Penguin found dead and two missing at Dortmund zoo

German police investigating death of Humboldt penguin and disappearance of two others a month after sea lion was beaten to death at zoo

Humboldt penguins swim at Dortmund zoo. The mystery over the whereabouts of two of their colony follows the disappearance of five animals in August. Photograph: Ina Fassbender/AFP/Getty

Associated Press in Berlin

Tuesday 1 December 2015 

Police in Germany are investigating potential criminal activity at Dortmund zoo after one penguin was found dead and two others are missing.

Officers are trying to determine if someone had stolen the birds or if they had somehow escaped, Marco Müller, a police spokesman, said on Tuesday. One Humboldt penguin was found dead in the zoo’s flamingo cage on Monday, he said.

“The loss breaks our hearts,” the zoo director, Frank Brandstätter, told reporters, adding that the missing one-year-old birds were born and raised at the zoo.

In November, a 21-year-old sea lion named Holly was found dead in her enclosure at Dortmund zoo with a smashed skull and three teeth missing. And in August, three pygmy marmosets and two acouchi rodents vanished.

Müller said police were investigating whether the incidents were linked. The zoo was adding more security personnel and guard dogs, Brandstätter said.

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