When Exotic Pets Turn on Owners

In 2021, a 15-year-old girl in North Carolina was hospitalized after her family’s pet serval—a slender, long-legged African wild cat—attacked her during feeding time. The animal lunged at her face, biting and scratching before her father intervened with a broom.

The teen suffered deep lacerations and nerve damage. Officials later confirmed the family had kept the serval illegally. While servals look like oversized housecats, they are anything but tame. The attack renewed calls to ban wild cat ownership in residential neighborhoods.