Judge resentences ‘Tiger King’ star Joe Exotic to 21 years in prison

nme.com:

Tiger King‘s Joe Exotic has been resentenced to 21 years in prison despite pleas from the former zookeeper for leniency as he begins treatment for early-stage cancer.On Friday (January 28), a federal judge reduced the 58-year-old’s punishment by just a year. “Please don’t make me die in prison waiting for a chance to be free,” Exotic tearfully told the judge, according to The Hollywood Reporter.Exotic, whose real name is Joseph Maldonado-Passage, was sentenced to 22 years in prison in January 2020 after he was convicted of animal abuse charges and a murder-for-hire plot involving animal welfare activist Carole Baskin.

Both were featured in Netflix’s Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem And Madness.Prosecutors said Exotic offered $10,000 to an undercover FBI agent to kill Baskin during a recorded December 2017 meeting.

In the recording, he told the agent: “Just like follow her into a mall parking lot and just cap her and drive off.” Exotic’s lawyers have said their client wasn’t being serious.Exotic, who maintains his innocence, was also was convicted of killing five tigers, selling tiger cubs and falsifying wildlife records.Baskin and her husband, Howard Baskin, were at the proceedings, and she told the judge she was fearful that Exotic could threaten her. “He continues to harbour intense feelings of ill will toward me,” she said.Baskin said even though Exotic is in prison, she has continued to receive “vile, abusive and threatening communications” over the last two years, and that she believes Exotic poses an even more serious threat to her now that he has a larger group of supporters because of the Netflix show’s popularity.The court proceedings came about after a federal appeals court ruled last year that the prison term Exotic.