Free the Tiger King! Texas-themed video begs Trump to pardon imprisoned Netflix star
With a booming bass line, gorilla claps and a guitar with a Texas-twang, a major motion picture-worthy score announces the video effort to persuade President Donald Trump to grant Joseph Maldonado-Passage, AKA Joe Exotic, the Tiger King, a pardon. A presidential pardon could extricate the Netflix star from his incarceration at FMC Fort Worth, a federal medical prison under siege from the coronavirus infection.
Bedford’s Eric Love, who is featured in the video, is a former lawman turned private investigator and businessman. He asks Trump to grant Maldonado-Passage a full pardon because he is not guilty of the crime of which he was convicted, but he is a victim of swindlers, according to the video which was obtained by TMZ.
In April 2019, Maldonado-Passage was found guilty of trying to hire someone to murder Carole Baskin, a prominent animal rights activist, according to NBC News.
He was convicted and sentenced to 22 years in the Texas prison on two counts of murder-for-hire, eight counts of violating the Lacey Act for falsifying wildlife records, and nine counts of violating the Endangered Species Act for allegedly killing tigers at his Oklahoma zoo.
The video, which was shot and produced in Fort Worth, also features a luxury travel bus, which has a picture of Joe Exotic and a tiger face painted on its side. The pictures frame a plea to President Trump to please pardon the Netflix star, according to reporting from TMZ.
Maldonado-Passage’s legal team is also pursuing a civil lawsuit on claims of false imprisonment, false arrest, discrimination, perjury and entrapment. He is asking for $93,840,000 in relief.
Defendants in Maldonado-Passage’s lawsuit include the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the U.S. Department of the Interior, the assistant U.S. attorney who prosecuted him and several witnesses in the case, including Jeffrey Lowe, who appears in the Netflix documentary series.
Maldonado-Passage claims in his lawsuit that the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service placed tigers on the exotic species list not to protect them, but to target people who use tigers in commercial businesses.
He also says he is being discriminated against because he “is an openly gay male with the largest collection of generic tigers and cross breeds.”
Maldonado-Passage’s legal team is also appealing his conviction, the TMZ video says.
The number of inmates who have tested positive for the coronavirus at FMC Fort Worth, where Maldonado-Passage is being held, has soared in recent weeks. Figures show that 470 inmates at FMC Fort Worth have tested positive for COVID-19, while four have died, according to Bureau of Prison records.
The infection numbers are the third highest in the country among federal prisons, according to government figures.
This story includes information from Star-Telegram archives.
This story was originally published May 8, 2020 at 1:50 PM.
