‘Tiger King’ Park Is Open, Visitors Not Practicing Social Distancing
After the huge fame from their the Netflix show Tiger King, it’s no surprise that Joe Exotic’s animal park in Oklahoma has reopened. But what might be a bit shocking is how many people swarmed the park and ignored social distancing.
The Daily Mail reports that the park in Wynnewood, Oklahoma was given clearance to reopen as long as both workers and visitors followed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s sanitation and social distancing protocols. However, photos taken by The Daily Mail show nearly all visitors ignoring social distancing guidelines, not wearing masks and crowding together to get a look at the park’s lions and tigers.
Tiger King Park workers also appeared to neglect rules, including head zookeeper Erik Cowie and the zoo’s new owner Jeff Lowe, who both appear in the Netflix series.
In photographs, Cowie appears close to visitors when presenting the animals, while Lowe and his wife Lauren are shown greeting guests as they entered the park.
Meanwhile, Lowe has come out with new details about his acquisition of the park from Exotic, claiming that Exotic convinced him to purchase the park after confiding in him that he was HIV positive. However, The Daily Mail confirmed that Exotic had another autoimmune disease called CVID, which shares a similar genetic code with HIV, but is not transmitted sexually.
Lowe said, “Joe not only told us he was HIV positive on several occasions but told several other people. He used it to his advantage so he could scam something out of them. Netflix wanted you to believe that I stole the zoo from Joe and Joe wants you to believe it as well, [but] he begged me to buy it.”
