40 crocodiles kill 72-year-old reptile farmer in Cambodia

A 72-year-old man was killed by 40 angry crocodiles after he fell into their enclosure while moving one of them out of the cage at his family-owned reptile farm in Siem Reap, a resort town in northwestern Cambodia.

The man was trying to move the crocodile away from where it had laid eggs when it grabbed the stick he was using as a goad and pulled him inside the enclosure.

As he fell, the main group of crocodiles came forth and started tearing his body apart leaving the concrete enclosure at the farm in Siem Reap awash with blood.

Mey Savry, police chief of Siem Reap commune, told AFP: "While he was chasing a crocodile out of an egg-laying cage, the crocodile attacked the stick, causing him to fall into the enclosure."

"Then other crocodiles pounced, attacking him until he was dead," he said, adding that the remains of the man’s body were covered with bite marks.

He said one of the man’s arms was bitten off and swallowed by the crocodiles.

Back in 2018, a two-year-old girl was killed and eaten by crocodiles while she was wandering into her family’s reptile farm in the same village, the police chief said.

There are a number of crocodile farms around Siem Reap, the gateway city to the famed ruins of Angkor Wat.

The reptiles are kept for their eggs, skins and meat as well as the trade in their young.