From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2008:

Thomas Doerflein, 44, renowned for
raising the Berlin Zoo polar bear Knut in
2006-2007 after the cub was abandoned by his
mother, was found dead in his apartment of a
heart attack on September 22, 2008. A 25-year
Berlin Zoo employee, “Doerflein with his burly
build and ponytail was a distinctive figure at
the side of the growing bear,” recalled
Associated Press writer Patrick McGroarty. “He
nursed young Knut in his arms behind closed doors
and wrestled with him after the bear grew old
enough to play. When Knut made his public debut
in March 2007, Doerflein was at his side. They
started a daily performance for the thousands of
visitors who flocked to see the bear at his
outdoor enclosure. But the ‘Knut show’ ended in
July of that year when the zoo’s director ruled
that the bear had grown too large for Doerflein
to frolic with in safety.” The “Cute Knut”
phenomenon reportedly boosted Berlin Zoo
attendance by 27% in 2007, and increased
revenues by $10 million.

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, September 2008:

Claudio, a three-month-old gorilla,
died on August 16, 2008 at the Munster Zoo in
Germany. “Münster zookeepers said Claudio’s
death was almost certainly the result of [his
mother] Gana neglecting and mistreating the
infant,” wrote Tony Patterson, Berlin
correspondent for The Independent. “Gana, 11,
last year gave birth to her first baby, a female
named Mary Zwo,” Patterson added. “Gana
rejected Mary Zwo for six weeks. Staff at the
zoo finally intervened and rescued the baby,”
who “has lived at a zoo in Stuttgart with four
other gorillas ever since.” Said Munster Zoo
director Jorg Adler, “There was no point in
intervening again. We cannot keep on taking away
children from a mother.”

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 2008:
Dave Maehr, 52, a University of Kentucky professor known
for his work on Florida panther conservation issues, was killed on
June 20, 2008 along with citrus grower and pilot Mason Smoak, 33,
when Smoak’s light plane crashed after takeoff at the Placid Lakes
Airport in Highlands County, Florida. Maehr and Smoak, a prominent
member of the Florida Farm Bureau Federation, were doing an aerial
survey of the Highlands County black bear population.

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, July/August 2008:
Tony, 17, a chimpanzee who escaped from the Keeling Center
for Comparative Medicine and Research on March 21, 2008, was
fatally shot by University of Texas police officer Paul Maslyk, 43,
after Maslyk disregarded warnings from the capture team to stay in
his car, according to police reports and witness statements obtained
in July 2008 by Joshunda Sanders of the Austin American-Statesman.
Wrote Sanders, “Maslyk told police investigators that after he
watched Tony take the tranquilizer gun and break it, the chimp
headed toward him… Fearing for his safety, Maslyk said he twice
shouted, ‘I’m gonna shoot,’ in accordance with UT police policy,
and then fired. Maslyk lost his footing, the police report says,
and continued to shoot at the chimp as the chimp passed him.”

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2008:

Jocko the spider monkey, 15, died from
a fractured skull on May 7, 2008 at the Greater
Vancouver Zoo in Aldergrove, British Columbia,
fighting to protect his mate Mia, three years
older, from night intruders. The intruders took
Mia from the zoo. She has not been found. Born
in captivity, Jocko and Mia had shared their
habitat since 1993.

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2008:
Stephen Claussen, 41, was killed in a May 17, 2008 light
plane crash in Englewood Township, New Jersey, along with pilot and
plane owner John Ambroult, 60, of Eastham, Massachusetts.
“Claussen, of Seattle, was best known for training Keiko, star of
the blockbuster movie Free Willy, for six years in preparation for
his release into the wild,” recalled Newark Star-Ledger staff
reporter Maryann Spoto. Claussen and crash survivors Jaclyn Toth
Brown, 28, and Juan Carlos Salinas, 43, of Mexico City, “worked
for Texas-based Geo-Marine Inc. gathering data for an environmental
impact statement the state Department of Environmental Protection
will use in assessing what effect offshore wind-powered turbines may
have on marine mammals and birds,” Spoto added. Raised in Bellvue,
Washington, Claussen volunteered in his teens at the Point Defiance
Zoo & Aquarium in Tacoma, “driving down before work at 4 a.m. to help
feed the animals,” wrote Seattle Times staff reporter Susan Gilmore.

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, May 2008:
Appaji Rao, 71, vice chair of the Animal Welfare Board of
India since 2005, died of a sudden heart attack on April 20, 2008
in Chennai. A graduate of the Madras Veterinary College, Rao
“volunteered at the Blue Cross of India from 1964-1966 and was our
first veterinary volunteer,” recalled Blue Cross of India chief
executive Chinny Krishna. “He joined the Madras Veterinary College
as a lecturer,” Krishna said, “and rose to head the department of
epidimeology.” Retiring in 1995, Rao continued to assist the Blue
Cross of India and other animal welfare charities. For the Animal
Welfare Board, Rao helped to produce draft rules for fish keeping,
dog breeding, and animal euthanasia, “recently finalised and sent
to the Ministry of Environ-ment & Forests for notification,” Krishna
said. “He was also the moving force,” Krishna added, “behind the
workshop for a rabies-free India held in 2006, and for drawing up
the protocols for Animal Birth Control. Rules for temple and captive
elephants he formulated were to be released by the Governor of
Rajasthan” during the week of his death. Among Rao’s last acts was
to telephone Idduki SPCA chief executive A.G. Babu, asking him to
seek an injunction from the High Court of Kerala “against the
indiscriminate killing of stray dogs [by municipal dogcatchers] all
over Kerala,” Babu posted to the Asian Animal Protection Network.
The injunction was granted, Babu said on April 26.

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, April 2008:
Charlton Heston, 84, died at home in Beverly Hills,
California, on April 6, 2008. Heston had disclosed in 2002 that he
had symptoms consistent with Alzheimer’s disease. An avid hunter in
boyhood, Heston from 1941 until late in life was chiefly an actor,
except during service in the Army Air Force, 1943-1947. Except for
several late-career cameo appearances, Heston played mostly starring
roles in 126 feature films made between 1941 and 2001, including Ben
Hur, The Ten Commandments, El Cid, Planet of the Apes,
Earthquake, and A Touch of Evil. Heston became involved in civil
rights activism in the 1950s, and later served as president of the
Screen Actors Guild and chair of the American Film Institute, but
had his biggest influence on public affairs as president of the
National Rifle Association, 1998-2003. Heston personally led the
aggressive NRA campaign against Democratic U.S. presidential
candidate Al Gore in 2000, after Gore expressed support for gun
control. Wrote Calvin Woodward of Associated Press, “As he had once
lifted Moses’ staff in The Ten Commandments, Heston held a musket
above his head and dared Gore from afar to pry it ‘from my cold dead
hands.’ Gore lost blue-collar votes to Bush in an election so close
any setback was perilous. The key finding: About half of voters
were from gun-owning households, and they voted for George W. Bush,
61% to 36%. Voters from households without guns backed Gore 58-39.
Ever since, Democrats in presidential and many Congress-ional and
governors’ races have scrambled to establish their bona fides as
hunters, if they can, or as admirers of firearms or the Second
Amendment if they can’t.”

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