Claws are out: 'Lion Man' Craig Busch wants big cats back from Kamo Wildlife Sanctuary

Kamo Wildlife Sanctuary is open to the public but who owns the big cats remains a mystery. Photo /Tania Whyte

Former "Lion Man" Craig Busch has reportedly launched a fundraiser to move his big cats from a Northland sanctuary and take them more than 12,000km away to South Africa.

While the appeal is yet to get anywhere near its $10K goal since commencing in October, it has raised the question of who owns the big cats at Kamo Wildlife Sanctuary.

An investigation by the Northern Advocate set out to uncover who the nine African lions, six Barbary lions - extinct in the wild - two Bengal tigers, the oldest cheetah in the country and New Zealand's only leopard belong to.

Busch's fundraising page lays bare his plans to return the wildlife sanctuary's big cats to his possession "under the South African sun" – the country he now calls home.

He claims the big cats in the Kamo Wildlife Sanctuary are actually in the ownership of the Busch Wildlife Foundation, meaning he still owns them.

Lion Man Craig Busch is claiming the big cats belong to him but their ownership has not been determined as yet. Photo / NZME

On top of this, Busch wrote that sanctuary owners Bolton Equity and park management did not have his permission to open the park and show the cats.

Busch's estranged mother Patricia Cooksley is backing her son, saying Bolton Equities owned the park but was forcing control over the big cats.

She wrote letters to the Ministry of Primary Industries (MPI), Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, Bolton Equities and other related parties that raised the issue of filming rights at the park and ownership of the cats.

Bolton Equities director Laurie Margrain said the company had nothing to say on the matter, other than Cooksley was entitled to her views and the company had spent "a lot" looking after the cats "for years now".

Bolton Equities has pumped around $9m into the lion park since 2014 to bring it up to MPI standards. The revitalised park was opened to the public in December last year.

When the Advocate contacted Big Cats Limited – responsible for the day-to-day operations of the park – the company referred all non-operational matters to Bolton Equities.

Questions emailed to Busch went unanswered and other attempts to reach him in South Africa were unsuccessful.

However, court documents show a two-day hearing to determine the ownership of the big cats was scheduled on February 14 and 15, ten years ago in the High Court at Whangārei.

Although the dates were vacated after Cooksley made an application to file several applications.

In court, Busch argued that he had originally acquired the animals himself and then transferred them to Busch Wildlife Foundation Limited trustees via a sale and purchase agreement dated July 4, 2005.

Therefore, his position was the trust owned the animals.

In the event that the transfer was invalid, his fallback position was that, by default, he must still be the owner of the animals.

One of the issues set to be determined at trial was whether Busch had validly transferred the animals to the trust.

Cooksley claimed the trust was effectively a sham and had never taken possession of the animals. Her lawyer told the High Court she would be able to demonstrate this by pointing to the absence of any documents indicating the trust effectively assumed control of the animals.

She sought discovery of several documents relating to the activities of the trust and its corporate trustee.

The trust deed and agreement for sale and purchase were prepared by the law firm Metro Law.

Patricia Cooksley in 2012 at her Karapiro home says the ownership of the big cats at Kamo Wildlife Sanctuary is undetermined. Photo / NZME

But the court said Busch's lawyer had not personally inspected the files held by Metro Law in order to ascertain whether relevant documents might be on the files.

On March 14, 2012, Justice Graham Lang directed Busch to file and serve a further affidavit no later than April 5, 2012, that listed any relevant documents from the file held by Metro Law related to the operation of the trust and, in particular, to the assumption of control by the trust over the animals.

The High Court last week confirmed the statements of claim and counterclaim were discontinued and the case is closed.

Cooksley said Busch had last week put an injunction on the cats' ownership, and because the issue was undetermined the animals could be owned by her, him or the Busch Wildlife Foundation.

"But definitely not Bolton," she said.

"The cats were originally an asset of Country Development Limited before Craig transferred them to the Busch Wildlife Foundation. There are some grey areas in the way he transferred them."

According to Cooksley, the intellectual property and filming rights of the animals resided with Wildlife Pictures Limited, and she was a director and shareholder.

In her letter to MPI, Cooksley wrote about images and videos of the big cats being used on the Kamo Wildlife Sanctuary Facebook page.

She said Wildlife Pictures had not been approached by any party for the use of any commercial right or interest in the shareholding.

"I request that MPI do not permit this facility to open until cat ownership and other intellectual property and filming rights are resolved."

MPl deputy director-general Vincent Arbuckle said in a reply to Cooksley dated December last year that the ministry's interest in the park was limited to the containment and welfare of the animals.

"MPI does not have a role in any private disputes about the ownership of animals and cannot comment on those points raised in your correspondence. We also hold no information on the photographing or filming of the animals."

Last week, Arbuckle said ownership of animals was not a condition for import but there were requirements placed on importers.

He described how the import permit stated zoo animals may be imported under MPI's import health standard from specified countries.

However, the importer must be a Government-registered/ licensed zoo that was approved to the Environmental Protection Authority's standard for zoo containment as well as MPI's zoo animals transitional facilities standard.