An Italian poacher illegally hunting boar may have accidentally shot and killed his father after mistaking him for game. The two were poaching boar together in the Postiglione national park.
The 34-year-old man, who has not been identified, said he heard noises and saw a shadow moving in underbrush and took a shot in the dark. The father, who has been identified as Martino Gaudioso, 55, was shot in the abdomen.
The son immediate took his father to a nearby hospital where doctors pronounced him dead. Police are charging the man with “culpable homicide” and have confiscated their rifles.
Hunting boar is illegal in the national park, according to local media.
Italian animal rights activists are calling for harsher punishments for poachers who they say are turning the Italian countryside into a “Wild West.”
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“It is a real national emergency,” said Michela Vittoria Brambilla, according to the BBC.
Last year Italy’s environment minister called to end all hunting in Italy after three others were shot and killed under similar circumstances.