An exotic jungle cat’s controversial stay in Downers Grove may be over after his third victim, a 2-year-old girl, was hospitalized with gouges that required 200 stitches.
On Thursday, an attorney who represents the injured girl’s family demanded that Cabo, a jungle cat, be destroyed so that rabies tests can be performed. If Cabo’s owner does not comply, Chicago attorney Richard Stavins said that the DuPage County state’s attorney’s office will seek a court order.
The Sunday afternoon incident served as a graphic reminder of how dangerous it can be to keep wild animals as pets.
The jungle cat is a common wild animal in Egypt, Sri Lanka and Indochina, said Rodger Philips, lead keeper in the Brookfield Zoo mammal department. But unlike the common house cat, which it resembles, the jungle cat has not been tamed through thousands of years of domestic breeding.
It grows to be somewhat larger than a common house cat. Cabo weighs 20 pounds, about the same as a large house cat.
Being wild animals, jungle cats are “genetically bred to have a territory and protect a territory,” Philips said. “If it feels its territory is being infringed upon, it’s going to protect that territory.”
That may explain why Cabo attacked when 2-year-old Alice Mintz ran out the back door while visiting her aunt, Sari Mintz, the cat’s owner, in Downers Grove.
Sari Mintz had the cat tethered to an overhead line in her back yard at 4612 Lee St.
“When nobody was looking, the kid ran out the back door into the back yard,” said David Rechenmacher, Downers Grove Police Department spokesman. “Nobody actually observed it, but the cat attacked the child.”
The cat had apparently also attacked the child when she was an infant, authorities said.
In order to decrease the chances of permanent scarring, the girl received more stitches than were absolutely necessary, Rechenmacher said.
It was unclear Thursday afternoon whether Alice, the daughter of Judy and Bobby Mintz of Chicago, would be released from Good Samaritan Hospital in Downers Grove, said Stavins, who was issuing all statements on behalf of the family.
“I’m sure the aunt feels terrible about it,” Stavins said. “We’re trying not to have a family feud here.”
For now, Cabo is under observation in a veterinarian’s office in Iowa City, where he originally was purchased from a breeder, Rechenmacher said.
Sari Mintz will not return the cat to Downers Grove, Rechenmacher said. Rather, he said, she hopes to place Cabo with a shelter or another suitable owner.
Mintz, a spokeswoman for the Illinois Toll Highway Authority, did not respond to telephone calls requesting comment Thursday.
Police ticketed Mintz for possessing a dangerous animal after Sunday’s attack, Rechenmacher said. Mintz must appear in court and may face a fine of up to $500, he said.
This is not the first time Cabo has landed his owner in court.
In August, a 10-year-old girl walking through Mintz’s back yard fell prey to Cabo. Two men had to pry the cat off of the girl’s back, said Ardith Baker, manager of the DuPage County Animal Control Department.
After that incident, Mintz was ticketed for failing to confine Cabo, allowing an animal to molest someone and failing to have a permit, Baker said. Mintz appeared in court in October and paid $150 in fines, according to court records.
In March 1994, Cabo also bit one of Mintz’s friends, a woman who tried to pet the animal through an open car window, Baker said. Baker said she also was told that Cabo had attacked Alice Mintz once before, sometime in 1993.
Illinois law designates a jungle cat as a dangerous animal, said Patrick Hogan, Illinois Agriculture Department spokesman. But a person may own a jungle cat as a pet as long as the owner has a license from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Hogan said. Mintz had such a license, he said.
Even so, Sari Mintz is liable for her pet’s conduct under Illinois law, according to Jeffrey Whitcomb, a Chicago attorney who has handled animal injury cases.
“You’re in control of the animal,” Whitcomb said. “It’s your responsibility to make sure the animal doesn’t bite somebody on its own initiative.” In the case of a wild animal kept as a pet, Whitcomb said, the owner’s duty is heightened because of the increased risk.
This isn’t the first case of unusual animals being kept as pets in the Chicago area.
Just last month, Chicago animal control officers removed a 65-pound mountain lion from a South Side garage where it was being kept.
