Stephan Miller spent years working with exotic animals before tragedy unfolded at his cousin’s animal training centre
An animal trainer was mauled to death by a grizzly bear he’d raised since childhood in an attempted stunt which went horrifically wrong.
Stephan Miller, 39, was at his cousin’s animal training centre – Randy Miller’s Predators in Action – in the San Bernardino mountains near Los Angeles, the US, when the tragedy unfolded.
He was helping his cousin to film a promo with Rocky, a 7.5ft tall beast weighing around 50 stone, given his experience with bears and show business.
The five-year-old grizzly was trained with humans and had already wrestled with Stephan in the 2008 comedy Semi-Pro, who was a body double for Will Ferrell.
The day of the attack in 2008, the pair of them brought the bear out, and Randy started to film what should have been a playful ad.
However, Rocky then lunged at Stephan’s neck and “caught him off guard”, biting him in a “vulnerable spot”.
Handlers used pepper spray to subdue the bear and managed to get Rocky away in a matter of seconds, while paramedics rushed to the scene. However, they were unable to revive Stephan, who died just minutes after being bitten – leaving behind a wife and two children.
Randy told the Associated Press: “It happened so fast. We did what we had to do to stop the bear. It took a matter of seconds to get him off, but it was too late.”
Randy had been raising exotic animals for over 25 years and built his business on action and staged attacks.
Describing the day of the attack, he told ShareNow.com: “He (Stephan) was bonding with the bear, hanging with the bear, talking to him for the day. He did a photoshoot a few months prior, but hadn’t seen him for a while, so he came up and started bonding with the bear.
“This bear’s real friendly and likes people and loves to play. So Stevie was just getting ready to wrestle the bear. All the protocols were taken, we set the location up based on what we were doing with the bear. The plan was for Stevie to wrestle the bear and set the hotline up to keep the bear contained.”
The bear was apparently acting like it was going to lick or kiss Stephan before randomly lashing out. The state’s Department of Fish and Game and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration subsequently launched an investigation and initially refused to rule on whether the bear should be put down.
Following pressure from animal rights groups, Rocky’s life was spared, and he was moved to an animal sanctuary in California. At the time, San Bernardino Sheriff’s spokeswoman Jodi Miller said the centre had all the relevant permits to carry out such filming.
The facility also housed two brown bears and a black bear, along with various snakes and reptiles, an alligator, crocodile, leopard, mountain lion, four African lions and four tigers.
Hollywood filmmaker Nick Palumbo occasionally visited Stephan and Randy while they working with the grizzly.
He said: “Stephan was my best friend. Anybody who killed him I would want to kill, but I don’t believe the bear meant to hurt him. Stephan loved the bear. He and his cousin raised it.”