Chimps Attack
California — Chimpanzees come across to the public as little darlings, often in diapers and always willing to hold hands. But they’re really aggressors, primate experts say, more than capable of carrying out attacks as violent as one that left a man fighting for his life.
Generally weighing between 120 and 150 pounds with strength much greater than man, chimps in the wild are known to kill chimps from neighboring groups, hunt other primates and even attack humans.
“Male chimps are intensely territorial. They defend their territory against any perceived threat,” said Craig Stanford, a professor at the University of Southern California who studies primate behavior. “Chimps can be violent at times just as humans can be.”
Chimpanzees, with a genetic profile that's 98 percent like ours, can seem like cute, hairy iterations of people. But periodic violent attacks on humans, including one in Havilah, Calif., in 2005 in which a man was maimed by two chimps at an animal sanctuary, are reminders that the animal have at least one big difference: brute strength.
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