Big cat belonging to ‘Tiger Queen’ shot dead after mauling keeper and escaping

The tiger attacked a 72-year-old man at an enclosure kept by the former tamer Carmen Zander and escaped

Carmen Zander performs with a tiger during the Monte-Carlo International Circus Festival in Monaco on January 23, 2018. Picture: Claude Paris/Getty Images

A tiger on the loose among garden allotments. Panicked residents summoning armed police ill-equipped to deal with a dangerous predator. And, behind it all, Germany’s self-proclaimed “Tiger Queen” and her private menagerie.

In startling scenes in the eastern town of Schkeuditz, near Leipzig airport, the mix proved fatal for a big cat named Sandokan and left a keeper seriously injured.