The shady business practices of a famous zookeeper came back to bite him. Bhagavan “Doc” Antle, whose South Carolina wildlife zoo featured prominently in the COVID-era hit “Tiger King,” was sentenced to a year and a day in prison on Tuesday. Antle pleaded guilty to trafficking exotic animals and money laundering, with prosecutors alleging that Antle laundered money from a human smuggling scheme to illegally purchase endangered chimps, lions, and tigers. His unconventional zoo charged $200 for five minutes with a baby chimp and $7,000 for a sleepover. It could have been worse for Antle: federal guidelines called for a two-year sentence, but friends and family who testified at the sentencing hearing in his favor seemed to sway Judge Joseph Lawson III toward leniency. Antle will become the second “Tiger King” alumnus to land behind bars after starring in the bizarro drama. Joseph Maldonado-Passage, better known as “Joe Exotic,” was convicted of attempting to hire a hitman to murder his rival Carole Baskin, the third member of the show’s tiger triumvirate. Baskin herself was the subject of intense scrutiny by viewers who speculated that she murdered her first husband, Don Lewis, who disappeared in 1997. Baskin has denied the allegations.
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