Last week, Cecil was killed illegally, sparking global outrage and forcing Zimbabwe to tighten restrictions on big game hunting.
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“During this trip, Dr. Seski did lawfully hunt and take a lion,” said his Washington attorney, Gregory Linsin. Any such hunts can only be conducted if confirmed and authorized by the head of the wildlife authority and if the hunters are accompanied by parks staff, it said.
Zimbabwean officials call for Palmer’s extradition to the country to face charges for crime of killing Cecil.
“The cruel killing of the Zimbabwean lion known as Cecil broke my heart”, said the 78-year-old, who has created many distinctive sculptures of lions in a career spanning six decades.
Dr. Jan Seski, a Pittsburgh-area oncologist, did participate in a “lawfully permitted hunt” in Zimbabwe in a different month, but he denies that he did anything wrong, his U.S. attorney Greg Linsin said.
The moves come amid an outcry over the killing of the well-known lion Cecil by American hunter Walter Palmer, after the lion was lured out of a Zimbabwe wildlife reserve.
“We shot an old male lion that I believed was past his breeding age”, Bronkhorst told AFP last week.
Landowner Headman Sibanda was arrested and is assisting police, it said.
Seski also has reportedly killed six African elephants.
Another American hunter has recently faced criticism for a big-game hunt in which she killed a giraffe on a legal hunt in South Africa.
According to CNN, the Zimbabwe Conservation Task Force reported on its Facebook page at 4 p.m. local time that Jericho had been killed.
However, since Cecil’s killer has made his way back to the country of origin and as said by Zimbabwe’s environment, water and climate minister, Oppah Muchinguri, that it was “unfortunately it was too late” to see it through. Cecil and Jericho were partners in a “coalition” but were not related, the wildlife authority said, according to AP.
It said in a statement that in April, illegal hunt by Seski took place around Hwange National Park of Zimbabwe.
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“Jericho is alive and well”, said Professor David Macdonald of Oxford University’s Wildlife Conservation Research Unit, which had been tracking Cecil and Jericho by satellite.
