Pro golfer hits balls at hawk until he kills it, then denies he tried to kill it

PGA Tour player Tripp Isenhour got mad a hawk that made noise while he was on a TV show, so he drove closer to the bird in his golf cart and began hitting balls at it. He eventually hit the bird and killed it. He was charged with cruelty to animals and killing a migratory bird.

"I am an animal lover," he said.

After the hawk moved within about 75 yards and perched in a tall pine tree, Isenhour allegedly said: "I'll get him now" and aimed for the hawk.

"About the sixth ball came very near the bird's head, and (Isenhour) was very excited that it was so close," officer Brian Baine of the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, wrote in a report.

According to witnesses, Isenhour hit the hawk a few shots later. The bird, protected as a migratory species, fell to the ground bleeding from both nostrils. "As soon as this happened, I was mortified," Isenhour said in a statement through his management company. "There was neither any malice nor deliberate intent whatsoever to hit or harm the hawk. I was trying to simply scare it into flying away."

Link (Via Arbroath)