{"id":39815,"date":"2025-03-17T02:08:00","date_gmt":"2025-03-17T07:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=39815"},"modified":"2025-03-17T03:50:25","modified_gmt":"2025-03-17T08:50:25","slug":"american-influencer-apologizes-for-snatching-australian-baby-wombat-following-outrage","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=39815","title":{"rendered":"American influencer apologizes for snatching Australian baby wombat following outrage"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

MELBOURNE, Australia — An American influencer who sparked outrage after posting a video of her snatching a baby wombat from its mother while in Australia apologized on Saturday, saying she had acted out of concern for the young animal\u2019s welfare.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Australian authorities had threatened Sam Jones<\/a> with deportation after she posted a video on her Instagram account of her running with a wombat joey in her hands from its mother on a roadside at night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI ran, not to rip the joey away from its mother, but from fear she might attack me,\u201d Jones, who also uses the name Samantha Strable, posted on social media.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe snap judgement I made in these moments was never from a place of harm or stealing a joey,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese<\/a> said the video of the young wombat being grabbed was \u201cjust an outrage.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said his department was investigating whether Jones had breached the terms of her visa before she left the country on Friday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere\u2019s never been a better day to be a baby wombat in Australia,\u201d Burke said after she left Australia voluntarily.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Burke said he did not expect Jones would apply for an Australian visa again.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The animal appears to be a common wombat, also known as a bare-nosed wombat. It is a protected marsupial found only in Australia.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Montana-based Jones claimed she became \u201cextremely concerned\u201d when she found the two wombats on a road not moving.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAs wombats are so often hit on Australian roads, I stopped to ensure they got off the road safely and didn\u2019t get hit,\u201d Jones said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cHowever, as is seen from the video, when I walked up to them, the joey did not move or run off. I was concerned it may have been sick or injured, and made a snap judgement to pick up the joey and see if that was the case,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An unidentified man laughs as he films Jones saying: \u201cI caught a baby wombat.\u201d They both note the mother\u2019s sounds of aggression.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Animal welfare experts said Jones could have harmed the joey by dangling it by its two forelegs.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jones said she returned the joey to its mother and ensured they both left the road.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have done a great deal of reflection on this situation and have realized that I did not handle this situation as best as I should have,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI have learned from this situation, and am truly sorry for the distress I have caused,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jones did not immediately respond on Saturday to The Associated Press\u2019s questions, including where and when the baby wombat was captured.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A wombat expert said the video revealed the joey had the skin disease mange and would die without treatment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Jones also did not tell the AP where she was on Saturday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

abcnews<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

MELBOURNE, Australia — An American influencer who sparked outrage after posting a video of her snatching a baby wombat from its mother while in Australia apologized on Saturday, saying she had acted out of concern for the young animal\u2019s welfare. Australian authorities had threatened Sam Jones with deportation after she posted a video on her Instagram account of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":39816,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1154],"tags":[1341,31220,32701],"class_list":["post-39815","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-trending","tag-american","tag-influencer","tag-snatching"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39815","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39815"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39815\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":39817,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39815\/revisions\/39817"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/39816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39815"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39815"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39815"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}