The fate of a supersized python who turned on its keeper and tried to strangle him to death this week in Newport Kentucky is undecided at the moment.
![Big Bad Snake Busted in Kentucky for Attempted Murder [photo]](http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d7/Python_natalensis_constricts_a_goat%2C_Zimbabwe2.jpg)
Animal Control isn’t sure if the 20-foot long reptile should be put down for the attempted murder of exotic-pet store owner, Terry Wilkins, or returned to him once the man fully recovers from his near-death ordeal.
Wilkins and a female assistant were cleaning the big bad snake’s enclosure when it suddenly lunged at him and, in an apparent feeding frenzy, bit him repeatedly before wrapping itself around his neck and head.
The frantic woman then desperately phoned 911 for help when her own efforts to free the shopkeeper from the python’s murderous grip dismally failed:
“There's a snake wrapped around his neck! Please, the snake's wrapped around his neck!" she can be heard yelling to an emergency dispatcher. “It's wrapped around his neck! His whole face! His face is covered!”
Responding officers managed to pry the snake loose with only minutes to spare, but that battle “was fierce,” Newport’s chief of police, Thomas Collins, told Buzzfeed. “The shop is covered in blood where it was squirting everywhere.”
