A MAN who lived in his own “zoo” of lizards and insects was fatally bitten by a pet black widow spider — then eaten by the other creepy-crawlies.
Police broke in to Mark Voegel’s apartment to find spider Bettina along with 200 others, several snakes, a gecko lizard called Helmut and several thousand termites had gorged on his body.

Neighbours alerted police after becoming alarmed by the stink.

And horrified officers were met by a nightmare scene.

A police spokesman said: “It was like a horror movie. His corpse was over the sofa.

“Giant webs draped him, spiders were all over him. They were coming out of his nose and his mouth.

“There was everything there one could imagine in the world of reptiles.

“Larger pieces of flesh torn off by the lizards were scooped up and taken back to the webs of tarantulas and other bird-eating spiders.”

Loner Voegel, 30, never invited people back to his “jungle” home, a small apartment in the German city of Dortmund.

Police described it as a cross between a botanical garden and the butterfly breeding ground in the serial killer movie The Silence Of The Lambs.

One tarantula had built a nest the size of a swallow’s in a corner of the ceiling.

Voegel also had a boa constrictor and several poisonous frogs from South America.

Spider expert and animal cruelty officer Gabi Bayer said he kept creatures “that should never be allowed in a private home”.

She said: “He had spiders so aggressive they are the equivalent of a pit-bull in the animal world.”

The reptiles were allowed to roam free in the flat.

The heating elements on two tanks containing spiders and their termite snacks had exploded and dislodged the metal tops allowing them to escape.


Voegel is thought to have been dead for between seven and 14 days.

A post-mortem will be carried out in the next few days. But authorities believe Bettina alone was responsible for Voegel’s death.

I smell this year's Darwin Award winner....(an award usually given post-humously)...

What an idiot....

Whoa, must have been quite the struggle to survive everyday.

Oh..my god. Could anyone think of a worse way to die?

Sure, burning to death....

He likely died pretty quick from the poison... It's what happened afterwards thats pretty nasty.....

WOW, that was one Graphic and Detailed description of the scene. My skin is literally crawling off my bones with a chill.

This guy was a complete idiot who's luck had finally ran out. Pet Black Widows and poisonous creatures roaming free around the room, that's brilliant. Another one for the Darwin Awards. A puppy just isn't cool anymore I guess. This guy should have taken notice to Sigfried(sp?) and Roy!

This is pretty bad... but there's worse.

Definite Darwin Award candidate.what a moron.
DE

Now that is some vicious torture! Forget the chair or lethal injection just put terrorist in that room.

Widowmaker poison kills in minutes and seconds. Where's the fun in that?

DE

I'm kinda surprised his body lasted long enough to start stinking. I would have thought with all those hungry creatures around, his body would have been devoured within a week.

Originally posted by DeusEx
Widowmaker poison kills in minutes and seconds. Where's the fun in that?

DE

Not always. It depends on certain variables. People have been known to fall into bushes and get bit multiple times and live. Usually with the mental capacity of a child and some physical disabilities, but they did live. Others, one bite and it's a dirt nap.

Either way, this guy was still a idiot who's days were numbered and who's deadly pets put his nieghbors in mortal danger as well. This guy had some serious problems and poor judgement in his choice of hobbies.

Originally posted by Jonna
Now that is some vicious torture! Forget the chair or lethal injection just put terrorist in that room.

Tell me about it

But....hat guy was moron....I mean why keep a black widdow? Unless you accualy have some reson to keep it, like to milk it for the venom. Same thing goes with the snakes.....I bet he didn't even have a license...to keep all those animals in one appartment.

Why keep one widow is unimportant. Why keep 200...now that's another kettle of fish.

As for the toxin thing, it depends largely on the mass of the person as to how fact the neurotoxin can spread. I was thinking along the average human weight...

DE

I was under the impression that Black Widow venom was usually NOT fatal to humans unless the person is allergic to it, excluding of course small children and the elderly. If I remember correctly, the toxin causes intense muscular contraction for several days, very painful.

The snake is no big thing. They said it was a boa, which is a constrictor and not poisonous. It might bite the hell out of ya, or even squeeze you until your bones crush and you die. But it can't poison you or anything else. Boa's and Pythons are very common pets in fact and even when some escape, it is rare that they cause any harm to anyone as a result.

I can even understand maybe one or two poisonous critters as long as you take extreme care in caging them. Anything more than that is plain carelessness which could result in someone else, most likely a child being killed. This moron could of killed everybody in his building had all those things got loose. Not too cool man!

Geez...that whole story just was creepy as hell. That guy is certainly a Darwin.

Hmm...this smells like BS to me. Widow bites don't kill everyone, usually only the very young or very old. So, the way I see this is that he had to be pretty old, got bit, and decided to sleep it off, only he never woke up... DreamRebel---where did you get this info? Sounds fake, but its still a good read!

Originally posted by dreamrebel

Pet Spider Kills its owner, what a way to go!

I never thought that a spider or a reptile could be a pet. Cats and dogs are enough.

Originally posted by dangermouse
I was under the impression that Black Widow venom was usually NOT fatal to humans unless the person is allergic to it, excluding of course small children and the elderly. If I remember correctly, the toxin causes intense muscular contraction for several days, very painful.

That's presumign the sucker only gets one bite in. Multiple bites ARE fatal. very fatal.

DE