Leopard suspected of eating 15 people in Nepal

OK clearly there are other kitties that are doing something useful for the world:

Kathmandu, Nepal (CNN) -- A ferocious leopard may have killed 15 people in Nepal in a 15-month span, its latest victim a 4-year-old boy that the creature dragged away into the jungle to eat. The head of boy was found in the forest a kilometer from his home Saturday morning, said Kamal Prasad Kharel, the police chief of the Baitadi district, an area about 600 kilometers (373 miles) west of Kathmandu.The grisly discovery, which came after teams of people searched for the child, marks the 15th victim in the past 15 months in that remote district in western Nepal. The police chief suspects that a single man-eating leopard is responsible for the deaths. If not, there are at most two of the man-eating creatures around, he believes. Maheshwor Dhakal, an ecologist at the Department of National Parks and Wildlife Conservation in Kathmandu, agreed that it is unusual to find more than one or two man-eating animals in one area. Most leopards live on wild prey. More human victims could also be expected if there were more than one or two man-eaters around, he said,"Since human blood has more salt than animal blood, once wild animals get the taste of salty blood they do not like other animals like deer," Dhakal said. Kharel said he feared the actual number of people killed by the leopard could be higher than 15, because others have lost their life to leopard attacks in Uttarkhand state in northern India, which borders Baitadi district. "It could be the same leopard," he said. The chief district administrator has granted permission for this particular leopard to be killed. Normally, it is illegal to kill wild animals. Leopards are common in the low mountain areas, as compared to the high Himalayas, across the country. While cases of leopards killing domestic animals are common, and there are sometimes instances of leopards killing people in Nepal, this case is "extreme," Dhakal said.