A Yellowstone National Park grizzly bear was put down Thursday after rangers claimed it was involved in the mauling of a 63-year-old Montana man last week.
Lance Crosby, from Billings, Montana, died from what was described as traumatic injuries from the
bear attack, Yellowstone officials said in its statement. The park said a female bear captured near Crosby at the time of the attack was confirmed as being involved in the mauling through DNA evidence.
"Based on the totality of the evidence, this adult female grizzly was the bear involved in the fatality and was euthanized today," the park said in its statement Thursday. "An important fact in the decision to euthanize the bear was that a significant portion of the body was consumed and cached with the intent to return for further feeding. Normal defensive attacks by female bears defending their young do not involve consumption of the victim’s body."
Park officials said that two cubs were found in the area and were transferred to a facility run by the Association of Zoos and Aquariums.
"As managers of Yellowstone National Park, we balance the preservation of park resources with public safety," Yellowstone National Park superintendent Dan Wenk said in the park's statement. "Our decision takes into account the facts of the case, the goals of the bear management program, and the long term viability of the grizzly bear population as a whole, rather than an individual bear."
The Los Angeles Times reported that Crosby's body was found last Friday near the Elephant Back Loop Trail. Park officials told the Times that he was alone and did not carry bear spray on him that could have helped repel the attack.
Crosby was an employee of Medcor, which runs three urgent-care clinics in the park, according to the Times. Officials told the newspaper that Crosby had lived in Yellowstone for five years.
Yellowstone officials did face criticism for killing the bear. Marc Bekoff, an ecology and evolutionary biology professor at the
University of Colorado, wrote about his disapproval in a Huffington Post essay.
"Many people are asking when will the killing stop? In my humble opinion and that of many others, it must stop now, and we must take responsibility for what we humans are doing to other animals into whose homes we wantonly trespass," he wrote.