Daniel Dukes was 27 and had just been released from jail for a minor offense when he either hid in SeaWorld until after hours or sneaked in once it closed. According to Outside Online, what we do know is that at some point he took off almost all his clothes, placed them in a neat pile, and got into the pool with the killer whale Tilikum.
We've probably all had dreams of swimming around with dolphins or whales, seeing them look at us and knowing there was some beautiful bond there, like an aquatic Doctor Dolittle. Or maybe he was just crazy or suicidal. Either way, Dukes looked more like a human-sized squeaky toy to the orca.
When his body was found the next morning, draped across Tilikum's back, it was clear something terrible had happened. His head and body were covered in marks and he had full puncture wounds on his leg. They had to hoist Tilikum onto a medical lift in order to get Dukes off him, and divers actually had to swim to the bottom of the pool to pick up small pieces of his body.
Since there were no cameras, it's impossible to know exactly what happened, but unless hypothermia got him first, it's pretty certain Tilikum held Duke underwater until he drowned. If so, this was the first of Tili's murders, but not the last.
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