Is there a word for "beyond horrifying"?
A recent poaching incident in Zimbabwe so horrifying and so cruel ...
"The game scouts looking for a black rhinoceros wounded by poachers in Zimbabwe’s Save Valley Conservancy could hear her snoring but could not see her through the long grass.
Eventually, by making a lot of noise, they forced the rhino to stand up and were greeted by a sight so appalling that it took them a few moments to realise what they were looking at.
The whole face of the 16-month-old calf had been removed, including her eyes, in an attempt by the poachers to take off her small horns.
The “snoring” was coming through a hole in the nasal bone. She was very weak and lay down again. One of the scouts crept forward and darted her with M99 tranquillising agent, but the dart bounced off her hide and she did not get a full dose.
She was so dehydrated that the wound on her face was not even bleeding. The decision was taken to give her another dose of M99 in the hope that she would succumb. After a short while she died.
A closer inspection revealed a snare wound on her left lower leg and a deep infected cut above it. There were also slashes from a panga on her back.
The nature of the wounds to her face suggested that the poachers had thought the young rhino was dead and proceeded to remove the horns when she suddenly revived. Perhaps that was when they had slashed her with the pangas. In any case, another of Zimbabwe’s black rhinos had fallen victim to poaching."
What punishment could possible fit this senseless crime?
