentary and was the star of the third season.

The Antle zoo was known to have billed hundreds or thousands of dollars to allow people to caress and keep baby animals like lions, tigers and monkeys that were so young that they were still fed a bottle. Customers could take photos or videos. Antle was sometimes heading in visits to an elephant.

Myrtle Beach Safari remains open only by reservation, according to its website. Antle has remained on bail since her arrest in June 2022.

The federal accusations of Antle were brought after the Tiger King series.

The prosecutors said that he had sold or bought cheetahs, lions, tigers and a chimpanzee without the appropriate paperwork. And they said that in a separate program, Hante had whitewashed more than $ 500,000 than an informant told him that people in the United States work illegally.

Antle used to have big sums of money that he could move quickly, the investigators said.

The FBI listened to Antle’s telephone calls to the informant because he explained that a baby chimpanzee could easily cost $ 200,000. Private zoo guards can charge hundreds of dollars for photos with young docile primates or other animals, but the profit window is only open a few years before growing animals can no longer be manipulated safely.

“I had to have a monkey, but people will not take a check. They only take money. So what are you doing? Antle said, according to a transcription of the telephone call in court documents.

Two Antle’s employees have already been convicted of their roles in his plans.

Meredith Bybee received a year of probation for sold a chimpanzee while Endlew “Omar” Sawyer, who said that the prosecutors helped whiten money, received two years of probation.

Jason Clay, owner of the Texas Private Zoo, pleaded guilty of illegally sold a primate and was sentenced to four months in prison, while the charges were abandoned against the owner of the Californian Ranch Charles Sammut.

Antle was also sentenced in 2023 to a court of Virginia of four charges of animal trafficking for sales of Lions and was sentenced to two years in prison suspended “on five years of good conduct”. A court of appeal canceled two of the convictions, judging that Virginia’s law prohibits the sale of endangered species but not their purchase.

Antle was recognized as not guilty of five charges of cruelty to animals during the same trial in Virginia.