A troubled teenager who dreamed of becoming a lion tamer was mauled to death in front of horrified zoo-goers after climbing a 20-foot fence to get into the big cats’ enclosure.

Gerson de Melo Machado, 19, snuck into the lionesses’s pen at Brazil’s Parque Zoobotanio Arruda Camara in the city of Joao Pessoa on Sunday, scrambling over a wire-topped fence to climb down a tree inside the lions’ pen, Brazilian outlet O Correio Braziliense reported .

Horrified visitors watched helplessly as lioness Leona ran over to the foot of the tree as Machado slowly climbed down — then suddenly pounced on him, video shared on X shows .

The big cat dragged the teenager behind a wall.

Machado reappeared briefly as he tried to run away, before the lioness leaped on him again.

The teen had been diagno

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