Should a parrot be allowed to be a key witness in a murder trial?
In an ideal world, yes, every murder trial should have a parrot take the stand, if only to inject a little levity into the typically staid proceedings.
But this is not an ideal world, and we probably don’t have nearly enough talking parrots to attend all this country’s murder trials (we have a lot of murders).
However, Bud, the talking African grey parrot from Michigan, could wind up being a key witness in his owner’s murder.
Martin Duram and his wife Glenna were found shot in their home back in May of 2015. Martin passed away, but his wife survived.
No one has been charged with the crime, but family members think the parrot knows who did it. From NBC:
However, family members say they may have a witness to the killing; the couple’s pet parrot. In a video taken several weeks after the murder, the African grey parrot named “Bud,” who is now being cared for by family members, can be heard saying, “Don’t f—ing shoot.”
The bird, they say, can be heard mimicking both Martin and Glenna as if they were arguing.
“I personally think he was there and he remembers it and he was saying it,” Duram’s father, Charles Duram, told woodTV.
They believe Glenna killed her husband, then took her gun to herself, but survived.
Police have not yet asked to interview the parrot.
[VIa NBC]